Sens. John Boozman (R-AR) and Mike Braun (R-IN) have introduced a Senate version of the Protect Farmers from the SEC Act, which would exempt farmers and ranchers from greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reporting rules proposed by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
The Senate bill is a companion piece of legislation to the House bill introduced by Rep. Frank Lucas (R-OK-03) earlier this year. Lucas introduced the bill in response to the SEC’s announcement of a proposed rule that would require all public companies to disclose GHG emissions from operations a company owns or controls in addition to indirect GHG emissions that occur upstream and downstream in the supply chain.
“The authors of this rule clearly lack an understanding of how agriculture works. The publicly traded corporations overseen by the SEC won’t be the ones tasked with complying with these onerous ‘value chain’ rules,” Boozman said in a statement. “That responsibility would fall on America’s family farmers and ranchers who would be forced to deal with (an) unprecedented amount of unnecessary paperwork. This is the last thing they need to deal with as they struggle in the face of record high input costs, supply chain bottlenecks, labor shortages, drought and other natural disasters.”
The Protect Farmers from the SEC Act is backed by several agriculture organizations, including the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA), which said in a statement the SEC’s proposal would increase the burden on ranchers with onerous regulations.
“NCBA is proud to support the Protect Farmers from the SEC Act because it ensures that federal regulators do not overstep their jurisdiction and it protects cattle producers from additional government red tape,” said NCBA Chief Counsel Mary-Thomas Hart. “We thank Senators Boozman and Braun for their focus on this issue.”
NCBA said while the climate rules are aimed at large corporations, producers could be required to comply with the rules since they are part of the supply chain for public restaurants and retailers. — Charles Wallace, WLJ editor
