The Farm Bill Gets Down On the Farm

by John Fawcett-Long

Very soon a major piece of federal legislation, the 1995 omnibus farm bill, will be under consideration in Congress. The farm bill, renewed only every five years, regulates farm commodity subsidies, food assistance programs, the Organic Foods Production Act, research and education, rural development and conservation programs among others. Through the farm bill, the federal government spends billions of our tax dollars annually toward an agricultural system that is increasingly dominated by larger and larger farms, is consolidated within the input and marketing sectors, and is exploitive of farm and food labor and is harmful to the environment.

Urban input is sorely needed in the debate. Urban members of Congress are under less influence from agribusiness and are more receptive to hearing concerns about creating a just food system.

Agriculture is increasingly centralized and dominated by a few interests. The following statistics from the organization Farm Aid illustrate recent trends in U.S. farming:

• The number of U.S. farms has fallen below two million for the first time since before the Civil War. The number of U.S. farms - 1,925,300 - is the lowest since 1850.
  
• Virtually all of the nation's poultry growers are under contract to a handful of processors.
  
• Every year, 32,500 family farmers are forced from their land due to financial difficulties, or 600 farm families per week.
  
• USDA reports show that the index of prices received by farmers from 1982 to 1993 rose only 7.5 percent while input costs rose over 23 percent. In effect, federal farm policies have subsidized our nation's equipment, seed, fertilizer, pesticide and herbicide dealers."
  
• "Nationwide, 90 percent of all farm operator households rely on off-farm sources to supplement their farm income.

Over the course of this century, farmers have steadily lost their share of the American consumer's dollar. In 1910, the farmer received 21 cents for every dollar spent on food. Today, it is closer to five cents. Much of the difference has gone to the people who sell the inputs, such as fertilizer and pesticides, or to marketers.

The marketing and input sectors in agriculture are heavily concentrated, bordering on monopolies. According to Marty Strange, author of Family Farming: A New Economic Vision, (recommended reading) a few companies in the U.S. are responsible for the major agricultural input industries of fertilizer, seed and machinery. For example, two companies dominate the market for hybrid seen corn (hybrids cannot reproduce, requiring farmers to buy new seeds every year.) Four companies sold 87 percent of the herbicides used on corn. Farm equipment sales are likewise dominated by a mere four companies.

Our present way of farming encourages overproduction. Farm subsidies push farmers to grow more crops on less land, not to practice good stewardship of the land, which requires crop rotation. Farm exports generate trade revenues, but they also hurt farmers in other countries who cannot compete with U.S. subsidies and industrial agriculture. Meanwhile, the decline of small-scale farms in the U.S. spells the demise of rural economic vitality. Our richest agricultural counties also harbor our nation's poorest communities.

Our food policy is buttressed by access to limitless, cheap fossil fuels. A study by the CIA shows that food travels an average 1,400 miles before it is consumed. The CIA considers this a national security vulnerability: our food supply lines could be cut. But this practice also fosters energy dependence. Cheap fuel makes it more profitable to ship lettuce from the Imperial Valley on the Mexican border than to pay farm workers a decent wage if they work close to where the food is consumed.

These trends in agriculture are not inevitable. Citizens should determine the shape and purpose of their food system. Family farmers, consumers and environmentalists cannot match agribusiness lobbyist resources, but having a unified voice with sufficient numbers will make a difference.

A national initiative called the Campaign for Sustainable Agriculture calls for innovative programs in the farm bill designed to preserve family farms, protect the environment and promote a just food system. The Campaign is working for a system of agriculture that is economically prosperous for family farms, supportive of viable rural communities, and environmentally sound.

The campaign's priorities were selected after a three-year consensus-building effort that encouraged broad popular participation to define national agriculture policy options. The Campaign is a nationwide network of over 500 diverse organizations including farmer, environmental, consumer, farm worker, animal rights, religious, urban gardening and social justice organizations. As of this writing, 14 organizations from the Puget Sound region have become involved. The campaign's goals include:

• Reforming farm programs to foster family farms and environmental stewardship.
  
• Strengthening conservation programs.
  
• Redirecting research and extension programs to promote sustainable farming systems.
  
• Promoting access to farm ownership for minority and beginning farmers.
  
• Improving conditions and fair pay for farm workers.
  
• Establishing humane farm animal husbandry as a key criterion of sustainable agriculture.
  
• Strengthening rural communities, and supporting new cooperative, local marketing, and new processing endeavors.
  
• Providing a safe and abundant food supply.

Legislative proposals for each of these issues have been drafted by groups involved in the Campaign. Other issues with a direct impact on urbanites include: provisions for preserving agricultural land, reducing pesticide use, food labeling (genetically-engineered foods, BGH, country of origin) and funding urban agricultural initiatives (metropolitan food system planning, community gardening, farmers markets and studying the use of locally grown fruits and vegetables).

The most fundamental programs within the farm bill are the commodity subsidies, amounting to $10 billion annually in direct payments to farmers. Seventy-three percent of commodity subsidies went to the largest 15 percent of the farmers. The Federal farm commodity programs reward farmers according to their size of operation and volume of production, in effect subsidizing large farms to expand and bid land away from moderate sized and beginning farmers. The commodity subsidies reward production, not environmental stewardship. In many instances, commodity programs actually penalize stewardship by reducing payments to farmers who practice crop rotation. In addition, low farm prices have depressed family farm income, forcing farmers out of business. To address surpluses, U.S. agriculture has become export-oriented, often damaging poor regions' food economies and their ability to reach food self-sufficiency.

Another problem is that many recipients of farm subsidies are not even farmers. According to a report released last month by Kenneth Cook, a Washington, D. C. agricultural analyst who operates the Environmental Working Group, urban farmers in Beverly Hills with the 90210 zip code received USDA subsidy checks totaling $1.2 million. The report, dubbed "City Slickers," also revealed that ABC News anchor Sam Donaldson, owner of a sheep and angora ranch in New Mexico, has received $97,000 in wool and mohair subsidy payments over the last two years. Donaldson lives in McLean, Virginia just outside Washington, D.C.

In regard to the subsidy programs, the Campaign offers the following solutions. First, increase net family farm income and enhance price stability by raising commodity loan rates. Second, close the loopholes and phase-out payments to high-income, non-farmers who invest or dabble in agriculture. Third, replace the existing annual set-aside program (where farmers are paid not to grow crops on portions of their farms) with an Environmental Reserve Program, in which farmers are paid to reduce production in ways that benefit the environment for terms of one to five years. And fourth, create a Stewardship Payment Program offering incentives to farmers to implement whole farm resource protection plans that address multiple resource issues.

The 1990 Budget Act typically cut support to moderate-sized farms by 20 percent through a failure to reduce subsidy payments to the largest farms. Our proposals, however, could be funded with savings from reduced payments to large farms and by consolidating existing conservation programs.

Senator Richard Lugar (R-IN) chairs the Senate Agriculture Committee. He has proposed a 5-year $15 billion cut in farm program spending by weaning farmers off their expensive dependence on commodity loans (the main form of farm aid.) Payments for crops would be ratcheted down to the lower "free market" price for crops. However, if Lugar really wants to "cut the pork," why not close all the loopholes that let big producers rake off most of the payments for a program designed to help smaller farmers? Lugar says nothing about that, nor does he acknowledge that decades of federal aid to big producers has created an industrial style of farming that guarantees even further consolidation of agriculture if supports are now withdrawn. Lugar is also conspicuously silent on the Conservation Reserve Program, the largest conservation program in the farm bill.

The farm bill is likely to be debated in earnest after the April Congressional recess. Contact members of Congress. Urge them to support the goals for the Campaign for Sustainable Agriculture and ask them to mention the Campaign's goals to agriculture committee members as well.