Specialty Crops Competition Act of 2006
Latest action. Read twice and referred to the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry.
Specialty Crops Competition Act of 2006 - Defines "specialty crop" as each U.S. agricultural crop other than wheat, feed grains, oilseeds, cotton, rice, peanuts, sugar, dry peas, lentils, chickpeas, and tobacco.
Amends the Agricultural Adjustment Act to provide for marketing order specialty crop food safety programs.
Amends the Farm Security and Rural Investment Act of 2002 to: (1) increase assistance for the tree assistance program; (2) provide for increased fruit, vegetable, and specialty crop purchases; and (3) increase and extend specialty crop technical assistance.
Obligates funds for fruit and vegetable marketing news activities.
Amends the Consolidated Farm and Rural Development Act to obligate funds for specialty crop operating loans.
Provides for: (1) the study of the extent to which U.S. specialty crops have or have not benefited from any reductions of foreign trade barriers; and (2) a foreign market access strategy plan based on such study.
Establishes a division in the Department of Agriculture to process petitions for reducing sanitary and phytosanitary export barriers and an office to develop and protect intellectual property rights in plants and plant materials.
Amends Federal patent law to define "essentially derived plant."
Provides for: (1) a national specialty crops development initiative grants program; (2) research on mechanized harvesting and new production and processing methods; and (3) a national clean plant network.
Establishes the Invasive Pest and Disease Response Fund in the Treasury to support emergency eradication and research activities.
Provides for independent scientific advice and peer review with regard to specialty crop import and export requests.
Authorizes food safety initiatives.
Amends the Food Security Act of 1985 to remove the income limitation from the environmental quality incentives program.
Addresses the development of voluntary sustainable practices guidelines for producers and processors of specialty crops.
Written by analysts at the Congressional Research Service and published on Congress.gov, not by Civibrief. Summarized at the "Introduced in Senate" stage on March 31, 2006. It describes the bill, it is not the legal text.
Where is it in the process, and what happens next?
4 steps remain before this bill could become law.
The record's latest action, on March 31, 2006: Read twice and referred to the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry.
- Clearing the committees it was referred to, and being scheduled for a floor vote
- Passage by the Senate
- Passage by the House
- The President's signature. If the President vetoes it, two-thirds of both chambers must vote to override.
How likely is it to become law?
Civibrief does not forecast outcomes and this page has no opinion about this one. What the record supports is a base rate, which is a fact about the whole pile, not a prediction about this measure.
In the 109th Congress (2005-06), 482 of the 10,701 bills and joint resolutions introduced became law, about 4.5 percent. That count covers every measure at every stage, including the many that never left committee.
This one is not there yet: 4 steps are still outstanding, listed above.
Has anyone actually voted on it?
No. No roll call in this Congress cites this measure. That is the ordinary outcome: most measures never reach a recorded floor vote, and a committee ends most of them simply by not acting.
A vote is not the only thing that happens to a measure. Hearings, markups, and referrals are all recorded actions, and none of them is a vote of the full chamber.
Who is behind it?
LARRY CRAIG (R-ID) introduced it on March 31, 2006, and 10 members have since signed on as cosponsors.
They come from both major parties: 5 Democrats, 5 Republicans.
Cosponsoring is a formal signature on the text. It is not a commitment to vote for the measure, it does not bind anyone's party, and a long list of cosponsors is a measure of attention rather than of prospects.
How long has it been in play?
It was introduced on March 31, 2006, 7515 days ago. The most recent recorded action was 7515 days ago, on March 31, 2006.
Measures do not carry over. Anything the 109th Congress has not finished by January 3, 2007 dies when the term ends, and has to be introduced again from the start in the next Congress.
Every answer above is assembled from this measure's own record on Congress.gov and from published counts of what Congress has passed before. Civibrief does not predict outcomes and takes no position on any measure.
Vote history
- SenateIn committee, no floor vote yet
- HouseAwaits Senate passage
- PresidentAwaits both chambers