Your Farm Bill & You

Several weeks ago, I wrote a call-to-action piece on the 2007 Farm Bill, urging you to write your Members of Congress on the matter. I explained the reasons for my concern on this matter there, and won’t repeat them again here. I included a letter in that piece so that you could forward it under your own name. I made it clear that while I didn’t believe that the letter provided was the best possible tool, it would be better than if your legislators didn’t hear from you at all.

Today, I received an updated letter from the coalition that helps build support at the grass-roots level in my area. While once again it isn’t perfect, it is an improvement over the original epistle. If you failed to take action earlier, but want to do so now, I urge you to forward the new letter to your Members of Congress. Their contact information can be found here.

As I noted previously, this letter is written from the viewpoint of a resident of New Mexico. There are two sections near the end where New Mexico is mentioned. I have put the state’s name in blue. If you do not reside in New Mexico, you should change this specific text to fit your state of citizenship. Otherwise, the letter should be able to stand on its own.

Time is of the essence. If you are going to act, do so today. Thank you.

Dear XXX,

I am writing to let you know that I care about your vote on the upcoming 2007 Farm Bill. I care about your vote because more than 35 million Americans, half of them kids, don't get enough to eat. Yet, kids get the majority of their calories at school, which makes school lunches extremely important to their wellbeing. So what do we feed them? Tater Tots, chicken (parts) nuggets, chocolate milk and canned fruit cocktail. School lunches are the dumping grounds for toxic food, and meanwhile one in two children will have diabetes by the age of 18!

I care about your vote because I worry about the loss of farmland and the fate of family farmers. As one example, in New Mexico over the last five years, over 200,000 acres of farmland and more than 500 farms have been lost! When farmland goes out of production, often the water rights are lost or transferred, which means that piece of land will never go into production again. As local farms disappear, our food security is threatened, especially as energy prices increase and our local production of food is compromised. Throughout the US, there are four times more farmers over the age of 65 than farmers under the age of 35. In northern New Mexico – once again a good example – the average age of farmers is 59 years old. Who will replace this generation of farmers? How can we train new farmers?

I care about your vote because I don't think it is right that our food system is dominated by corporations and commodities. It is crazy that almost 50% of all commodity subsidies went to just 5 percent of eligible farmers in 2005, which marginalized those who were producing locally grown organic food and grass fed meat and dairy products. I care because out of the hundreds of plant and animal species that have been cultivated for human use, the Farm Bill favors just four primary food groups: food grains, feed grains, oilseeds, and upland cotton. While millions of Americans are hungry, most of the subsidized food groups above are either fed to cattle in confinement or processed into oils, flours, starches, sugars or other industrial food additives. Now there's the threat of diverting farms to the production of biofuels, too.

I care about your vote because something is terribly wrong when millions of Americans are obese and the Surgeon General is predicting that this could be the first generation of kids who won't live longer than their parents. It's because the Food Bill favors the mega-production of sugars and starches rather than regional supplies of fresh vegetables, healthful fruits, and nuts. Over the last 15 years, the cost of fresh fruits and vegetables has risen 40%, while the cost of dairy, red meat, chicken, sugar, and fat has fallen 25%. Our populace doesn't have as easy access to food that is good for them, while highly-processed, subsidized food is easily and cheaply available.

Farmland conservation programs need help, too! Conservation bills have been cut by 14% and wildlife incentive programs have been underfunded by 30%. The Conservation Reserve Program helps farmers reduce soil erosion, yet 28 million acres are being removed from the program. Wildlife Habitat Incentives, Wetlands Reserve, Environmental Quality Incentives, Farm and Ranchlands Protection – all these programs need to continue to help farmers promote healthy habitat for animals and plants, reduce air and water pollution, and protect agricultural land from urban sprawl.

I think you'll agree that things are pretty out of whack with our country's Farm Bill. Now is the time to make our food and farm policies more enlightened, which is why I care so much about your vote!

Here are some of the things I'd like to see better funded in the 2007 Farm Bill:

* Increase the funding for the Food Stamp Program so that those below the poverty level can access the more costly fresh fruits and vegetables and have a choice over eating the processed, high fat, low nutritional cheap food now flooding the market.
* Continue and increase the funding for the Farm and Ranchland Protection Program. It will help farmers and ranchers create permanent conservation easements, receive a one-time, up-front payment equal to the fair market value of the development rights and continued use of the land for agricultural purposes.
* Please don't consolidate conservation programs! Each is important and deserves to be adequately funded.
* Provide more support for disadvantaged and limited resource farmers, so that farming is a sustainable lifestyle that others will want to do. In the west, 25% of farmers are minority, yet they get less than 1% of the funding. Be sure that the census accurately counts minority farmers.
* Allow schools to use federal money to have geographic preference to buy food. Right now, federal money doesn't allow us to buy food from New Mexico producers. New Mexico kids should eat New Mexico apples, not those flown in from Washington!
* Provide funding to help us rebuild our agricultural infrastructure. There's been a big push in New Mexico, for example, to grow wheat, but it has to be shipped 300 miles to get it milled in Texas! We need to rebuild our local mills and processing facilities to make it easier to grow and sell local food.
* Don't just subsidize the "big 5" crops (wheat, corn, cotton, rice, and soybeans). Farmers need support to grow fruits and vegetables, and be sure the funding has a geographic preference so it gets to all parts of the country, including New Mexico!

I depend on you to ensure that our food system is sustainable into the future by voting NOT with the farm bloc but for the common person who needs good food, locally available to live a healthy life. This opportunity to change the direction of our food and farm policies only comes once every five years, so please make the most of it. Thank you for your consideration.

John Q. Public
555 Main Street
Anytown NY 55555

4 June 2007