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All over the news last week was work that the $700 financial bailout package finally found approval Friday afternoon. After failing to pass Monday in the House, the Senate sweetened the package with several tax extensions, including a handful of energy tax extensions set to expire at the end of this year.
The bailout legislation includes an extension of the biodiesel tax incentive for one year through Dec. 31, 2009, and provisions to shut down the "splash and dash" practice that currently allows foreign-produced fuel to enter the U.S., claim the biodiesel tax incentive and be shipped to a third country for end use.
The tax extension also continues the small biodiesel producer credit of 10 cents/gallon and the $1/gallon production tax credit for diesel fuel created from biomass until December 2009.
The provision would also eliminates allowing second-use biodiesel (which currently receives 50 cents/gal) to receive the same, full $1/gal tax credit as other biodiesel, and eliminates the requirement that renewable diesel must be produced using a thermal depolymerization process. Diesel fuel that is created by co-processing biomass with other feedstocks (e.g., petroleum) would be eligible for the 50 ct/gal tax credit for alternative fuels.
The package would also give pipeline owners the same tax benefits they receive for moving both renewable fuels and petroleum products, a sticking point in getting petroleum companies to come behind the idea of transporting ethanol via pipeline.
Continuing resolution
President George W. Bush signed a continuing resolution (H.R. 2638) last Tuesday that will fund most non-defense aspects of the federal government at fiscal year 2008 levels until March. The new fiscal year for the federal government started Wednesday, Oct. 1 morning.
The CR included a continuation of funding for programs that would have been in an agriculture appropriations bill had one made it through Congress. It also included full funding for the Market Access Program (MAP) at $200 million and the Foreign Market Development program (FMD) at $34.5 million, as authorized by the 2008 Farm Bill.
Passage of the CR will allow Congress to consider leaving session until next year, but was largely overshadowed by continued discussions about financial rescue legislation.
Policy is one of the most important issues facing farmers today, but often the most difficult to digest. Jacqui Fatka has a passion to decode the often difficult world of agricultural policy into terms understandable for today's ag players.
Fatka joined the Farm Progress team as E-Content Editor in August 2003 after graduating from Iowa State University. Prior to full-time employment with Farm Progress, she interned at Wallaces Farmer magazine, Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley's press office and the Iowa Pork Producers Association and freelanced for National Hog Farmer. She also worked as a public relations consultant with Iowa Industries for the Future, an effort to bring together major players in the biorenewables industry.
Currently Fatka is a staff editor at a sister publication, Feedstuffs. For Farm Futures she regularly tells the story of ongoing agricultural policy changes. Her byline can also be found on management profiles.
Fatka grew up on a grain and livestock farm near Atlantic, Iowa. She currently lives in central Ohio with her husband Eric.
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