Food and Farm Bill special

[nosmokes]

A most excellent piece on the Farm Bill and it's impact and importance to all of us, even the inner city ultra-urban wouldn't recognize food if it weren't on a menu types. For one thing we're talking about a bunch o money. I know that in this day and age of privatising wars and flying palettes of C-notes into the middle of chaotic scenes full of angry people with guns and priceless antiquities that date back to the origins of Western Civilisation $225Billion might not seem like a lot, but back down here on Earth, you can still make a real difference w/ that kinda coinage.And it's not just about the farmers or the Ag corporations. This is the bill that funds food stamps and school lunches too.There's good info here and some good links and hopefully it'll spur you to write and call your Senators and tell them to give more money for organic research and marketing and for farmers to transition into organic. We need more money for farmers starting out on small farms.We need to eliminate the penalty for organic farmers in Federal crop insurance. Stop the subsidies for Agbio Corps and make them responsible for contamination.

original-ethicurean

Digest - Food and Farm Bill special
by Ethicurean @ 10:02 am on 28 October 2007

For some pre-Halloween thrills and chills, this digest is all about that zombie-, vampire- and Frankenstein-filled piece of legislation called the Food and Farm Bill.

Late last week, the Senate Agriculture Committee completed its work on the bill and sent it to the full Senate, where it will be debated in a few weeks. The debate could be action packed (in a legislative sense) because Senate rules allow unlimited amendments and there are quite a few reform plans that did not receive a hearing in committee (some of these topics were covered by the Center for Rural Affairs last week).

Before we get into the somewhat discouraging news about the lack of reform in the Ag Committee’s proposal, we’ll start with a few treats:

* The Organic Trade Association points out that in the Senate version, the USDA will not be allowed to charge an insurance surcharge for organic crops unless the charge can be justified by historical loss data; the proposal also provides $22 million in new funds to help farmers transition to organic (but is this mandatory or optional funding?).

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complete article including links to related sourceshere

[TheFarseer]

1. can anyone tell me why we can't agree on

a payment cap of $250,000 per farm? Farmers want it. Taxpayers want it. The only people that don't want it is agribusiness and the politicians they fund.

[sutz12]

3. I think you answered your own question.

:shrug:

[TheFarseer]

4. True n/t

[TimBean]

5. I agree on a cap of zero dollars

You shouldn't be paid by the government to farm and you really shouldn't be paid not to farm.

[TheFarseer]

6. should you be paid $1.60/bushel

for something that cost about $2.40/bushel to grow? That's how it was before ethanol got going a couple of years ago. I suppose you still don't give a crap. I suppose you want farming outsourced to China or Brazil so we can cut a couple billion out of the budget. OK, let's depend on third world countries for our energy and our food. That's brilliant!

[TimBean]

7. Thank you for supporting inflation!

Big Agra loves you too!

[Liberal_in_LA]

2. The farm subsidy is welfare for the rich.