ASI President from Wyoming says New Farm Bill Top Priority for 2025

January 16, 2025

This week, Scottsdale, Arizona is once again hosting the American Sheep Industry Association Annual Convention.

ASI president and Wyoming rancher Brad Boner says like other industry organizations passing a new farm bill this year is critically important.

"Well, it's always been an important piece of what we do," said Boner. "For the wool manufacturers and apparel, the Wool Trust Fund is an orphan program in the farm bill and a major funding source for ASI. That's always important. Plus, a lot of our ag initiatives like disaster payments is also important. So, the farm Bill is a really big piece of what we all look forward to."

He says like others, ASI is concerned with President-Elect Trump's threat of tariffs on imports and possible retaliation. However, they're looking forward to working with the new administration on rolling back burdensome regulations that have impacted farmers and ranchers.

"The past administration, especially in the last couple of years, was real aggressive on federal lands issues and some of the things they were doing there, really didn't work with agriculture at all," said Boner. "So it'll be helpful to get a a little different take and maybe someone a little more ag friendly in there and someone that maybe isn't so willing to have a government overreach taking place at the drop of a pen. We're looking forward to that."

He's also hoping for better lamb and wool markets here in 2025.

"The consumer on the on both the lamb and wool side has been really pulling in their horns and not spending as much money because like it or not, I think we were in a recession," said Boner. "I think we all believe for the last 2 or 3 years, the consumer was just spending their money more conservatively than they had in the past. So, I think we're seeing a little bit more starting to come out of that a little bit and look forward to to better times ahead."

For more information about what the ASI is working on on behalf of U.S. sheep producers, you can just visit www.sheep usa.org.

Source: Western Ag Network