Farm Bill

The Farm Bill must include a strong rural development title that promotes federal programs designed to help improve the quality of life in rural America. The Farm Bill should contain tools that help electric cooperatives perform some of our most basic functions. First, it must provide financing for the basic electrification that is still essential to keeping the lights on in rural America. Second, the Farm Bill needs to facilitate the innovative work electric cooperatives do to deploy high speed communications technologies, generate and distribute electricity from renewable sources and manage the electric grid more securely and efficiently. The Farm Bill must also suppport the role of many electric cooperatives as important economic development organizations in the communities we serve.