There are several farm disaster relief bills in various stages of development on Capitol Hill this week, one being the reauthorization for WHIP+ in 2020 and 2021. Tuesday, the House Agriculture Committee approved that bill and sent it to the full House for consideration.
Earlier this month, we ran a story where House Agriculture Committee Chairman David Scott, a Democrat from Georgia, talked about some of his priorities. And one of those was a disaster aid bill for producers.
Currently, WHIP + covers losses in 2018 and 2019, so the effort is to expand that coverage. The program provides payments to producers to offset losses from hurricanes, wildfires, and other qualifying natural disasters. It covers the losses of crops, trees, bushes and vines that occurred as a result of those disaster events, milk losses due to adverse weather conditions, and losses to on-farm stored commodities.
The bill, approved by a voice vote of the committee, would expand coverage to include the natural disasters in 2020 and 2021.