Western Growers is celebrating a series of hard-fought victories that marked a transformative moment for America’s specialty crop industry.

The Specialty Crop Farm Bill Alliance (SCFBA), co-chaired by Western Growers President and CEO Dave Puglia, first convened in 2022 with a clear mission: to establish farm bill priorities that would bolster the long-term competitiveness of specialty crop growers. Under the strategic leadership of its Steering Committee, the Alliance successfully advanced an ambitious policy agenda, resulting in the introduction of more than a dozen bipartisan marker bills in the House and Senate. These efforts ensured that specialty crop priorities were prominently reflected in legislative proposals from both Agriculture Committees.

The Alliance’s work also helped prompt the Biden Administration to launch the first-ever Marketing Assistance for Specialty Crops (MASC) program, designed to deliver swift relief to growers. In the last two weeks, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) completed its internal review and released an additional $1.3 billion to support specialty crop growers.

Adding to this momentum, President Donald Trump recently signed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA) into law. The sweeping package ensures robust funding for specialty crop initiatives over the next five years, including:

• $100 million per year for the Specialty Crop Block Grant program.
• $175 million per year for the Specialty Crop Research Initiative (SCRI).
• A doubling of funding for the Market Access Program (MAP).
• Full funding for the Technical Assistance for Specialty Crops (TASC) program.
• A permanent exemption to the AGI limitation for Title 1, disaster, and conservation programs, if 75 percent of your income is derived from farming.
• Full funding for the Emergency Citrus Disease Research and Development Trust Fund.
• Increased funding for the Office of Pest Management and the Plant Protection Act Sec. 7721.
• Full funding for the Organic Certification Cost-Share Program and the Specialty Crop Market News.
• Enhancements to the Tree Assistance Program (TAP) and crop insurance programs.

The MASC program and OBBBA represent landmark wins, but important work still remains. Due to Senate rules, the OBBBA did not include several key provisions championed by the SCFBA, including:

• Comprehensive crop insurance reform to provide most of our growers with an effective and affordable safety net for the first time.
• Commonsense procurement reform to ensure that more U.S.-grown fruits and vegetables participate in government programs.
• Affirming the statutory definition of “specialty crops” to protect the integrity of USDA programs our growers rely upon.
• Directing the use of funds allocated by the OBBBA to important priorities such as mechanization research and TASC.
• Making adjustments to USDA programs that affect specialty crops to reflect changed circumstances since the 2018 farm bill was enacted.

These issues are still front and center for Western Growers, and we will continue to advocate aggressively to make sure specialty crop growers have the risk management tools, market access and program support they need to remain competitive.