The Wisconsin Farm Bureau Federation’s top policy priorities for 2024 include preserving agricultural land for farm use, boosting financial support for wildlife-related crop damage and expanding rural child care.
More than 230 delegates gathered over the weekend through Monday for the group’s annual meeting in Wisconsin Dells to establish its “policy book” for 2024. Federal policies will be sent to the American Farm Bureau Federation, to be considered next month at its own annual convention.
State bureau members supported enacting Wisconsin law requiring “agricultural impact statements” for constructing solar and wind products. They want all new solar projects to use contaminated “brownfields,” degraded or low-yield land, as well as rooftops and underutilized or marginalized farmland.
They also oppose farmland preservation tax credits being claimed for land being used for solar projects unless as an accessory use of the farm. And members want to make biofuels more accessible statewide, according to the group’s release.
Other state-level policies include initiatives to expand affordable rural child care options, creating and funding a Wisconsin Office of Agricultural Tourism and supporting a voluntary carbon credit market.
Federal priorities included increasing the weight limits for drones — often used by farmers to monitor their crops and livestock — as well as easing requirements for the Farm Service Agency Beginning Farmer Loan program to help more young farmers get started.
WFBF also announced Polk-Burnett Farm Bureau member Brad Olson has been elected as the group’s president. Olson and his wife Vicky farm more than 600 acres of crops in Polk County, according to the release.
The federation is the state’s largest general farm organization, made up of 61 individual county farm bureaus across Wisconsin.
See the policy release: https://www.wisbusiness.com/2023/wisconsin-farm-bureau-delegates-set-policy-for-2024/
See the leadership election release: https://wfbf.com/farm-bureau-news/olson-elected-president-of-wfbf-krentz-re-elected-president-of-rural-mutual-insurance-company/
–By Alex Moe
