So recently I did a research paper for my take on the history of US farm bills and how they affect the agriculture industry. This i think gives a different perspective especially for me of how much these have changed since they started.
The United States Farm Bill
My favorite quote I heard many years ago is one
that we as consumers should always remember “without a farmer you would be
naked, hungry, and sober”. With that thought we would think that the importance
of the farmers and the land we have to produce food on would be valued, right?
Agriculture has changed many times since people first started farming around
9500 BC, and as we can see in history even though the farmer is such an
important roll in society, they have not always been valued as such. While we are
very different from farmers of the past, we still see struggles for farmers and
continue to make changes. Unfortunately, even with struggles in history we still
see an issue with poor choices we even make today. This leads to the current
practices and asking, what do we have in place to protect farmers now, and with
policies in place who is benefitting?
United states farmers have faced many ups and
downs in agriculture since the early 1900’s. In 1920 it was reported that we
had 6.5 million farms in the US (Berkman 2020) and in the early twenty’s prices were
good and farmers managed well and provided to consumers. An issue that some farmers
faced, was when farms took out large loans to buy neighboring parcels with the
intent to expand, but then faced price drops in the market. At that time
farmers did go to congress to ask for help, but nothing was put in place to
give relieve to the farmers. Some farms were forced to sell while others were
able to stay afloat. We then faced the Great Depression in 1929. While we had
buyouts that happened in the early 1920’s, some farmers in 1929 then faced
hardship and could not make payments on the loans they had taken out. Prices
dropped, land lost value, decreased prices of land and farmers lost farms to
the banks (Walbert n.d.). If the farmers and country wasn’t
struggling enough, in the 1930’s farms suffered from the infamous Dust Bowl also
referred to as “The Dry Thirties”.
In the 1930’s we started to see a lot of
changes especially once the Dust Bowl began in 1931. The Dust Bowl lasted
nearly a decade and the effect had serious effects on the environment as well
as the economy (Editors 2009). The dust bowl was a result of a
mixture of poor farming economics, weather changes, federal land policies, and
farming on the great planes. The Dust Bowl caused drought, loss of crops,
livestock, as well as death of people in effected areas. The winds ripped topsoil
from the land Which contributed to the “Black Blizzard” in 1934 which brough
the topsoil that was ripped from the Great plains formed as a thick cloud that
reached all the way to New York. The dust clouds caused issues with dust
pneumonia which killed several hundreds to thousands of people around that
time. On April 14th, 1935, a thick cloud started in Oklahoma and
stretched east carrying over three million tons of topsoil from the Great
Plains. This was the worst of all large traveling storms and was referred to as
“Black Sunday” (Editors 2009).
Farmers
faced many struggles in the 1930’s and during that time we began to see several
laws and acts put into place because of the financial and environmental
struggles we were facing. With that we started to see some changes and things
put in place to try to offset the effects we were seeing during this economic
crisis with programs that were created under The New Deal. In 1933 the
Commodity Credit Corporation also known as the CCC was created as an attempt to
create relief for farmers. This program was interesting to me, but it
contributed to other programs being added. The CCC offered risk free 12-month
loans for selling their crop for profit, if the market price increased for the
crops the farmer would pay off the loan, if the market dropped below a fixed
price the farmer would then give the crop to the CCC and they would then deal
with the storage issue. The same year the Agriculture Adjustment Administration
the AAA was an act that was put in place that contributed to creating fixed
prices in the market to increase prices, but also offered some of the first
subsidies to farmers for replacing sections of their land from cash crops to
grasses for soil conservation. This had positive and negative effect to the
market between farmers and consumers. While on one hand it financially benefited
the farmers, on the other it increased the prices to the financially stricken
consumers by decreasing the supply of certain goods available in the market. In
1933 President Roosevelt signed the Agriculture Adjustment Act that’s intent
was to help create emergency relief to lower prices of crops to help lesson the
burden on consumers during the Great Depression. The drawback of this act was
the increased limitations it created in the market for the production of some
of the agricultural crops (Wikipedia, United States farm bill 2022). During this time,
we also saw the formation of the Farm Credit Administration or the FCA which
between 1934 and 1935 worked with farmers to help decrease current interest
rates they were carrying. These programs were the governments first attempts to
assist in economic welfare, but also was the first step towards the increase in
federal authority we could see during the Great Depression. The Agriculture
Adjustment Act was deemed unconstitutional because of the way it obtained the
money needed for the subsidies. When the act was first put in place in 1933 the
money was from an exclusive tax that was placed on companies that processed
agricultural products. The Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938 changed the
policy that the funding would be provided by the federal government and not
from a tax to processors (wikipedia
n.d.)
While
we have seen many changes in the agriculture industry, we also can see over
several years many bills and laws that have changed or been put in place that
can affect a farmer in many ways. While the hope we had would be to preserve
family farms, the push over almost 100 years and the commercialization of
agriculture has had its effects. In the mid 1930’s we had an estimated 7
million farms in the United States, today we have just over 2 million. With
decreased support to family farms, it can make younger generations discouraged
from carrying on the family’s legacy, because of this the agriculture industry
has seen a decrease in interest as career choice. With this we can suspect to
see a slow staggering effect as current students are our future teachers. This unfortunately
will only encourage more corporate farming and large-scale operations to make
up the difference which we only hope wont have negative impacts. Since the 1930’s the US farm bills are revised
around every five years, and changes are made depending on current economic
needs as seen by the government. While the question of who benefits is
debatable, what we have seen a growing trend in is an increase in
commercialized farming. This then really makes you ask yourself if these
programs we currently have in place are benefiting those that may need it the
most. Fast forward to the Federal Agriculture Improvement and Reform Act of
1996 or Freedom to Farm Act, this changed policies allowing more flexibility
with government loans over a 7-year period but were fixed with no reflection on
the current market process and production. With this they also promised to
increase exports but asked farmers to agree to lower government subsidies. This
act over time was also considered the “Freedom to Fail” act by some. This farm
bill we could see good and bad contributions to farmers and many changes that
were made regarding qualifications, and repayments based on commodities percentages
(wikipedia.org n.d.). Looking back at several of the bills
and programs that came after the first in 1933, has slowly pushed farmers to be
dependent on the government for help with not as much regulation on large
corporate farms slowly pushing farmers out of the picture. The bill in 1996
excludes production of some fruits and vegetables, as well as other facets of
the agriculture industry resulting in only helping some of the struggling farms
and helping larger operations more.
Another
hot topic that is included in a lot of the farm bills that we have seen passed
is with the inclusion of food stamp benefits for the low income. We can
consider Farm Bills as food bills especially because of the inclusion of food
stamps for those who need them. The first food stamp program was established in
1939 and ran until 1943 with a peak participation of 4 million Americans. These
were orange and blue stamps that were worth fifty cents for blue ones and a
dollar for an orange for equal value of food they may buy with cash. It wasn’t
until 1960 when Kennedy witnessed the effects poverty had on family's especially with food security and saw the importance in bringing
back the food stamp program. In 1961 a pilot program was created to bring them
back, and in 1964 was signed into law by President Johnson. While the program
then you had to pay for the food stamps which is different from how the program
is now, this put food stamps in a position to be included into farm bills that
are passed (USDA 2018). While we have seen
many times actions taken to try to take this important program away, this alone
can be a reason to call farm bills Food Bills.
Looking
at the last two farm bill acts we had in 2014 and 2018 we saw changes on many
levels. The Agricultural Act of 2014 added new options for farmers for crop
insurance, new conservation programs, as well as many modifications to the food
stamp program. Between the last two farm bills that we have had passed I found
many to find more positives and changes in the 2014 farm act than the 2018. The
Agricultural Act of 2014 increased programs for specialty crops, bioenergy, and
organic farming (wikipedia.org, Agricultural Act
of 2014 n.d.).
Unfortunately, the 2018 United States Farm Bill Act many do not agree with, and
programs that were set to expire from the 2014 Act were not restarted. The most
recent farm bill is debatably not in favor to farmers, but then they question
is what kind of farmer benefits. The changes from a family farm perspective can
also be dependent on how large that farm is. Some of the changes I found were
very generous for those making almost a million dollars a year, now included as
eligible to subsidies when before was not allowed for such a high-income
bracket. To a very large dominating farmer this may seem very ideal, but for
smaller competing farms this encourages an unfair market advantage. Another
notable thing I found about the most recent bill was the lack of requirement of
in person management of a farm that is eligible for subsidies. An article from
taxpayer.net considered these two out of 10 worst provisions in the newest farm
bill. They also called the new income limits if you can call them limits,
provisions that have “Ruined over 30 years of common-sense limits to subsidy
progress” (taxpayer.net 2018). This last bill
while did give more to new farmers and hobbyists, those who have been slowly losing
family farms are feeling left behind. Dairy farmers were affected by the
changes as well from commodity programs coming to an end and being now
converted to law. The Margin Protection Program MPP was replaced with Dairy
Margin Coverage DMC which we then saw a domino effect of Michigan dairy farms slowly
leaving and being replaced by much larger operations.
While
on paper some of the laws may seem favorable to help the farmers, but over time
I feel we have seen an increased push in a direction of commercial farming.
Farmers can be limited on qualifying factors for insurance, subsidies, and
other programs if they are willing to work under contracts and grow what you
are told to. While at some points we saw more flexibility, we can push to
decrease some of these current limitations especially to small scale farmers.
The ability to enter a market independently is extremely challenging, and a
farmer can get stonewalled at several turns. Increasing laws, rules, and
regulations can limit a small farmer in many ways such as processing issues
because of USDA requirements, requirements for sale of meat and other
agricultural products. Because of this we have seen the push for contract
farmers, complete vertical integration from an outside company leaving no
flexibility to the farmer. While we have seen the importance of tracking from
farm to table, the abilities of access to smaller farmers should be equal to
large corporations. Without equal opportunity of small farmers compared to
large scale companies we will see small farms slowly decrease over time. This I
feel dramatically decreases food diversity options when commercial operations
grow mass amounts of the same product. The unsustainability factor should be
considered as we continue to move in such a direction. Diversification of the
food options we have available is important, not only from a small business
aspect, but also from a growing aspect as well. If we limit the varieties of
what we grow we will see in increase with issues such as pests and disease. As
we have come to see the negative effects of the use of many pesticides, and herbicides
we previously used and their negative effects we should push for more change.
In
conclusion, over the years we have seen many programs such as crop insurance
and other programs, but if you research into some of the history of who founded
them and where they came from, we can slowly begin to see some of the potential
issues. We can see the worry with growing corporate America and the owner
anonymity which can create unseen market dominance dictated by corporations
with private shareholders. These growing issues we have seen in the agriculture
industry I feel can reflect such issues, and unfortunately things like farm
bills can be the only thing that can change or protect current policies and
practices. While we can assume the original purpose of farm bills was to
protect food security and help farmers, we must see how policies have changed
over time and how farmers have been affected. We as consumers and a society need
to be more vigilant and observant of changes like these to ensure we are moving
towards a productive and sustainable future. Change in policies to help support
smaller farmers, market options and opportunities, as well as more access to subsidies
and programs to encourage organics farm diversification, and land preservation.
These are things needed if we want to not only help the last of our family
farms, but also the future of agriculture in the US.
Works Cited
Berkman, Seth. 2020. "How farming has changed in
every state the last 100 years." Stacker. September 3. Accessed
january 2022.
https://stacker.com/stories/3989/how-farming-has-changed-every-state-last-100-years#:~:text=While%20American%20farming%20has%20certainly,come%20in%20at%20two%20million.
Editors, History.com. 2009. "Dust Bowl." History.com.
October 27. Accessed 2022.
https://www.history.com/topics/great-depression/dust-bowl#:~:text=The%20Dust%20Bowl%20was%20the,failed%20across%20the%20entire%20region.
taxpayer.net. 2018. "Top 10 Worst Provisions in
the 2018 Farm Bill." taxpayer.net. December 11. Accessed 2022.
https://www.taxpayer.net/agriculture/top-10-worst-provisions-in-the-2018-farm-bill/.
USDA. 2018. "A Short History of SNAP." usda.gov.
9 11. Accessed 2022. https://www.fns.usda.gov/snap/short-history-snap.
Walbert, David. n.d. The Depression for Farmers.
Accessed 2022. https://www.ncpedia.org/anchor/depression-farmers.
wikipedia. n.d. "Agricultural Adjustment Act of
1938." wikipedia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agricultural_Adjustment_Act_of_1938.
Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. na. "History
of agriculture." Wikipedia. Accessed 2022.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_agriculture#:~:text=It%20was%20not%20until%20after%209500%20BC%20that,peas%2C%20lentils%2C%20bitter%20vetch%2C%20chick%20peas%20and%20flax.
—. 2022. "United States farm bill." .wikipedia.org.
Accessed January 2022. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_farm_bill.
wikipedia.org. n.d. "2018 United States farm
bill." wikipedia.org. Accessed 2022.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018_United_States_farm_bill.
—. n.d. "Agricultural Act of 2014." wikipedia.org.
Accessed 2022. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agricultural_Act_of_2014.
—. n.d. "Federal Agriculture Improvement and
Reform Act of 1996." wikipedia.org. Accessed 2022.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Agriculture_Improvement_and_Reform_Act_of_1996.
