The Farm Bill Again? Already?

by: Jill Richardson

Fri Dec 18, 2009 at 16:21:23 PM PST

"We will probably have all of the different interest groups come in and tell us what is working well and what isn't and to start formulating their ideas about what they think we should be doing in 2012. My intention is to write a baseline bill and not seek extra money. That way we can deal with this in the Agriculture Committee and not get drug into other committees like we did last time."

Perhaps most interesting in the interview were Peterson's comments on subsidies. It sounds like he wants to get rid of the current system entirely and replace it with a subsidy program "based on whole farm revenue, coupled with crop insurance." As for whether the ag lobby will actually go for such an idea, he predicts resistance, particularly from cotton, rice, and peanuts. Since Blanche Lincoln, current chair of the Senate Ag Committee represents cotton and rice interests, this could get VERY interesting (unless she loses her Senate seat in the 2010 election).

Whether this is good or bad for sustainable ag and our food system as a whole, I can't say. I'm no agricultural economist and I look forward to hearing the experts' analysis of this idea, when they are available. However, I will say that in general I tend to disagree with Collin Peterson on nearly EVERYTHING so if he likes it, I probably won't.

Peterson said a lot more, none of which was unpredictable. He against any climate change legislation or treaty that affects ag. He also calls the "food vs. fuel" issue created by the use of food crops in ethanol "a phony issue." Most interesting there is his admission that the artificially low corn prices in the U.S. are an indirect subsidy to factory farms. He says:

The livestock industry likes $1.80 corn and they built an industry based on $1.80 corn which was never realistic because it was subsidized and they got cheap feed. And now when they have to pay the actual value, the model doesn't work so well. So they try to lower the cost at anyone else's expense. I have told them that we are not going back to the day when we are going to subsidize the livestock industry through a crop subsidy program, or the export markets through a crop subsidy program. We need to get to as much of a market-based situation as we can and you need $3.50-4.00 to grow corn. And the more environmental regulations they put on us and all of this other stuff, the more it's going to cost. The livestock people need to get used to it and people are going to have to pay more for meat. That's where this is headed.

He stopped short of calling organics stupid this time, instead saying that he wasn't going to do anything to help small farms:

We are not, in Congress, smart enough to figure out how big a farm should be. I don't think we should be subsidizing someone just to stay small. That doesn't make sense. I'm for small farms, medium-size farms, big farms....as long as they make economic sense.

That's a load of baloney in my opinion, because economic sense isn't the only thing that's at stake. Environmental sense is also a factor. And economic sense for who? The farmer, the community, or the fertilizer, seed, pesticide, etc, industries? And how healthy is the food the farm produces? These ARE issues Congress should be concerned with, and they SHOULD lend a hand to farmers who are doing things right.

Source: "Ready for the 2012 Farm Bill?" Agri-Pulse, December 16, 2009.