How the Farm Bill Affects More Than Just Farms
The stealthy farm bill has fooled Americans for years into thinking it only affects people who wear overalls to work.
By Laura Sahramaa, Center for American Progress
Tuesday July 17, 2007
Sure, the Farm Bill has a lot to do with farms. But its influence goes far beyond agricultural policy. The bill affects public health, by shaping what Americans eat; the environment, by determining what land gets conserved and how much alternative energies are promoted; and global poverty, by playing a large part in setting U.S. crop prices.
Congress is rewriting the act this week, which gets reauthorized every five years and is up for renewal again this September. Take a look at the following diagram to see why the Farm Bill affects you as much as government policies on war or taxes.
To view the diagram, click the image below and it will open in a new window. Click and drag to move the diagram.
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I’ve been following this story for a while, lots of info on agricultural subsidies here:
— Speedmaster - Jul 18, 04:47 PM - #http://amateureconblog.blogspot.com/search/label/agriculture
conservative economists have been complaining about handouts to farmers for a long time
— kevin - Jul 18, 05:51 PM - #Is free trade the answer to global poverty? What specific policy changes are you advocating?
— Sally Jo Sorensen - Jul 18, 05:59 PM - #Specific policy change:
Get rid of subsidies to huge agribusiness.
These subsidies drive down prices and encourage overproduction. Farmers in other countries who may have a comparative advantage in growing rice, cotton, or sugar cane are at a huge disadvantage even in their local community where american farm products get dumped.
— Kevin - Jul 19, 08:31 AM - #This diagram is a great resource! I really like it. But… now that you’ve laid out some of the pros and cons of the bill, what can we do about it?
— Sarah - Jul 19, 09:18 AM - #I hear very little in these discussions re. ethanol and biofuels about the bullying that is taking place by Montsanto and others to inflict GM crops on us. People do not realize that soon we will not be able to grow organic corn or soy or canolla in this country. And no serious research is being done on the health impacts of eating GM food.
— sharon genasci - Jul 19, 12:40 PM - #Is it really in the best interest of the United States to change a business model that has been very successful for us in order to help small farmers in other countries? If surplus American grain is more cheaply available than local products, people have the opportunity to feed themselves for less if they choose to do so. Soy and cereal grain products are profitable because they can be shipped and have a long shelf life- In comparison, the lettuce or apples you buy ay the supermarket go bad fairly quickly. While grain and pulses can be sold profitably around the world, seasonal vegetables are a far more limited product. Nevertheless, a bag of beans or a can of carrots costs less than a box of twinkies. Don’t blame a bill for people’s bad personal choices.
— Nicole - Jul 23, 08:31 AM - #A few notes:
- Without the subsidies, it seems unlikely that US crops can compete because of the higher cost of US business, including higher equilibrium wages, environmental regulations, etc. If a “fair trade” agreement were put into place so as to increase the cost paid for crops from the developing nation, it would probably have a similar effect.
It should be noted, however, that subsidies like this are used by many US exporting industries to supposedly keep American jobs and increase domestic employment and net exports. It seems that farm subsidies get a lot of opposition on this note, but not other subsidies. Also, it should not be omitted that other countries (China) use subsidies to protect their own industries.
- In any case, the price of corn in Mexico isn’t dropping or going to drop in the forseeable future because of the Tortilla Price Stabilization Pact that subsidizes Mexican corn producers and controls tortilla prices. However, if Mexico were operating in a free market environment, that effect sounds plausible.
- It is an excellent point that the Farm Bill only grants subsudies to farmers who grow certain crops; others, such as ranchers, are virtually ignored.
- It seems that the diagram suggests that a major price differential between grains and fresh fruits/vegetables is a consequence of the farm bill. As it is, Americans pay close to the world price for fruits and vegetables; in other words, a lot of the fruits and vegetables we eat are imported because other countries can produce them more cheaply than the US. If the price of fruits and vegetables is expensive, it’s because that’s the world price, not because we aren’t subsidizing them. Subsidizing fruits and vegetable producers in the US would probably shift more domestic fruit/vegetable production but only affect price as a secondary effect.
- If we were paying the world price for both grain products and fruits/vegetables, the price differential would probably less significant, which would probably mean the price for both would be a bit higher. That would probably mean that rather than making poor nutritional choices, the poorest people would be going with less food altogether, which is a central argument defending farm subsidies that wasn’t mentioned. Just something to think about. In any case, better nutritional/health education is essential.
— David - Jul 23, 05:08 PM - #Thanks for all the great comments.
A lot of your questions are addressed in this great piece the Center for American Progress’s Director of Policy for Agriculture, Trade & Energy, Jake Caldwell, wrote last week on the Farm Bill markup. He talks about what Congress should do with the Farm Bill on this go-round in order to help farmers, improve U.S. energy security, combat global warming, and help reduce global poverty — read it here.
If you’re particularly interested in the Farm Bill’s impact on alternative energy research and production, you should check out the CAP report “Fueling a New Farm Economy,” on creating incentives for biofuels in agriculture and trade policy.
As for what you can do: because the Farm Bill is entirely in Congress’s hands, the most powerful tool you have to influence what happens with it is your voice as a voter.
Call, email, or even make a friendly in-person visit to your member of Congress and let them know that they have a chance to expand the benefits of our agriculture policy to more farmers; promote clean, renewable energy produced in a sustainable manner; and create fair and open markets for U.S. products at home and abroad — and they should take it. You can find all the contact information for your members of Congress here.
Also, it never hurts to tell your friends and family about the Farm Bill’s importance and why we should all be paying more attention to it.
— Laura Sahramaa - Jul 24, 10:01 AM - #Man, all my pretty HTML links did not translate! Sad. Here are those links:
Jake Caldwell’s piece:
http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2007/07/farm_bill.html
CAP report on the Farm Bill:
http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2007/01/pdf/farm_economy.pdf
How to contact your member of Congress:
— Laura Sahramaa - Jul 24, 10:03 AM - #http://www.congress.org/congressorg/home/
The 2007 Farm Bill means everything to anyone who eats, not just the farmers. As a child, I attended public schools in Jacksonville, Florida and regularly ate school lunches. Year after year, the schools’ cafeterias served the same things – pizza, chicken nuggets, french fries, and tater tots. Fruits and vegetables were a rare sight in the lunch line and they were always from a can. Why have our public school kids been eating this junk for years? Our currently dysfunctional Farm Bill has everything to do with it and unless change is made, kids (especially from lower income families) will continue to eat poorly at school. We need healthy food for a healthy future. Check out www.healthyfarmbill.org if you want Congress to make change.
— Rachel Bonfanti - Jul 25, 10:55 AM - #I’m not sure that cafeterias serve pizza, chicken nuggets, french fries, and tater tots solely (or even mainly) because of farm policy. Note that french fries and tater tots are made from potatoes (vegetables) – it’s the food service that decides to serve them that way rather than baked/mashed/whatever. Regardless, it is probably true that nutritional standards in local schools are below where they should be. This is not the purpose of farm policy, though. Without changing nutritional standards, I am not convinced a change in farm policy would result in healthier food appearing in cafeterias.
— Adam - Jul 25, 01:45 PM - #