(author’s note: I’ll try to add footnotes later)
I ran across posts about the Minnesota Food Charter on the COMFOOD list recently. At the bottom of the web site were “links” to, for example, work on other food charters, including work in Iowa, Michigan, Oregon and West Virginia. This blog very briefly raises questions of context to help these efforts. Food charters are wonderful developments, but they are limited by various omissions, misunderstandings and myths that are found in the dominant paradigm(s) and narratives of today.
THE CONTEXT OF GENERALIZATIONS AND SPECIFICS
The Food charter work mentioned above varies somewhat, but seems to share a variety of characteristics. General contexts are set forth, contexts which include larger agricultural issues, as well as issues of nutrition and health. The charters get more specific in their focus on local food systems. This point is relevant to most of the further comments about context that are presented below.
HISTORICAL CONTEXT
The food charters I’ve seen are statewide projects involving a variety of groups. Across much of the nation, including Minnesota and Iowa, there were similar collections of groups working on similar issues 30, 40 and 50 years ago (i.e. 1955-1995). The groups today work on the consumer side, the food side. The groups back then worked primarily on the farm side.
If you told the farmer groups in past decades about a future that included the food councils of today, and other Food Movement Work, they would be thrilled and amazed. If you told them that those new food-side groups would have little knowledge of the massive farm side (Family Farm Movement) work of history, they would be astounded. It would be unbelievable, extremely confusing and depressing.
FOOD IN THE CONTEXT OF FARMING
Food-side work today often seems to describe the farm-side as if producing food were the main purpose or even the only purpose of farming. In fact, food is a much smaller category or context than farming. Food covers only a fraction of farming, though in some places and times it is a large fraction. Related to this are the vegetarian, vegan, and other views that criticize the role of feed, (leading to food as meat,) in agriculture.
Some of the biggest food-side issues cannot be adequately addressed without also addressing the huge farm-side issues, starting with the questions of “farm justice,” and then leading to the biggest issues of environmental sustainability, (involving agriculture as a whole, not just organic and similar niches,) public health and nutrition, economic viability, etc.
More to the point, a food-only framework, if it were somehow implemented today, would lead to massive destruction of the US and global farming infrastructure, thus subverting a wide range of food-side goals. The fundamental reason for this is that it would lead to massive overproduction, driving down US and global farm market prices, thus fostering massive increases in food poverty and hunger. (Recent figures indicate that 80% of the global “undernourished” are rural, as are 70% of the population of Least Developed Countries. They need the kinds of strong rural economies that can only come from fair farm price floors and supply management.
Out of the lack of understanding of farm-side issues is a lack of understanding of farm-side infrastructure problems, (i.e. infrastructure for diversity and sustainability in farming systems,) and info-structure problems, such as the knowledge resources from and for beginning farmers. Food-side work seems to emphasize training new farmers who know nothing about farming and who have no access to land. Farm-side advocates focus more on the many former farm kids who want to farm and who have, perhaps, 10 years experience (age 8-18?), and who may have access to land (i.e. future inheritance). Examples of infrastructure issues include the rapid decline of sale barns and meat lockers, elevators that have recently stopped buying crops like oats (part of Resource Conserving Crop Rotations), and elevators that have recently stopped grinding feed.
Another food vs farm issue is simply that adding non-farm activities, (processing, retail,) and infrastructure, (and knowledge base,) to the work of farming doesn’t go very far toward solving the problem of getting paid fairly on the farm side. It’s also a steep learning curve, on top of the many challenges of farming alone. Yes, you can make more in the non-farm enterprises, but how about fixing the underlying farm side problems. (see more below)
THE CONTEXT OF LOCAL VS NONLOCAL
One very shocking thing I saw at one food charter site was tremendous optimism about the future for farmers. It strikes me that this can only be said by those who don’t know their own history (see above) or current politics (see below). On the other hand, I think I understand it, and in another sense, it’s great. Those of us on the farm-side, (farm-justice-side, which is mostly flat on it’s back, and pathologically underfunded,) would heartily agree that we need a ton of hope and renewed vigor.
I think that the hope comes from “local food” activities, (and the charters are an incredible example of that specific hope,) and, prior to that, from the organic sector. The organic sector was growing by 20% per year for a longtime, and didn’t need help on justice issues. Overall, the Sustainable (Family Farm) Agriculture Movement broke away from the Family Farm (Farm Justice) Movement during the 1990s. In part that was due to a failure on the farm justice side, and in part it led to some of the most valuable recent work that helps all. On the other hand, in the big picture, “there’s no sustainability without farm justice,” and the Sustainable Agriculture Movement has advocated for the cheapest of cheap farm prices for CAFO feeds and junk food ingredients. Meanwhile, corporate agribusiness has come after organic, showing how ignoring the big justice issues and remaining divided is a recipe for ultimate failure.
Work on local food is wonderful, as far as it goes. In places like Iowa and Minnesota, there’s much valuable work to be done. On the other hand, our productive capacity is so enormous that a local strategy can’t help the majority of farmers. It only takes a small fraction of Iowa agricultural land to feed Iowa, (as much as our climate will allow). For that reason, it would be relatively easy, (hypothetically speaking,) for Iowa or Minnesota farmers to swamp and destroy local food efforts, driving down prices to where farmers went broke (and then, perhaps, the new infrastructure was destroyed).
I live near Cedar Rapids, (100,000) but the regional market there hasn’t had nearly enough customers to support much in the way of local meat sales, relative to our capacity. Farmers typically go to two or more cities, (i.e. try to add Dubuque, Waterloo, Iowa City, Davenport, or even Des Moines). A local meat store here and an on-farm cheese processor started up, had great products, but went out of business.
VEGETABLES, FRUITS AND COMMODITY CROPS: ANOTHER CONTEXT
I think that bringing more vegetables and fruits into places like Iowa is a great long-term strategy. On the other hand, as the farm-side movement has long known, it’s important not to do this in a way that destroys farmers elsewhere (i.e. vegetable and fruit farmers).
On this point, Tom Philpott had a recent suggestion to take, for example, 10% of corn and soybean land in the midwest and convert it to vegetable and fruit production. I did some number crunching on that. I found that such a hypothetical switch involving just 10 midwestern states would increase vegetable, fruit and nut acres by 160% (100%+160%=260%). Such a massive increase would destroy fruit and vegetable farming in the US. It’s exactly the kind of issue that the Family Farm Movement has long understood, and that the new Food Movement doesn’t much understand at all, (& on this latter point, see similar arguments made above).
We’ve also seen that Food Movement leaders (academics including scientists, books, films,) have framed this issue in ways that make it look like vegetables are expensive, while commodity crops are cheap, (and this, then is supposed to be caused by farm subsidies, which are thought to prevent farmers from growing more fruits and vegetables, [again see Philpott]). So it seems very clear that they’re working to lower the price of vegetables. As measured by percent of parity, however, (and I seem to be the only one who has put forth any data on this point,) both commodity crop and fruit-vegetable prices have fallen drastically, (with commodity crop prices + subsidies being consistently lower than a wide range of major fruits and vegetables).
Related to all of this, I see little information related to Food Charters or in the Food Movement as a whole, (including it’s “public health” sector) that relate to actual farm bill programs for vegetables and fruits, as seen throughout history. You need to know the history and possibility first, before you can innovate on it to better address the widespread concerns of today.
Historically, fruit and vegetable price and supply issues were handled through Market Order programs, (and they were handled in less direct ways than what we find for commodity crops. These are “perishable” crops, unlike commodity crops, which are easily “storable,” which is why they need different kinds of programs.
For comparison, see the dairy program, which has had price floors and supply management, (though, like commodity crops, they were lowered and eliminated under massive lobbying from corporate agribusiness). It has also made cheese available, for example, to help feed the poor. Another example is the sugar program. Sugar is perishable in raw form, but storable when processed. Those facts then led to a different kind of program, (involving processors, not just farmers,) that may have relevance for fruits and vegetables.
Supply management programs for fruits and vegetables could easily provide surplus healthy foods for the poor. This seems to be a major example of the kinds of obvious solutions, (or obvious problems to be avoided!) that can be discovered when there is adequate interaction with farm-side activists.
A related point needs to be made on vegetables and sugar. Sugar beet, (a sugar vegetable,) and sugar cane have kept their price floor programs while other commodity crops, (including corn for corn sugar,) have lost theirs. It’s important for “food and health” advocates to understand how the farm bill affects cheap sugar. When it was debated in 2013, I found it quite hard to get any response from sugar-oriented food advocates. They seemed not to have any clue of this domain of farm policy and farm programs, including the politics of it. Surely this is something important for food charter groups to know about. (And the same applies with corn policy, where the food movement unknowingly sides with agribusiness for the cheapest of cheap food, in direct contrast to their own fine values, goals and intentions.)
POLITICAL CONTEXT: THE POWER STRUCTURE
It’s common in my town for people in towns like mine to hold bake sales, place donation boxes in places like gas stations and banks, and hold other events to try to save people who are dying of cancer or other diseases. This probably focuses more on the popular or extroverted people, and not on homebody types. I don’t see any similar efforts in these places to support affordable health care. The former are activities that unite us. The latter would be divisive, given what we’re exposed to in mainstream media, and given the mega-power behind the problems.
Food charters seem to be a bit similar to the bake sale approach, but on a much more sophisticated scale. They bring together major stakeholders in work that has common agreement. On one hand, the anti-farm (agribusiness or “farm”) and big pharma lobbies are among the biggest and most oppressive in Washington. On the other hand, agribusiness commodity buyers (General Mills,) and health insurance companies (Blue Cross and Blue Shield) work together with “farm,” food and health advocates on Food Charter issues (Minnesota), perhaps funded by the Kellogg Foundation (Michigan). I’ve never seen Extension Services or Public Television, work with any group that’s really confronting the big powers, but they seem to feel quite comfortable with food charters.
For example, there has been a rapid assault on the US farming system, as seen in massive ways in Iowa and Minnesota. Perhaps the best simple statistic to understand it is that 4 corporations (1 Chinese) own 66% of US hogs. That’s a radical kind of extremism that massively destroys the infrastructure, trained labor force and knowledge base relevant to the work of Food Charters. We’re rapidly sinking to where rebuilding, even to slow the decline, becomes ever more impossible. This, (which is closely related to the massive exploitation of crop farmers, via the cheapest of cheap prices that the farm bill delivers,) then makes Resource Conserving Crop Rotations economically unviable in major ways. It’s a snowball effect, and I see nothing in the charters that demonstrates much knowledge of what’s going on “on the ground” in places like rural Iowa and rural Minnesota on the issues of destruction of infrastructure, knowledge, etc. that are relevant to the goals of food charters.
THE CONTEXT OF “SUCCESSFUL SOCIAL MOVEMENTS”
(Continuing from the previous section,) I suspect that some groups, including some who would criticize the councils as examples of corporate “colonization” of our minds, see Food Charter work as very problematic. While I think they could be correct, here I’d like to focus on where we are in movement history, as described by Bill Moyer in “The Movement Action Plan,” “The Practical Strategist,” and other materials.
Moyer describes the stages that “successful social movements” go through, and, as part of that context, a variety of roles that persons and groups play at various points in history. The roles include: “the rebel,” “reformers,” “citizens,” and “change agents,” and there are good and bad ways to do each. Rebels are most important early on. Citizens are most important in the middle. Reformers are most important at the end.
Food charters clearly seem to involve work with the status quo, work that leaves out some huge issues, especially issues of justice. This kind of work is more appropriate later on in the process of “successful social movements.” Today we have varying sectors with differing locations within our history. The Family Farm (Farm Justice) Movement has a much longer history. While it’s had some major successes in past decades, sometimes beyond the movements of today, over all, on the biggest issues of farm justice, it has not been successful, even at getting the Sustainable Agriculture, Food, Public Health sectors of today to know how to advocate for their own interests. The Sustainable Agriculture Movement is much newer, (big expansion during the 1990s,) and, at least within it’s own goals, has been impressively successful. The Food Movement is newer, and, unlike the Family Farm Movement, has gotten it’s narrative into the mainstream media, even massively so, (though that narrative has been false, siding with agribusiness, with regard to the biggest issues of justice). The Public Health sector is even newer, as far as I can see.
Related to this, the corporate culture of the Family Farm Movement is the most familistic and affectional of these sectors. It’s the most deeply rooted in history, and the most justice oriented. A key example, I think, is PrairieFire Rural Action, which played a major role in mobilizing mainline churches and other churches to support the big justice issues of the 1980s. Theology of the land has played a major role in the Family Farm Movement.
In contrast, the Center for Rural Affairs is a prime example of a group that split off from the Family Farm Movement to start the Sustainable Agriculture Movement. CRA mobilized sustainable agriculture academics as part of the Consortium for Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education. These kinds of academics have had, in my view, a significant impact on the corporate culture of the Sustainable Agriculture Movement, which has been much more directional and contractual in it’s corporate culture.
The new Public Health sector has involved physicians and other health professionals, plus science groups like the Center for Science in the Public Interest and the Union of Concerned Scientists. These groups naturally take an approach that is less friendly with the “rebel” role, and that has closer ties to the status quo. That can be a great asset, at certain points. It could also be a significant limitation, if it is related to not listening to those with 50 years of experience in this work, (ie. blue collar family farmers working on the big issues of farm justice). I see it as both.
One anomaly is that the new science and health oriented groups rely on a variety of major scientific invalidities related to the big farm bill issues, (“The Subsidy Myth: Scientifically Invalid, Subverting Food Day”). The result is that they side with agribusiness exploiters against the victims and against their own goals.
PUBLIC INPUT PROCESSES IN LIGHT OF THESE CONTEXTS
For important reasons, I’m convinced that the processes used for gaining public input, (including from farmers,) for the food charters, while widely accepted as good process, are clearly inadequate for the context I’m describing here, (the overall context). In part, I think that these problems are caused by the lack of family farm activism (on the big justice issues,) in these states. So it has a major farmer-side cause as well as a consumer-side cause.
What we have today is a reality in which most of the movement knows very little about the history that came before, and what it does know is often false, (ie. most history of the farm bill). The new urban side movement has hardly ever even heard mention of how, decade after decade, family farmers pleaded for such people to awaken from their passivity and pro-status quo neutrality and to join the in the fight for justice, “before it’s too late.” For most farmers, of course, all of the new activities are too late, (and are often falsely oriented as well).
Given the fact that huge realms of context are misunderstood in major ways today, the typical and accepted processes that take in information and process it, such as we find in the food charters, are wholly inadequate. (See, for example, the processes used in the Minnesota Food Charter, here on page 2 of their blog list [11/1/14] http://mnfoodcharter.com/blog/page/2/ [and on page 3]). Surely they appear perfectly fine.
The problem can be seen in several ways. First, neither the food-side nor the farm-side knows much about the other side, (and there are no resources available today to re-mobilize the farm side). So what the Farm Justice Movement might teach the food movement from it’s 60 years of experience isn’t much known by the Farm Justice Movement. And what the Food Movement could ask, isn’t known, as well.
Then, contaminating this are the major farmer-bashing myths related to the false and misunderstood issue of farm subsidies and the Farm Subsidy Database, plus misunderstandings about the role of livestock to sustainability, and then, the whole question of what has been called “industrial agriculture.” (Is indoor plumbing, electricity and the use of gas and diesel engines really so bad?) And then, on one side you have these blue collar “affectional” types, and on the other are the academics. But then also, the first side are business persons with economic self-interests, while many others advocate progressive values, even to the point of calling for “people not profits.” Looking, then, at the economic self interests of one small sector, it’s apparently been quite easy to not recognize it as the biggest justice issue of all, a paradigm that would bring distributive economic justice into the new food movement for the first time. It’s an alternative paradigm addressing, not just for rural white blue collar farmers, but also for a wide range of the most disadvantaged “politically correct” groups, both US and global, plus the organic and local sectors.
And then, while there have been widespread examples of the various PC groups getting a voice at major events of the new movement, (which is great, much needed,) the one group that is almost always missing from the key chances for communication and exposure, is “the new minority,” “the last minority,” family farmers.
So, “It’s the paradigm stupid.” It’s just not going to happen that any collection of comments will disclose, (meaning include,) the range of huge contexts that I’ve identified here. So often, group facilitators encourage us to identify what we see as most important, what we want to work on, in order to take note of that.
But isn’t that exactly the opposite of finding the anomalies that are rarely understood, but that could save the whole paradigm. These are exactly the items, (given the contexts I’ve set out here,) that don’t get addressed in these kinds of processes.
In past decades, perhaps, this could all be about racism or sexism resulting from the exclusion. (Or perhaps still today, in many domains of our lives.) Today, my conclusion from the various contexts, is that farm-side justice is the most glaring exclusion.
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