The Latest from AgMag

House Leadership Puts FARRM Out to Pasture?

Friday, July 27, 2012

Although the future of the farm bill remains unclear, the leadership of the House of Representatives effectively rejected a proposal by the House Agriculture Committee that would have cut nutrition assistance and environmental programs to help finance lavish new subsidies for the largest farm businesses.

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Policy Plate: Extension Denies Opportunity for Real Reform

Thursday, July 26, 2012

A House proposal to extend the 2008 farm bill by one year is a repudiation of the Federal Agriculture Reform and Risk Management Act of 2012 (FARRM) produced by the House Agriculture Committee and would deny the full House the opportunity to debate meaningful and long-overdue reform of crop insurance subsidies.

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Policy Plate: Babcock Talks Drought on Colbert; Top Chefs, Health Experts Denounce House Farm Bill

Wednesday, July 25, 2012

As the Des Moines Register reports Iowa State University economics professor Bruce Babcock appeared on the show to talk about the Midwest’s historic drought, but the conversation turned to crop insurance.

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Policy Plate: Who’s Really Funding Crop Insurance?

Tuesday, July 24, 2012

Crop farmers are going to be OK coming out of the current drought – but not taxpayers, economist Bruce Babcock of Iowa State University says in a National Public Radio interview.

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EWG’s Answers to Chemical Agribusiness

Tuesday, July 24, 2012

The Alliance for Food and Farming, an agribusiness group representing the bulk of conventional produce growers in California - and seemingly the only organization in existence that doesn’t want people to have information about which fruits and veggies come with multiple pesticides - sent me a list of questions after the release of Environmental Working Group’s 2012 Shopper's Guide to Pesticides in Produce.

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Pesticides

Policy Plate: Taxpayers on the Hook for Huge Payouts

Monday, July 23, 2012

An article by Marcia Zarley Taylor in DTN/The Progressive Farmer reveals how far the crop insurance program has strayed from its origins as a fiscally responsible safety net for farmers. Most farmers in the corn belt, covered by new so-called revenue protection insurance polices, stand to make more money this year – thanks to taxpayers – than they would have if they hadn’t lost crops because of the drought.

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Food for Thought? Not With the Farm Bill

Monday, July 23, 2012

Sarah (not her real name), was usually one of the best students I met while teaching 8^th grade math in a New Orleans public school. When I asked a question, her hand darted into the air as she politely, and more importantly quietly, waited to be called upon. Her answers were rarely off-target. The questions she raised were thought-provoking. She understood what she read. She refused to be defeated by my most challenging math problems.

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Food

Healthy Eating

Policy Plate: Bad Ideas Spring From Drought

Friday, July 20, 2012

Some members of Congress appear eager to jam through a costly drought disaster relief program with a flawed farm bill. In an AgMag post entitled “Bad Ideas Spring from Drought,” Environmental Working Group’s Scott Faber points out that Congress has already provided farmers with a gold-plated disaster program called crop insurance - and it will pay farmers indemnities regardless of whether Congress passes a farm bill.

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Environment

Bad Ideas Spring from Drought

Friday, July 20, 2012

Several members of Congress are using the drought to push for a costly and duplicative disaster assistance program and passage of the worst farm bill in decades.

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Policy Plate: Drought is No Excuse for Lack of Farm Bill Reform

Thursday, July 19, 2012

The drought hammering farmers and communities across the Corn Belt is being used by some as an excuse to send “the worst farm bill in recent memory” to the floor of the House of Representatives. Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio.) addressed those calls today, saying (mp3): “Well there’s no question that there’s a real threat throughout the Midwest because of the dry conditions. Most farmers in my district avail themselves of crop insurance. That’s why it is in the farm bill, that’s why our government subsidizes the cost of crop insurance, to encourage farmers to buy that. In most cases it should be sufficient to deal with this problem.”

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Policy Plate: Kind Pushes Real Farm Bill Reform

Wednesday, July 18, 2012

Last week the House Ag Committee pushed through one of the worst pieces of food and farm legislation in recent history. While Ag leaders are pressing for the bill to come to the floor, Rep. Ron Kind (D-Wis.), is arguing that the bill “takes us backward in terms of budget-busting crop subsidies, unlimited insurance subsidies, and trade-distorting programs”

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Policy Plate: House Farm Bill Bad for Taxpayers, Hungry Families and the Environment

Tuesday, July 17, 2012

Today at the National Press Club, Environmental Working Group and a wide array of public interest organizations, including anti-hunger, public health, labor and animal welfare advocates – took part in a widely covered press conference to highlight the damaging and alarming provisions of the farm bill approved by the House Agriculture Committee.

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Policy Plate: An Unconscionable and Grotesque Farm Bill

Monday, July 16, 2012

EWG and groups including the Humane Society of the United States, Natural Resources Defense Council, Bread for the World, the Center for Food Safety, Defenders of Wildlife, Oxfam America, United Food and Commercial Workers International Union, United States Conference of Catholic Bishops and Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine plan a press conference for Tuesday, July 17, at the National Press Club to discuss the alarming and damaging provisions in the House Agriculture Committee's farm bill.

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Policy Plate: King Amendment Out of Bounds

Friday, July 13, 2012

The Los Angeles Times’ Kim Geiger reports that the amendment added by Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) to the House Agriculture Committee’s draft of the farm bill could "block states from imposing their own standards for agriculture products on producers from other states" and "jeopardize California laws to protect chickens."

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Crop Insurance: Bad for Taxpayers, Bad for the Environment

Friday, July 13, 2012

Unlimited crop insurance subsidies lead growers to make planting decisions that are bad for the environment, two of the nation’s most respected agricultural economists conclude in a newly published paper.

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The Audacity of Scope

Thursday, July 12, 2012

Late Wednesday night, July 11, the House Agriculture Committee added an amendment by Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) to the farm bill that would severely limit states’ authority to regulate conditions or standards of agricultural production.

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Policy Plate: Ag Committee Takes Big Step Backwards

Thursday, July 12, 2012

In the early hours Thursday, the House Agriculture Committee marked up and passed a bill that is quite simply the worst piece of food and farm legislation in recent memory. In a statement released earlier today, Environmental Working Group’s Scott Faber said: "The committee’s farm bill increases unlimited subsidies for the largest and most profitable farm businesses. As millions of families struggle to put food on the table, the bill cuts funding for critical nutrition assistance programs by $16.1 billion."

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Top Ten Reasons to Reject the House Farm Bill

Thursday, July 12, 2012

The budget-busting farm bill approved by the House Agriculture Committee late Wednesday night is quite simply the worst piece of farm and food legislation in decades. The bill will feed fewer people, help fewer farmers, do less to promote healthy diets and weaken environmental protections – and it will cost far more than congressional bean counters say.

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Policy Plate: Crop Insurance Reform Would Save Tens of Billions

Wednesday, July 11, 2012

As the House Agriculture Committee considered a proposal by Reps. Frank Lucas (R-Okla.) and Collin Peterson (D-Minn.) to expand crop insurance subsidies by more than $9 billion, Rep. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) introduced legislation to instead roll back crop insurance subsidy rates.

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