This report is a guide to one of the regular appropriations bills that Congress considers each year. It is designed to supplement the information provided by the House and Senate Appropriations Subcommittees on Agriculture. It summarizes the status of the bill, its scope, major issues, funding levels, and related congressional activity, and is updated as events warrant. The report lists the key CRS staff relevant to the issues covered and related CRS products.

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This report provides information about the Labor Rights Issues for DR-CAFTA. Congress had linked labor protections to trade promotion vehicles for at least two decades with purposes in mind.

Trade agreements such asthe NAFTA and the GATT Uruguay Round agreements have been approved by majority vote of each House of Congress rather than by twothirds vote of the Senate — that is, they have been treated as congressional-executive agreements rather than astreaties. The congressional-executive agreement has been the vehicle for implementingCongress' long-standing policy ofseeking trade benefitsfor the United States through reciprocal trade negotiations. In a succession of statutes, Congress has authorized the President to negotiate and enter into tariff and nontariff barrier (NTB) agreements for limited periods, while mandating that NTB and free trade area agreements negotiated under this authority could enter into force for the United States only if approved by both Houses in a bill enacted into public law and other statutory conditions were met.

This report identifies selected websites for maps of Iraq, including government, library, and organizational websites. Maps of the Middle East, Iraq, facilities used by U.S. forces in the Gulf, and U.S. government humanitarian assistance and reconstruction activities in Iraq are also provided.

This report discusses the reintroduction of the 30-year bond that could reduce government borrowing costs.

This report provides Background and Legislative Issues about Export-Import Bank. The Export-Import Bank is a U.S chief government agency which finance American exports.

This report provides an overview of The Middle East Partnership Initiative (MEPI) program, its perception in the Middle East, and its role in the debate over U.S. efforts to promote democracy in the Arab world.

This report provides an overview about the Objectives, Options, and Outlook on Importing Prescription Drugs.it also examines the issues,spells out how they are treated from bill to bill, and refer to alternatives to important to ease the burden of prescription drug.

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This report discusses Azerbaijan's democratization progress as evidenced by its 2005 legislative election.

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This report provides information about the Major Policy Issues and Status of Negotiations on the Free Trade Area of the Americas. The FTAA began as a commitment by 34 countries to consider a comprehensive trade agreement.

The question of whether to permanently repeal the federal estate tax or to reform it remains a topic of congressional interest.This report presents a variety of data measuring the payment of estate and gift taxes to help inform the debate.

Since congressional passage of Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) in August 2002 (P.L. 107-210), the U.S.-Chile free trade agreement (FTA) has been implemented and negotiations were concluded on the Dominican Republic-Central America-United States Free Trade Agreement (DR-CAFTA). Implementing legislation may be introduced in the first session of the 109th Congress. Other important U.S.-Latin America trade initiatives include FTA negotiations with three Andean countries and Panama, and the ongoing but slowed talks on the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA). Congress defined trade negotiation objectives in TPA and trade agreements are enacted only after Congress passes implementing legislation. This report supports the congressional role in trade policy by providing an analytical overview of U.S.-Latin American trade data and trends.

This report briefly examines Senate Rule XXV and party conference rules that address committee assignments. It includes a table for A, B, and C committees with an overview of limitations and procedures.

This report examines P.L. 109-92 (2005), which passed the Senate and the House as S. 397, 109th Congress and was signed by the President on October 26, 2005

The Cobell v. Norton litigation has been before the courts since 1996. Cobell is a class action lawsuit alleging federal government mismanagement of accounts held in trust for individual Indians. To date the litigation has not been able to secure from the Department of the Interior sufficient data in the form of an historical accounting to determine the accuracy of the payments to individual account holders. Although a full historical accounting is unlikely to be judicially required, the prospect that pursuit of an accounting through litigation will be costly, protracted, and elusive has resulted in the introduction of S. 1439/H.R. 4322 and a concerted effort by Indian representatives to develop principles for a legislative settlement. This report provides an overview of the development of a legislative solution.

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This report evaluates multiple studies, whose assessments of NAFTA, by and large, are analytical in nature, use established methodologies, caveat their own work to reflect limitations of the research, and draw on academic rather than special interest research.

This report gives an overview of Dairy policy issues and the contents include Dairy forward pricing pilot program, Milk Income Loss Contract (MILC) payments, Milk protein concentrate trade issues, and dairy price support program