Congress has been active in establishing federal policy for the agricultural sector on an ongoing basis since the 1930s. Over the year s, as economic conditions and technology have evolved, Congress has regularly revisited agricultural policy through periodic farm legislation. Across these decades, the breadth of policy areas addressed through such farm bills has expanded beyond providing support for a limited number of agricultural commodities to include establishing programs and policies that address a broad spectrum of related areas, such as agricultural conservation, credit, rural development, domestic nutrition assistance, trade and international food aid, organic agriculture, forestry, and support for beginning and veteran farmers and ranchers, among others. On June 21, 2018, the House voted 213-211 to approve H.R. 2 , the Agriculture and Nutrition Act of 2018, an omnibus farm bill that would establish farm and food policy for the next five years, covering FY2019-FY2023. The vote to approve H.R. 2 followed a failed vote of 198-213 on the same bill on May 18, 2018. The final passage vote on June 21 followed a vote of 233-191 approving a motion to reconsider, which was made after the unsuccessful vote on final passage of May 18. The Senate passed its version of H.R. 2, the Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018, on June 28, 2018, on a vote of 86-11. Both the House- and Senate-passed versions of H.R. 2 continue the tradition of multi-year farm bills that would establish policy for farm programs and nutrition assistance. To this end, H.R. 2 addresses agriculture and food policy across 11 titles in the House bill and 12 titles in the Senate bill. These titles cover commodity support programs, agricultural conservation, trade and international food aid, domestic nutrition assistance, credit, rural infrastructure and economic development, research and extension, forestry, horticulture, and a variety of other policies and initiatives. The disparity in the number of titles between the two bills reflects the provision of a separate title for energy programs in the Senate bill, whereas the House bill would eliminate what had been a separate energy title in the 2014 farm bill and place these agricultural energy programs within the title on rural infrastructure and economic development. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) issued its scores of H.R. 2 as passed by the House and the Senate on July 24, 2018. CBO projected that spending on mandatory programs in the Senate bill would total $867 billion over the 10-year period FY2019-FY2028 and $865 billion in the House bill. These totals compare with CBO's estimate of the cost of extending the current 2014 farm bill for 10 years of $867 billion. According to CBO, the estimated costs across titles and individual programs frequently differ between the House-passed bill and the Senate-passed bill as well, reflecting the program priorities and policy preferences of each chamber. The Budget Impact section of this report includes a breakdown of these differences in the two bills. Both versions of H.R. 2 would supersede the current slate of farm programs and policies authorized by the 2014 farm bill, P.L. 113-79 , many of which are to expire in 2018 unless Congress acts to reauthorize or extend them. Certain programs, such as crop insurance, are permanently authorized and would continue to operate in the absence of new farm legislation or an extension of the current farm bill. The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) could continue to operate as long as funding is appropriated. But if the current farm law were to expire, many other programs—such as revenue support programs for producers of major agricultural commodities—including corn, wheat, milk, sugar, and others—would be governed by so-called permanent laws, which date from the late 1930s and 1940s and do not expire. These permanent laws, including the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938 (P.L. 75-430) and Agricultural Act of 1949 (P.L. 81-439), rely on supply controls to buttress price support regimes that would raise market prices of these basic farm commodities above existing levels. A change in farm policy along these lines could restrict production and prove to be broadly disruptive for farmers, farm input suppliers, agricultural exporters, food manufacturers, and consumers. Many other programs, such as conservation programs and rural development programs, would cease to function. In the past, when Congress has faced the prospect of expiring farm legislation without enacting successor legislation, it has acted to extend the existing policies, as it did when the 2002 and 2008 acts expired. A change in the current policy environment from the situation that prevailed when the 2014 farm bill was being debated and enacted is the reduced profitability of the U.S. farm economy. The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) forecasts that for 2017 and 2018, net cash farm income—a measure of the profitability of farming—will be about one-third below the high levels reached in 2012 and 2013, when Congress was considering the 2014 farm bill. The decline in net cash farm income over this period reflects declining prices for many commodities. More recently, trade disputes involving major U.S. agricultural export markets—including China, Canada, Mexico, and the EU—has led to imposition of tariffs by these trading partners on a range of U.S. farm product exports. Agricultural exports provide critical support to U.S. commodity prices and farm profitability. The tariffs have coincided with a further decline in prices for some U.S. agricultural products while fostering uncertainty about the near-term prospects for U.S. agricultural exports and, by extension, farm income. This report provides a title-by-title summary of the policies and provisions in the House- and Senate-passed versions of H.R. 2 and compares them with current law. Following an analysis of the budgetary implications of both bills, summaries of some of the changes that the House and Senate bills would make in each of their 11 and 12 titles, respectively, are provided. These summaries are followed by title-specific side-by-side comparison tables that briefly describe the provisions in the House- and Senate-passed versions of H.R. 2 and compare them with the current law or relevant existing policy. A farm bill authorizes funding in two ways. It authorizes and pays for mandatory outlays with multiyear budget estimates when the law is enacted. It also sets the parameters for discretionary programs and authorizes them to receive future appropriations but does not provide funding. Mandatory programs often dominate farm bill policy and the debate over the farm bill budget. The budgetary impact of mandatory spending proposals is measured relative to an assumption that certain programs continue beyond the end of the farm bill. The benchmark is the CBO baseline —a projection at a particular point in time of future federal spending on mandatory programs under current law. The baseline provides funding for reauthorization, reallocation to other programs, or offsets for deficit reduction. In April 2018, CBO released a baseline for farm bill programs with mandatory spending that will be used for the rest of the legislative year. It projects that, if current law were extended, farm bill programs would cost $867 billion over the next 10 years, FY2019-2028, 77% of which is in the nutrition title for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). The remaining $203 billion baseline is for agricultural programs, mostly in crop insurance, farm commodity programs, and conservation. Other titles of the farm bill contribute about 1% of the baseline ( Table 2 , Figure 1 ), some of which are funded primarily with discretionary spending. When a new bill is proposed that would affect mandatory spending, the score (cost impact) is measured in relation to the baseline. Changes that increase spending relative to the baseline have a positive score; those that decrease spending relative to the baseline have a negative score. Budget enforcement uses these baselines and scores and may follow "PayGo" and other budget rules (that in part may require no increase to the federal deficit). Relative to the baseline, CBO released its scores of H.R. 2 as passed by the House and as passed by the Senate ( Table 2 ). The 10-year score of House-passed H.R. 2 is a net reduction of $1.8 billion from the federal budget (-0.21% below the $867 billion baseline). This is the result of a decrease in projected outlays of $1.3 billion and $0.5 billion of new revenue from fees that would be paid by contractors in the SNAP program. On a shorter-time-period basis, the five-year score shows a net increase of $2.2 billion over the $426 billion baseline that is more than offset by net reductions in the second five years of the budget window. The 10-year score of the Senate-passed amendment to H.R. 2 is budget neutral ($0, +0%), with an overall increase in outlays of $68 million (+0.01%) that is offset by a $68 million increase in revenue from fees for an oilheat program. As in the House bill, the five-year score shows a net increase ($1.6 billion) that is offset by net reductions in the second five years of the budget window. The overall relatively small scores (measured in percentage changes) of the bills are the net result of sometimes relatively larger increases and reductions across individual titles ( Table 2 , Figure 2 ). In the House bill, the 10-year score of outlays shows increases for the commodities, trade, research, and miscellaneous titles. These increases are more than offset by net reductions in the nutrition, conservation, energy (rural infrastructure), and crop insurance titles, as well as a revenue provision in the nutrition title. In the Senate bill, the 10-year score shows increases for the trade, energy, horticulture, research, and miscellaneous titles.