Willard W. Cochrane, writing in the July 1 issue of the "Progressive Populist," questions the wisdom of the U.S. continuing to pursue a farm policy that assumes exports will solve the farm crisis. Cochrane, a former agriculture economist for the Kennedy administration and the United Nations, and a professor emeritus at the University of Minnesota, points out that current weakness in global demand for American commodities means that increasing production will only lead to further lowering of prices. He calls the current push for more exports by USDA Secretary Ann Venneman and other policy makers "a terrible solution." 

"To expand your sales by selling more at a still lower price is no way to get well financially and stay in business." Policy makers would do better by the American farmer by abandoning the fantasy of an export solution to the farm crisis and "concentrating their energies on enacting legislation designed to strengthen rural communities, reduce the pollution of America's farmland and rivers, and increase competition among suppliers and non-farm produced inputs on the production side, and among handlers and processors on the marketing side." 

Read the article at: http://www.populist.com/01.12.cochrane.html

The Environmental Working Group recently analyzed government records of farm subsidy payments from 1996 to 2000, and concluded what most people in the farming community already know: the bulk of farm payments are going to just a few farmers, while many of the rest get little or nothing. For instance, eight percent of the farms in Ilinois garnered over half of the $1.95 billion in aid to that state last year.

Furthermore, many large aid checks went to individuals, organizations and universities that receive substantial income from other sources but also happen to own farm land. "No one asks if [recipients] need it the way they do, for example, with a student loan," says EWG president Ken Cook. Based on their analysis, the group predicts that the patterns of unequal distribution will continue with the $5.5 billion in emergency farm aid passed last week by the House: over $2.3 billion of this money will go to just 20 congressional districts where the most highly subsidized crops are grown.

The report is available at http://www.ewg.org/pub/home/reports/farmfairness/default.html

If you have begun to wonder what is in the food you eat, how it has been treated or processed, and importantly, if it is healhty and safe, you are not alone. According to a recent poll done by Roper Starch Worldwide, Inc. for Walnut Acres, an national organic producer, almost half of all consumers polled said they will be buying organic food within five years. 

These changes in buying habits are attributed to concerns consumers have with several factors; bacterial contamination, use of growth hormones and antibiotics, residues of synthetic pesticides and fertilizers, irradiation and genetic modification. The poll, reported in the July 9 PRNewswire, sampled 1,000 adults, age 18 or older and found the following:

• 79% say they are concerned about the safety of their food
• Forty percent of Americans say organic food will be a bigger part of their diet within one year;
• Fifty percent predict that organic food will be a bigger part of their diet within the next five years;
• Six in 10 Americans (63%) buy organic foods and beverages at least sometimes;
• Two-thirds (68%) say organics will be a major food trend in the new millennium.

Continuing a full scale lobbying push for fast track trade legislation, the American Farm Bureau (AFBF) is now telling rural America that the Farm Bureau "consider(s) granting Trade Promotion Authority (Fast Track) to the President one of the most critical trade issues of the year." 

In a radio interview pre-produced and made available to hundreds of rural stations across the heartland, Audrae Erickson, trade specialist for the American Farm Bureau Federation adds that fast track "is an absolutely necessary tool and an important signal on the road to getting what we really want and that is a launch of a new round of trade negotiations in the World Trade Organization." While many agricultural producers see free trade policies as "unfair" and dominated by corporate interests, many farm organizations decry fast track as an unconstitutional presidential liberty that will not be used to serve family farmers or rural America. Nonetheless, the Farm Bureau radio piece begins with the interviewer announcing without equivocation, "Farmers say fast action is important for trade promotion authority." 

To read the transcript go to: http://www.fb.org/news/newsline/nl01/nl0629.html

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