Rev. John L. McCullough
Photo: T.Abraham/CWS |
From the Executive Director's Desk...
Sow Justice on Family Farms Everywhere
November 2006
By Rev. John L. McCullough, Executive Director and CEO, Church World
Service
The arrival of fall, the approach of harvest season, and the onset of the debate over new Farm Bill legislation, makes it timely to explore the connections between just and sustainable development and agricultural policies as they affect small-scale farmers and rural communities. Our New Testament passage was the theme for a CROP Hunger Walk in Pennsylvania recently.
“Woe to those who join house to house, who add field to field, until there is no more room, and you are made to dwell alone in the midst of the land…” Isaiah 5: 8
“. . . that through the church the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places.” Ephesians 3:10
God’s covenant
Land played a central role in the lives of the Israelites both economically and spiritually. The fifth chapter of Isaiah reminds us that land is a gift from God, and enjoying access to it involves a covenantal relationship with God. The Israelites could not do whatever they wanted with the land. Any kind of monopolization was a serious breach of the covenant. When a tribe or family used land within Israel, it was expected that the bounty of what was produced would be shared with all its members.
As we seek the root causes of hunger and poverty in developing countries today, we are brought face to face with the far-reaching changes occurring in the control of the land and of commodity markets. In looking at these systemic problems, we find that the U.S. system of low crop prices and government subsidies is destroying small farmers and communities in developing nations while also harming rural communities in the U.S.
Hunger and Poverty in Rural Communities
My office recently received two emails from Church World Service regional staff that prompted me to select these passages from Isaiah and Ephesians. One of our associate director s is from the Midwest, whose family has been farming for seven generations. She talked about how sprawl was threatening farmland in her area, how each year she has seen more farms shut down, barns sagging and equipment rusting. She reflected on how hard her father had worked to keep their own farm going over the years, and said how painful it was to realize the task of saving it from developers now had come down to her.
Sadly, the corporate consolidation in agribusiness that harms U.S. rural communities is linked to the economic pressures that devastate rural communities in developing nations – forcing many small farming families in Mexico and Central America to emigrate and become laborers in U.S. fields because they are desperate to find work and eat.
If we are serious in wanting to address global hunger and poverty then we must tackle low crop prices and not perpetuate a system of dependence on subsidies and overproduction in the U.S. As we look to the coming Congressional debate around the Farm Bill, we can support policy changes to help family farmers in the U.S. and around the world save their farms, feed their families and educate their children.
The Failure of Subsidies
The U.S. system of low crop prices and government subsidies sets in motion a vicious cycle that does not benefit small farmers or U.S. taxpayers. The lower crop prices go, the more we spend on subsidies to U.S. farmers. Last year, U.S. taxpayers spent $20 billion subsidizing domestic crops such as corn, wheat, and cotton. Notably, the bulk of subsidies end up in the hands of a limited number of farmers who do not necessarily need them, while many of those small farmers struggling to stay on the land do not receive them.
Oxfam notes that of 2 million farmers in the U.S., only one-fourth qualify for commodity subsidies at this time. Of those who do qualify, 10 percent receive 72 percent of the subsidies. According to Oxfam, these large payments are not going to disadvantaged or minority farmers, but more often to large-scale operations. Rural communities continue to shrink as farming becomes less and less a viable livelihood.
Meanwhile, the combination of low prices and subsidies leads to the sale of artificially cheap food in developing countries at prices below the local cost of production. Small-scale family farmers in those nations find that they cannot compete and may be driven out of business, as were 1.3 million Mexican farmers after the implementation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).
When small-scale family farmers in developing countries go out of business, hunger spikes in places already plagued by poverty, where the people survive on a dollar a day. These societies cannot create enough new jobs to absorb the disenfranchised farmers. On the farm there may be a few staple crops for the family to eat, but once off the farm, without a job, the farmer has no income to buy food, no matter how cheap it may be.
Developing countries have been left with drastically fewer means to support their own farmers. While the U.S. Congress resists reforming the U.S. subsidy system, our government has promoted policies through the World Bank and International Monetary Fund that force developing countries to eliminate or drastically reduce funding for the various tools – such as agricultural subsidies, public credit and field extension programs -- they once had in place to protect their own farmers and to help make them more productive. And it is certainly true that developing countries cannot afford the kinds of lavish subsidies the U.S. government provides its farmers.
Now the U.S. is pressuring developing countries to remove tariffs and quotas and completely open their markets to competition. These are the only tools developing country governments have left to support their farmers and to protect them from cheap imports.
If U.S. small-scale family farmers received a fair price for the crops, U.S. taxpayers would not have to fund subsidies, and farmers in developing countries would not face competition from artificially low-priced imports. One way to raise U.S. crop prices is to reverse the near monopolization of markets by a few grain trading, meat processing and other agribusiness interests whose size and market control basically means that they can dictate prices to farmers. Better enforcement of anti-trust laws would mean that agribusiness buyers cannot exert undue influence on prices.
Because all people need food to survive, farming ought to be rewarded as a sacred calling to take care of the land and to bring forth the food that sustains the community. According to St. Paul, “the farmer who does the work ought to have the first share of the crops” (2 Tim. 2:6). But, in fact, the farmers’ share of the price we pay at the supermarket for processed foods is very small. For example, for a $1.27 loaf of bread, the farmer receives just 7 cents for the wheat - only 5 percent of the total consumer price!
Even a 50 percent increase in the price paid to the farmer – so that he or she could cover the cost of production -- would increase farmer’s share of the loaf of bread by only 3-4 cents. Further, if just prices for the farmer’s work were a priority, we would pay more for bread’s main ingredient, and perhaps less for marketing, advertising and transporting it to markets. Doing this would not have to translate into an increase in the cost of our food.
As consumers, taxpayers, and people of faith in solidarity with our brothers and sisters around the world, we do well to advocate for a dramatic reform of U.S. agricultural policy so that small farmers in the United States and in the developing world can survive and prosper.
Sowing
Justice for Family Farmers Everywhere: A Vision for the 2007 Farm Bill
Publication
PDF (1.59 mb) • Postcard
PDF (587 kb) • Order
Online
This 24-page resource examines key issues that need to be
addressed in current U.S. farm policy to support small-scale family
farmers in the U.S. and overseas. Comes with a postcard so you can
take action.
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