USDA

The House would be limited to considering eight specified amendments under the terms proposed by the Rules Committee for debate of the CFTC reauthorization bill.

Senators voted, 95-3, to limit debate in the run-up to work on a "minibus" that includes the fiscal 2015 funding for the Agriculture Department.

Prospects for "historically large" world wheat supplies are likely to result in "a challenging situation for U.S. wheat exports and prices later in 2014," say economists Dan O'Brien and Mykel Taylor of Kansas State University.

Landowners enrolled in the Conservation Stewardship Program, which pays farmers to practice soil, water and wildlife conservation as part of their daily operations, will have two months to apply for a renewal of their contract, says a USDA bulletin.

The U.S. House may take up reauthorization of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission this week. It is one of two major bills on the agenda; the other is the Defense Department appropriations bill for fiscal 2015.

First Lady Michelle Obama told a gathering of middle school students at the White House, "I'm going to fight until the bitter end to make sure that every kid in this country continues to have the best nutrition that they can have in our schools."

Despite a late, wet and chilly planting season, the U.S. corn crop is in prime condition. "U.S. crop conditions in the most recent Crop Progress report are the best in four years for the aggregated 18 reported states...

Ethanol makers have enjoyed a run of high profits since March 2013, "driven by a combination of steady or rising ethanol prices and falling corn prices," write economists Scott Irwin and Darrel Good at farmdoc daily.

The House won't vote until next week at the earliest on the headline issues for the Agriculture Department funding bill - a waiver of school lunch reforms for some schools and adding whilte potatoes to the WIC food basket.

The U.S. winter wheat crop will be the smallest in eight years due to drought in the central and southern Plains, the government said, estimating a harvest of 1.38 billion bushels, 2 percent less than it forecast in May and 10 percent smaller than 2013.

Foes hope to shorten the lifetime of the country-of-origin meat labeling law with help of the Agriculture Department funding bill pending in the House.

The U.S. soybean stockpile is expected to shrivel to its smallest size in 10 years - less than a two-week supply - by late summer ahead of a record-large harvest that will saturate supplies and sharply pull down prices for the oilseed, according to trade expectations for the crop report today.

Chinese quarantine officials are barring imports of distillers dried grains from the United States because they may contain a genetically modified organism that is not approved by China, said Reuters.

The House could begin debate this week on the Agriculture Department funding bill for the fiscal year that opens on Oct 1, says Majority Leader Eric Cantor's office.

Participation in food stamps, the major U.S. antihunger program, is down for the fitfth month in a row, say USDA data. Some 46.1 million people received food stamps at latest count, down 3 percent since October.

Hog farmers are obliged to report outbreaks of Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea Virus and work with offiicials to combat the disease and prevent its spread, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced at the World Pork Expo.

Thanks to forecasts of large harvests, global grain supplies will rise again this year, says the UN Food and Agriculture Organization.

Signup will open on Monday for the "continuous" enrollment option for the Conservation Reserve but there will be no general enrollment this year, said an Agriculture Department statement.