During the week ending June 6, 2025, the House Agriculture Appropriations Committee released their initial markup of the FY 2026 Budget. The markup summary proposes $1.654 billion for the National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA), which is $24.6 million below the FY25 enacted level. By contrast, the President’s Budget proposed over $600 million in cuts to NIFA, including a cut to Smith-Lever 3 (b&c) of $150 million. The proposed House markup cuts break down as approximately $18 million from the Research and Education account, roughly $6 million from the Extension account, and approximately $1 million from the Integrated Account. At this time, it is unclear which line items from the Extension account will see cuts.
Ag Council on Government Affairs Called to Action on SNAP-Ed and RFA Regarding FY2025 Reconciliation, CARET Soon to Receive the Call
During the week ending June 6, 2025, the APLU Agriculture
Council on Government Affairs received a call to action that stated plainly:
Please consider engaging with your Senate offices and
educating agriculture staff, particularly those on the Senate Agriculture
Committee, on the important (the SNAP-Ed and Research Facilities Act) programs
(as appropriate and based on your institution’s participation/needs).
The distributed SNAP-Ed background and talking points, as
distributed by APLU’s Marcus Glassman, were as follows:
- For Chairman Boozman to pull the SNAP-Ed elimination in the Senate reconciliation package he must hear from other Republican senators that they want it saved.
- While we wait to see if the proposed elimination of SNAP-Ed would comply with Senate rules (Byrd), we ask you to weigh in with your Senate offices to educate them about SNAP-Ed and the impact the program has in your state, including:
- How does SNAP-Ed operate in your state—are there state-specific goals, priorities, and programming?
- How many constituents does the program reach?
- How many counties/parishes?
- How many programs/services does the program provide?
- How much money per year comes to your state for SNAP-Ed?
- How many jobs does the program support?
- Signature outcomes/impacts/statistics/partners from your state’s program.
NOTE: Your SNAP-Ed Administrators should have compiled most, if not all, of this information.
SNAP-Ed Ask/Talking points for Senate staff:
- We understand the difficult choices being made right now. However, consideration of the Farm Bill is the best time to weigh the future of nutrition education and how to amplify impact.
- Changes can be made, but it should be a thoughtful conversation and not something that will halt progress just when we need it most.
- In a time when SNAP recipients are going to be asked to do more with less—stretching every dollar is critical and SNAP-ED ensures recipients have access and understanding of how to do that.
- SNAP-ED is not perfect, changes can be made, but SNAP-ED is also successful given it receives only one half of one percent of SNAP funds going to states.
NOTE: While LGUs receive a significant
portion of SNAP-Ed funding, numerous other organizations also receive funding.
Currently, APLU is working with the Association of SNAP Nutrition Education
Administrators (ASNNA) on joint messaging and will share additional talking
points when finalized.
CARET members should receive similar communications in the coming days.
Extension Foundation Announces Appointment of Adam Hughes to Lead National Health and Well-Being Coordination Efforts.
The Extension Foundation is pleased to announce the
appointment of Adam Hughes, MPH, to provide national-level managerial support
for Cooperative Extension’s health and well-being initiatives. In this role,
Hughes will support the implementation of the five high-level recommendations
from Cooperative Extension’s National Framework for Health and Well-Being,
approved by the Extension Committee on Organization and Policy (ECOP) in 2021.
Learn more here.
