SALEM — Oregon could soon celebrate its inaugural Farmer and Rancher Day, but only if state lawmakers in the Senate get a move on.

The House has already approved House Bill 3141, which would annually honor the state’s crop and livestock producers on the third Tuesday of March — a designation that in 2025 would fall on March 18 .

“Farming and ranching are not just jobs, rather lifestyles that require resilience, knowledge and an unwavering commitment to the land and animals,” said Rep. Vikki Breese Iverson, R-Prineville, the proposal’s chief sponsor.

After passing the House on March 11 by a margin of 57-1, HB 3141 was referred to the Senate, where it’s scheduled for a first reading on March 13. It’ll then be referred to a policy committee for review, which must recommend the bill for a vote on the Senate floor.

The proposal includes an emergency clause, which means it’ll be effective upon passage, so it’s technically possible for the designation to be commemorated this year.

If there’s not enough time for HB 3141 to prevail in the Senate and be signed by Gov. Tina Kotek by March 18, the first Oregon Farmer and Rancher Day will take place on March 17, 2026 — coinciding with St. Patrick’s Day.

The designation was originally proposed for Oct. 12 of each year, which would have given lawmakers more leeway time-wise, but it was changed because the original date would have fallen on Columbus Day or Indigenous People’s Day in some years.

Breese Iverson said that Farmers and Ranchers Day is meant to recognize the sacrifices and hard work of families who are the “heart and soul of agriculture in Oregon” but who “often go unnoticed.”

The revised timing of the designation also allows it to align with National Ag Day, which will help promote agriculture and raise awareness of the challenges faced by the industry, including water scarcity, market fluctuations and climate change, Breese Iverson said.

The sole lawmaker in the House to vote against HB 3141 was Rep. Jami Cate, R-Lebanon, who with her family raises grass seed and runs a seed cleaning facility in Linn County.

Cate said she generally opposes such designations because there are so many that “adding more just further exacerbates that there is no real significance or benefit to what they claim to celebrate.”

In regard to this particular bill, lawmakers can claim they support agriculture by creating the Oregon Farmers and Ranchers Day even though they continue to make “countless policy decisions” that harms the ability of farmers and ranchers to survive, she said.

“I would rather Legislators actually have to pass something to offer real benefit to the industry in order to get to claim they’ve supported us, versus offering empty platitudes,” Cate said in an email.

Similarly, she voted against designating the potato as Oregon’s official state vegetable in 2023, saying the light-hearted resolution didn’t offset the mounting regulatory burdens that lawmakers have imposed on farmers.

“If we are really serious about wanting to promote agriculture, we should stop passing bills that restrict and put barriers on agriculture,” Cate said at the time.