DAVENPORT, Iowa — Editor's Note: The video attached originally aired on Sept. 21.
A federal farm bill that helps provide food assistance programs for families, crop insurance, and more is expiring Saturday, Sept. 30 and Congress still needs to figure out how much to spend on a new bill or file an extension.
The farm bill was signed into law in 2018 by former President Donald Trump. It's a package of legislation passed roughly every five years.
News 8's Charles Hart spoke with Davenport farmer Robb Ewoldt who said he needs the crop insurance.
"That's the number one thing that it's one where we pay a premium, but the premium is subsidized a little bit," Ewoldt said. "But it gives us protection to market our crop that we haven't grown yet."
An estimate (Note: link is from the U.S. Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry) from the Congressional Budget Office predicted even without any changes from 2018, a new farm bill could top $1 trillion in spending for the first time ever.
"It's a big advantage to farmers to carry this crop insurance and make sure that we're in business the next year, if we have a disaster one year, we can stay in business next year to still keep producing food for the country," Ewoldt said.
"Normally, they just extend the current farm bill. (It's) what we've seen in the past and I don't see why it would be anything different," Ewoldt said. "So that's what I would hope for so they can keep our government offices open, that farmers go into during the fall."
Ewoldt says it's important to have this partnership between farmers and legislators for more food security in our country.