Berkshire Grown

From Grist.org, Philpott challenges the organic movement

2008-06-29T21:58:00.001-04:00

How the organic movement can regain its relevance

27 Jun 2008

On June 25, I spoke at the Organic Summit in Boulder, Colo., to an audience consisting largely of people who work in the organic food industry. This column is an adapted version of my talk.

In his wildly popular satirical blog Stuff White People Like, the Canadian writer Christian Lander recently made some tart observations about the place of organic food in North American culture.

"White people need organic food to survive," he declared. "Where they purchase this food is as important as what they purchase. In modern white person culture, Whole Foods has replaced churches and cathedrals as the most important and relevant buildings in the community."

Later in this remarkable post, Lander returned to the religious theme: "Many white people consider shopping at Whole Foods to be a religious experience, allowing them to feel good about their consumption."

I bring up this clearly over-the-top piece of writing because I think it actually raises an important question about the place of organics in our culture today. To what extent do organics merely "allow people to feel good about their consumption," as Lander says, and to what extent do they inspire people to think about their consumption, to consider their place in the consumption-production process?

I would argue that today, amid all of our ecological crises -- the climate crisis, the water crisis, the energy crisis, the crisis of the oceans, all of which implicate agriculture and food production -- organics aren't inspiring people to think very much at all. And the responsibility for that failure lies most heavily with the people in organics who have the power to communicate with the public: the corporate marketers.

We're So Sorry, Uncle Albert

If we look at the history of organic agriculture from its origins in the work of botanist and agricultural maverick Sir Albert Howard in the 1930s and 1940s, we can make a case that organics have been a stunning success. For years, they've been the only real growth area in the entire food industry, which here in the United States is characterized by stagnant demand. While overall food consumption rises with population -- something like 1 percent per year -- demand for organics rises by a steady 15 to 20 percent per year.

The Soil and Health, by Sir Albert Howard.

However, from a different direction, the success of organics looks considerably more modest. Sir Albert published The Soil and Health in 1947 -- just at the point when industrial-scale agriculture was taking off, supercharged by synthetic and mined fertilizers as well as a slew of poisons from the rising petrochemical industry. Sir Albert never saw organics as an "alternative" or "niche" form of farming. He saw the two visions of agriculture in direct competition -- and foresaw all manner of grave consequences if industrial ag won out.

Sir Albert insisted on what he called the Law of Return, which can be summed up like this: Every time we harvest something from the soil -- every time we consume food or drink -- we're taking away nutrients and organic matter that need to be replaced. The whole trick of agriculture, from the first wheat fields of the Fertile Crescent to a modern 10,000-acre Iowa corn farm to my own little patch of land in North Carolina, has always been how to replace those nutrients, how to maintain soil fertility.

Now, according to Sir Albert, when you deal with soil fertility by resorting to synthetic and mined fertilizers, you're undermining soil's long-term ability to produce crops. You're leeching out key micronutrients without replacing them. You're sterilizing the soil of microorganisms needed for truly healthy plants. Producers who farm this way, he said, are "bandits" stealing true soil fertility from future generations.

Something tells me Sir Albert would be pretty alarmed by what's happening today, despite the steady growth of organic food. Globally, demand for synthetic and mined fertilizer is exploding. Amid a bleak economy and a dismal stock market, one of the few seemingly sure ways to make money is to invest in fertilizer companies. The globe's two largest fertilizer companies -- Potash Corp. of Saskatchewan and Mosaic, which is two-thirds owned by Cargill -- are practically printing money. In the last year alone, Mosaic's shares have quadrupled and Potash's have tripled, while the overall stock market has lost 10 percent. Meanwhile, Monsanto, the globe's dominant purveyor of genetically modified seeds, has seen its share price double.

Just this week, the Wall Street Journal declared that the "salad days of organic agriculture are wilting in favor of high-tech tomatoes." Almost triumphantly, the Journal published a chart comparing Monsanto's surging share price to that of Whole Foods, which has plunged by a third over the last year.

Even as organics gain popularity and make people feel good about what they consume, industrial agriculture is consolidating its grip over the U.S. heartland, where it's burning through one of the greatest stores of soil fertility on the globe, and it's expanding rapidly into the savanna and even the rainforest of Brazil, the globe's emerging industrial-agriculture powerhouse.

I don't mean to discount the work that's been done by the organic movement. Today, we have about 1.7 million acres in organic crop production in the United States. That's a remarkable achievement, representing decades of hard work. No one can deny the value of protecting that much land from a steady stream of chemicals that poison workers, the soil, and water alike. But total U.S. cropland stands at about 435 million acres. That means less than 1 percent* of U.S. cropland is managed organically. With conventional grain prices at all-time highs, that number may be stagnating, not growing. We have lots more work to do.

Appetite for Instruction

One of the things the organic industry has to do is educate, inform, and provoke. In this country, fewer than 1 percent of us farm. That's the lowest rate in the world -- and surely the lowest rate in the history of agricultural society. Food really does seem to arrive on our plates by magic -- it appears, or seems to appear, by the grace of corporate marketers, not through the hard work of people interacting with the soil, animals, and the climate.

And I believe this ignorance -- this beautiful, blissful state of unknowing that would be the envy of nearly any society that came before us -- has mostly been maintained by the organic movement. Surely it's maintained by "organic" milk processors that buy from feedlot dairy operations, and then decorate their cartons with happy cows munching grass. Surely it's maintained by "certified organic" supermarket chains that decorate their produce sections with images of prosperous farmers, and then stock their shelves with produce grown under God knows what conditions in Chile. It's maintained by large organic farms that quietly rely on exploited immigrant labor to eke out profits. And it's even maintained at the farmers market, by the farmer who's too embarrassed to tell his customers that he's barely scraping by, that his back is killing him, and that he can't afford health insurance.

If we're going to move beyond 0.4 percent organic cropland and really challenge industrial agriculture, we also have to move beyond this acceptance of mass ignorance. One concrete thing we can do is start talking honestly and seriously about soil fertility -- Albert Howard's Law of Return. We all know our food system generates tremendous amounts of waste. Very little of it gets cycled back into soil. Instead, it ends up rotting in landfills.

I know from hard experience that for new organic farms, the No. 1 challenge is coming up with a fertility strategy. Creating the kind of closed-loop, mixed-farming system celebrated by Albert Howard and embodied by Joel Salatin in Virginia takes years. One of our dirty secrets is that a lot of organic farmers rely on manure from confined-animal feedlot operations to fertilize their land. By doing so, we're depositing all manner of pharmaceuticals and toxins into our best farmland -- the very stuff people try to avoid when they buy organic. An alternative farming system that relies on CAFO waste for fertility is a kind of parasite on a sick animal.

Why not champion a national composting policy, one that compels municipalities to transform food waste into high-quality, crop-grade compost? And why not then give it away to farmers -- the ones who grow food for their nearby communities? That's an agricultural subsidy that makes all kinds of sense.

While we're at it, let's reinvest in the infrastructure that makes small-scale, pasture-based meat and dairy production viable. The best and most successful organic farms are the ones that mix diversified crop production with livestock production; they build their soil with their own animals' composted manure. But as the Tysons, Smithfields, and Cargills of the world gained control of the meat and dairy industries, they shut down processing plants and concentrated production geographically. Who wants to raise chickens if you have to haul them 70 miles to a USDA-approved slaughterhouse, and 70 miles back?

Rather than continue a trend of corporate control and consolidation of organics, the decision makers in this industry should be cajoling the federal government to enforce antitrust laws and break up the monopolies that control the food system. You should conceive of yourselves as the anti-Tysons and anti-Smithfields by investing in appropriate-scale processing plants all across the land.

As our globe lurches into a period of ecological and economic crises -- not least, the food crisis -- what we need is less ignorance about food and more people with their hands in the dirt producing it. If we can't achieve that, than the Tysons, Cargills, and Monsantos will retain their grip over food production, and organics really will amount to some "stuff white people like" -- a soothing room within a sinking ship.

Locally Known-- local young farmer grows a large organic farm in Maine

2008-06-23T19:59:00.004-04:00

At a store near you, low-mileage lettuce

A farm's oil-stingy plan cuts out the cross-country trek for Boston-bound greens

By Jenn Abelson, Globe Staff | June 23, 2008

BOWDOINHAM, Maine - Ben Dobson is betting his future on 170 acres of salad greens along the shores of Merrymeeting Bay.

The 24-year-old oversees New England's first large-scale organic farm dedicated to supplying East Coast supermarkets and restaurant chains with local greens.

The start-up farm, called Locally Known, is trying to capitalize on soaring fuel costs and growing consumer demand for local, organic foods by offering fresher lettuce at competitive prices.

Most salad greens make a cross-country trek of more than 3,000 miles from California's Salinas Valley, nicknamed "Salad Bowl of the World," to get to Boston. Locally Known's produce, however, traveled just 144 miles from Maine to hit the shelves last week at Whole Foods supermarkets. And five ounces cost $1 less than the same amount of greens from California-based Earthbound Farm, a savings largely due to lower transportation costs.

"This is absolutely huge. What Locally Known is attempting has never really been done before on the East Coast to this level," said Bill McGowan, Whole Foods' produce coordinator for the North Atlantic region. "At this time, trucking greens from California, the primary grower, to the East Coast is not great from a fuel standpoint and a green-mission standpoint."

Until now, it has been nearly impossible for small local farmers to supply major supermarket chains because of costly food safety requirements, restrictions that grew more stringent following the 2006 E. coli outbreak in spinach. But with an investment from a group of entrepreneurs under the age of 30, along with a $250,000 grant from Maine's agriculture department, Locally Known built a processing plant that washes, dries, and packages the greens to meet industry standards.

Much of the harvest is automated, with band saws on wheels, allowing a crew of three and machines to do the work of 50 people picking lettuce by hand. At full capacity, Locally Known expects to harvest about 60,000 pounds of greens each week, including spinach, arugula, and baby kale. The produce will supply retailers such as Whole Foods, Trader Joes, and Hannafords.

"We can offer fresher greens that sit on the truck less time and can be identified with the local farm connection," said Dobson, president of Locally Known. "And we can offer it at competitive prices."

Locally Known's 170 acres pale in comparison to lettuce farms in California, which can sprawl over more than 2,000 acres. But Dobson, who grew up working on his father's farm in the Berkshires, is looking to lease land in Florida to harvest in the winter. Ultimately, he wants to build a cooperative across the region to create a sustainable year-round supply of produce for the East Coast sold under the Locally Known label.

Soaring costs for fuel and petroleum-based fertilizers used in conventional farming have made local organic produce a more competitive option for supermarket chains and restaurants, said Brook DeLorme, who at 28 is the oldest of Locally Known's five partners.

According to the market research publisher Packaged Facts, sales of locally grown foods in the United States were expected to rise from about $4 billion in 2002 to $7 billion by 2011. Locally Known said it is not trying to steal the market from local farms that supply small health food stores and nearby restaurants. Instead, it is focusing on major supermarket chains.

"More and more of the larger food services and retailers are rethinking their sourcing. They're paying more attention as fuel prices soar, and regional distribution appears to make the most financial sense," said Rich Pirog, associate director at Iowa State University's Leopold Center, which does research to develop sustainable agricultural practices.

A Leopold study conducted several years ago found that conventional produce traveled an average of 1,518 miles to reach Chicago, with grapes, lettuce, spinach, broccoli, and cauliflower traveling over 2,000 miles.

This month, the Massachusetts Restaurant Association hosted a "Green Restaurant Revolution" event, featuring media mogul turned restaurateur Ted Turner and local celebrity chef Todd English talking about ways restaurateurs can focus on environmental stewardship and local sustainability. English, in an interview, said local sourcing is increasingly important because of rising food prices and fuel surcharges.

"You have to be smarter, look harder for the best buys out there," English said. "And buying local just makes sense; it's fresher and you're supporting the local economy."

In Bowdoinham, Dobson is working nearly 20 hours a day, every day, to keep the farm on track. But lettuce is growing faster than expected, a salad spinner broke down last week, and bar-coding software he passed on to save money is now desperately needed. Adding to his stress is a planned visit by Maine's governor this week.

"It's a lot of chance," Dobson said, as he peered out onto his farm, acres of peppery arugula and spinach stretching into the distance. "But we think it's the right opportunity at the right time."

Jenn Abelson can be reached at abelson@globe.com.

2008-06-20T14:21:00.002-04:00

http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D91CM3R81.htm
Chipotle to use more local ingredients
By CATHERINE TSAI
DENVER
Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc. is breaking from the fast-food model once again.
The Denver-based chain known for its hefty burritos is pledging to use a set amount of local produce at each of its more than 730 restaurants around the country -- when produce is in season.
This summer, Chipotle is purchasing 25 percent of at least one produce item for each of its stores from small and mid-sized farms located within about 200 miles. Those purchases could include lettuce, onions and peppers.
Organic beans, avocados and herbs grown only on a large scale in certain climates won't be part of the program.
Fine dining chefs have long sought ingredients from nearby farmers, but Chipotle is moving that philosophy to a growing quick-service chain.
"It's going to open up the practice of knowing where food comes from to a wider variety of people," said Kate Evanishyn of Slow Food USA, which believes in food production that treats the environment, animals, human health and workers well.
"Ultimately this is changing the way the world thinks about and eats fast food," Chief Executive Steve Ells, who founded the company, said.
Ells, a graduate of the Culinary Institute of America, said it's about getting the best tasting food. The program marks an extension of the "Food With Integrity" slogan for the chain, which only serves naturally raised pork and chicken.
Ingredients taste fresher when they don't travel as far to get to the table, and they taste better when raised without chemicals, Ells said. Using local food means using less fuel to transport ingredients, and it supports the local economy, he said.
Ann Daniels, executive director of purchasing, said using more local ingredients will lower expenses in some cases and raise them in others, but food costs won't significantly change either way. She said the policy will stay in place even as Chipotle adds stores.
Finding the right suppliers, though, has been a challenge. During a test last year, Chipotle discovered it would have to use mid-size farms of about 500 to 600 acres to ensure a reliable supply. Tiny growers were less able to survive swings in weather or couldn't always deliver a product, Daniels said.
The company turned to distributors, local employees and the Web to find producers and then checked that each met its standards, such as those for food safety.
Daniels said Chipotle has 30 to 50 farms on its list so far.
Among them is third-generation farmer Kirk Holthouse of Holthouse Farms in Willard, Ohio. His family's 500-acre farm will provide jalapeno peppers, romaine lettuce and green bell peppers to Chipotle in Ohio, Pennsylvania, Indiana, Kentucky and Michigan.
He said he was glad to hear a chain was interested in local produce.
"In the summertime, quite often, we don't get some of that business because a lot of chain restaurants will be buying out of California," from farms 10 to 20 times larger, Holthouse said.
His farm usually ships about 1,000 truckloads a year. Chipotle's orders could add an extra truckload a week, he said.
Chipotle's initiative comes amid a weak economy, with diners eating out less. In a note to investors this week, Deutsche Bank analyst Jason West said the chain's same-store sales, or sales at locations open at least a year, have decelerated in each of the last four quarters.
Chipotle has not commented on West's note, but Ells said last week that the chain is committed to adding more local ingredients and suppliers and to include smaller farms.
"It's not an easy project but very worthwhile," Ells said.

Growing Food at Home

2008-06-11T22:00:00.002-04:00

From the NY TIMES: MARIAN BURROS

CASSANDRA FEELEY prefers organic ingredients, especially for her baby, but she finds it hard to manage on her husband’s salary as an Army sergeant. So this year she did something she has wanted to do for a long time: she planted vegetables in her yard to save money.

“One organic cucumber is $3 and I can produce it for pennies,” she said.

For her first garden, Ms. Feeley has gone whole hog, hand-tilling a quarter acre in the backyard of her house near the Fort Campbell Army base in Kentucky. She has put in 15 tomato plants, five rows of corn, potatoes, cucumbers, squash, okra, peas, watermelon, green beans. An old barn on the property has been converted to a chicken coop, its residents arriving next month; the goats will be arriving next year.

“I spent $100 on it and I know I will save at least $75 a month on food,” she said.

She is one of the growing number of Americans who, driven by higher grocery costs and a stumbling economy, have taken up vegetable gardening for the first time. Others have increased the size of their existing gardens.

Seed companies and garden shops say that not since the rampant inflation of the 1970s has there been such an uptick in interest in growing food at home. Space in community gardens across the country has been sold out for several months. In Austin, Tex., some of the gardens have a three-year waiting list.

George C. Ball Jr., owner of the W. Atlee Burpee Company, said sales of vegetable and herb seeds and plants are up by 40 percent over last year, double the annual growth for the last five years. “You don’t see this kind of thing but once in a career,” he said. Mr. Ball offers half a dozen reasons for the phenomenon, some of which have been building for the last few years, like taste, health and food safety, plus concern, especially among young people, about global warming.

But, Mr. Ball said, “The big one is the price spike.” The striking rise in the cost of staples like bread and milk has been accompanied by increases in the price of fruits and vegetables.

“Food prices have spiked because of fuel prices and they redounded to the benefit of the garden,” Mr. Ball said. “People are driving less, taking fewer vacations, so there is more time to garden.”

Each spring for the last five years, the Garden Writers Association has had TechnoMetrica Market Intelligence, a polling firm, conduct a national consumer telephone survey asking gardeners what makes up the greatest share of their garden budgets. “The historic priorities are lawns, annuals, perennials, then vegetables, followed by trees and shrubs,” said Robert LaGasse, executive director of the association. This year, vegetables went from fourth place to second, which Mr. LaGasse called “an enormous attitude shift.”

People like Rita Gartin of Ames, Iowa, are part of that shift. Last year she kept a small garden. This year it has tripled in size into a five-by-seven-foot plot because, Ms. Gartin said, “The cost of everything is going up and I was looking to lose a few pounds, too; so it’s a win-win situation all around.”

Ms. Gartin, who fits gardening into her 12-hour workday as an interior designer and property manager, is not intimidated by the 20 kinds of vegetables she has planted: she was raised on a farm with a giant garden. A fence has been erected to keep the deer and people out, and it’s where the pole beans and snap peas are already climbing.

She is ready to take a stab at canning, but reserves the right to freeze everything instead, she said.

“I probably spent maybe $50 for everything and that’s less than a week’s cost of groceries or the price of a gym,” she said.

Seed companies and garden centers say they didn’t see the rush coming. There wasn’t any buildup last year, said Barbara Melera, the co-owner of the D. Landreth Seed Company in New Freedom, Pa., who takes the pulse of gardeners at the 13 garden shows she attends around the country each year.

“We pack for all the shows and bring 16 different beans, 10 packets for each kind,” Ms. Melera said. In earlier years, by the time the shows end in March, she said, “we are lucky if we have sold two of the 10 packets.”

“This year,” she said, “we sold out the first show and literally sold hundreds. We never sell any corn; this year we sold out of corn by the end of the season. We saw the same thing in the mail order business.”

She said the greatest demand was for what she calls “survival vegetables”: peas, beans, corn, beets, carrots, broccoli, kale, spinach and the lettuces. “It was so different from what it has been in prior years,” she added.

Randy Martell, one of the owners of the Garden Factory in Rochester, says it isn’t just vegetables. “The potted fruit trees were sold out by the first week of May,” he said. “Blueberries, raspberries and grapes are sold out. I think those sales have doubled. Overall sales are up about 30 percent.”

Dottie Wright, greenhouse manager at one of the Dammann’s Lawn, Garden and Landscaping Centers in Indianapolis, said she talks to people every day who are starting their first vegetable garden. “If they don’t have a yard they try containers for tomatoes and herbs. We can’t keep the herbs in this year.”

Thrilled as gardening experts are about this phenomenon, they know that many first timers don’t have any idea how much sweat equity is involved.

“Many people I sold seeds to have never gardened before,” Ms. Melera said, “and we have to find a way to educate them so the experience is successful. They have got to be taught.”

Mr. Ball of Burpee knows some of the new gardeners won’t stick with gardening beyond the first year. “Some people can’t get with the idea of digging a hole; getting buggy, sticky and hot,” he said. “Gardening is an active hobby; it’s a commitment.”

Doreen G. Howard, a former garden editor for Woman’s Day and now a writer for The American Gardener, is one of the committed. She has had a vegetable garden for most of the last 25 years. This year she has quadrupled the size of her vegetable plot in Roscoe, Ill., because of the economy and because she thinks the quality of store-bought produce has deteriorated. Once vegetables were just 5 percent of her garden; now they are 20 percent.

“Food prices have gotten to the point where we are seeing the difference,” she said. “It’s pushing our budget and we are a two-income family. It was never a concern before.” Ms. Howard said her grocery bill for two went from $100 a week to $140 a week this year.

She has chosen many vegetables that freeze well, investing in a secondhand freezer to store the bounty. She plans to dry the herbs that grow on the back porch next to boxes of mesclun, and to make pickles from the cucumbers and raisins from the grapes — her newest addition. And she is looking forward to a cellar full of Peruvian blue potatoes.

Some of Ms. Howard’s increased harvest will also go to food pantries through an organization called Plant a Row for the Hungry, which encourages gardeners to plant extra vegetables to share with the poor.

“I’m hoping to take $20 a week off my grocery bill,” she said. This is in the low range, according to Mr. Ball, who says a $100 investment will produce $1,000 to $1,700 worth of vegetables.

Ms. Gartin, now in her second year, says gardening is worth the effort.

“I got soft calluses from hoeing and digging,” she said, adding cheerfully, “but my fingernails are still pretty — long and not chipped. I probably spent 30 hours putting the garden in, and when I’d come into the house I’d be covered in sweat. But now it’s pretty easy because of all the rain we’ve had.”

And the vegetables, she said, are “awesome.” “It’s a totally different flavor from what you buy in the store. It’s exciting to go out and pick the fruits of your labor.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/11/dining/11garden.html?em&ex=1213329600&en=57da52d982ec3b3c&ei=5087%0A

The Big Picture or Why Care about the Farm Bill

2008-06-05T16:57:00.002-04:00

"...did you know Congress passed a $307 billion farm bill in late May that has a much bigger impact on what you will eat for dinner tonight than what you chose to place in the grocery cart?

"...does the massive legislation support family farmers? Increase food access in urban food deserts? Or feed the 40 million poor and hungry in the United States?

"Yes and no. Reauthorized and revamped every five years, farm law has its roots in the 1930’s New Deal efforts to handle the overproduction of agricultural commodities while maintaining stable prices. Although most of the money in the current bill, around 75%, goes to nutrition programs such as food stamps, the politics of writing the bill is still driven by commodities such as corn, rice, wheat, cotton, and soybeans."

To read more, see earlier posting on this blog or paste and enter:

http://www.ethicurean.com/2008/06/04/pollan-farm-bill-2/

The Big Picture -- Why Berkshire Grown Cares about the Farm Bill

2008-06-05T16:50:00.003-04:00

Debra Eschmeyer, a farmer and activist has given her permission to reprint and circulate this important article.

Old MacDonald Has a Farm Bill

By Debra Eschmeyer

We’ve all noticed higher grocery bills, but did you know Congress passed a $307 billion farm bill in late May that has a much bigger impact on what you will eat for dinner tonight than what you chose to place in the grocery cart?

The farm bill has a hand in all that happens before the swallow. The bag of Tyson chicken wings (grain subsidies), gallon of Horizon Organic milk (forward contracting), and pound of Fuji apples (country of origin labeling) are all regulated in some fashion by this policy determining how our food is raised and who profits.

But does the massive legislation support family farmers? Increase food access in urban food deserts? Or feed the 40 million poor and hungry in the United States?

Yes and no. Reauthorized and revamped every five years, farm law has its roots in the 1930’s New Deal efforts to handle the overproduction of agricultural commodities while maintaining stable prices. Although most of the money in the current bill, around 75%, goes to nutrition programs such as food stamps, the politics of writing the bill is still driven by commodities such as corn, rice, wheat, cotton, and soybeans.

One way to interpret farm policy is to follow the money. According to the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy, Cargill’s profits increased nearly 1000 percent from $280 million in FY1997-98 to $2.34 billion by FY2006-07. Add to that pile of profits the $35 billion in indirect subsidies that the industrial animal factories (owned and controlled by corporations like Cargill) reaped by being able to buy feed crops at 20-25 percent below the cost of production.

Farm-bloc legislators were challenged this time around to make the connection between the current farm policy’s cheap corn complex and the growing problem of diabetes and obesity. Unfortunately, prior policy plunders were not weeded out of the current farm bill. As the House Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin Peterson (D-MN) explicitly stated that except for some "minor changes," the new farm bill is "very much like the current law that we have been operating under."

For those farm bill pugilists—sustainable agriculture groups, anti-hunger advocates, faith-based organizations, conservationists, community gardeners, and grassroots family farmer coalitions—that tried to have their voices heard above the industrial agriculture cacophony, the final 2008 Farm Bill is bittersweet. Bitter due to the numerous multifunctional reforms that never came to fruition while corporate agribusiness deepened their roots and sweet for the minor victories for sustainable agriculture, nutrition, and conservation.

The policies that survived through countless revisions, late night conferences, numerous listening sessions, lobbyist wrangling, and earmarks are far from the wish lists various groups envisioned. However, more than one thousand food and farm organizations came together and requested that Congress override the President’s promised veto. As stated in their joint letter to Congress:

"Communities across the nation, from urban to rural, have waited too long for this legislation. The Conference Report makes significant farm policy reforms, protects the safety net for all of America's food producers, addresses important infrastructure needs for specialty crops, increases funding to feed our nation's poor, and enhances support for important conservation initiatives. This is by no means a perfect piece of legislation, and none of our organizations achieved everything we had individually requested. However, it is a carefully balanced compromise of policy priorities that has broad support among organizations representing the nation's agriculture, conservation, and nutrition interests."

Passing through the House with a margin of 306 to 110 and the Senate 82 to 13, the votes in both chambers were far past the majority needed to defeat President Bush’s veto. Formally called the Food, Conservation, and Energy Act of 2008, the 673 pages of legislative prowess represent a precarious balancing act of principles and politics.

Below are samples of positive seeds of change planted in the new Farm Bill:

§ Community Food Projects and Geographic Preferences: The new Farm Bill provides $5 million in mandatory annual funding for innovative Community Food Projects for matching grants to community groups building sustainable local food systems addressing hunger, nutrition, and meeting food security goals. There is also new statutory language clearly stating that preference can be given to local purchasing of agriculture products for schools serving meals that receive federal assistance, resolving a conflict in USDA’s interpretation of the 2002 farm bill.

§ Local Food Initiatives: Another provision provides funding for new local and regional food supply networks including $33 million in mandatory funds for the Farmers Market Promotion Program, $56 million for the Seniors Farmers Market Nutrition Program, and $1.2 billion to expand the Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Program that will enable 3 million low income children across the country to have access to healthier food options.

§ GMO Oversight: New mandates to strengthen USDA oversight of GMO crops will help prevent the disaster that occurred when an unauthorized genetically modified rice strain entered the U.S. rice crop and caused massive losses to export markets. The new regulatory framework will reduce the potential for future GMO contamination events at field trial test sites.

§ First Ever Livestock Title: Provides much needed protections for independent ranchers and farmers raising livestock under contract, which includes preventing mandatory arbitration clauses for livestock/poultry contracts; allowing a three-day period to cancel contracts; and requiring contracts to disclose the requirement of large capital investments.

§ Diversity Initiative: The Farm Bill gives significant recognition to the importance of minority and socially disadvantaged farmers. There are specific targets for minority and socially disadvantaged farmer participation in conservation, farm credit, Value Added Producer Grants, and the Beginning Farmer and Rancher Programs. Minority Outreach and Education (Section 2501) authorized in the 1990 farm bill receives for the first time mandatory funding at $75 million over 4 years. This competitive grant program to community based organizations and educational institutions helps minority and socially disadvantaged farmers access USDA programs through effective outreach programs.

§ Beginning Farmer and Rancher Development Program: Provides $75 million over four years in mandatory money for competitive grants to groups providing technical assistance and other services to beginning farmers and ranchers. This program was created in the 2002 Farm Bill but was never funded.

§ Country-of-Origin Labeling and Interstate Meat Shipment: The Farm Bill includes language to implement long-awaited COOL requirements for produce, beef, pork, chicken, lamb and goat that will go into effect in September 2008. COOL was included in the 2002 Farm Bill, but food industry, USDA and meatpackers’ opposition have delayed its implementation. There are also provisions allowing for the interstate shipment of state-inspected beef that meets federal inspection standards. Both of these policies represent victories for consumers and farmers aiming to rebuild local food systems.

§ Organic Agriculture: The bill provides $78 million in mandatory funds for the Organic Research and Extension Initiative, which enhances the ability of organic producers and processors to grow and market organic food, feed, and fiber. For those transitioning to organic production, $22 million in mandatory funding is provided for the next five years.

The above positive provisions represent alternatives to the current food system without replacing the industrial model, which will take even more advocacy for good food policy in the next farm bill and beyond.

On one of my farm bill lobby visits to Washington, DC, I spoke to several Congressional Offices advocating for fair prices on behalf of family farmers. After one of my meetings, a young amiable congressional staffer with a mixed countenance of pity and arrogance, proceeded to tell me, “We aren’t looking to revolutionize the food system, Deb, let alone the farm bill.”

Well, I am looking to revolutionize the food system, and I am not alone. Yes, we have an uphill battle. Biotech giant Monsanto Co. spent nearly $1.3 million in just the first quarter of 2008 to lobby on farm bill provisions to protect their investments, but there are thousands of grassroots organizations working for public policy that will protect and strengthen the future of our food supply, environment, public health, and communities.

I’m on the frontline of this food revolution as a beginning organic farmer and food justice advocate. Will this farm bill help me with the infrastructure I need to process my chickens? Or provide me with the confidence that my sustainably raised food will be price competitive so that all people with empty and deep pockets alike have access to good, fair, and affordable food?

I’ll let you know in five years, but in the meantime, I’ll keep planting those seeds of change and hope you’ll join me in cultivating more palatable food policy.

For more information on farm bills: http://nationalaglawcenter.org/farmbills.

Debra Eschmeyer is the Marketing & Media Manager of the National Farm to School Network and the Center for Food & Justice. She works from a fifth-generation family farm in Ohio, where she continues her passion for organic farming raising heirloom fruits, vegetables, and chickens.

Prior to joining CFJ, Debra was the Project Director at the National Family Farm Coalition in Washington, DC where she focused on U.S. agricultural policy and food sovereignty initiatives among grassroots domestic and international rural advocacy and other social justice networks. She was also the Asia Program Coordinator for the Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund at Conservation International and the Humanitarian Grants Asia Coordinator for Rotary International.

Michael Pollan on the Farm Bill 2008

2008-06-04T15:44:00.003-04:00

Michael Pollan writes to people on his listserve:
"I haven't been in touch for a while, and some of you have written asking for an an update on the 2008 Farm Bill. After many, many months of wrangling, the bill was just passed by Congress, overriding a veto by the President. In my view, it is not a very good bill-- it preserves more or less intact the whole structure of subsidies responsible for so much that is wrong in the American food system. On the other hand, it does contain some significant new provisions that, with luck, will advance the growing movement toward a more just, sustainable, and healthy food system.

"You might rightly ask why there was so little movement on commodity subsidies, in a year when crop prices are at record highs and public scrutiny of the subsidy system has been intense. Indeed, the people on the Hill I talk to tell me they have not seen so much political activism around the farm bill in a generation. All the calls, cards, and emails sent by ordinary eaters clearly made a difference. So why so little change on the key issue? Why didn't we get a food bill, rather than another farm bill?

"Here's what I think happened. Critics of farm-policy-as usual-- and I count myself among them-- did a much better job of demonizing subsidies than they did proposing alternative forms of farm support that would have won over some percentage of the farmers now receiving subsidies. The whole discourse depicting subsidies as a form of welfare -- payments to celebrities, rich people in cities, mega-farms etc-- convinced many farmers that the ultimate goal of the farm bill's critics was to abolish subsidies, rather than to develop a new set of incentives that would encourage farmers to grow real food and take good care of their land. Had the reformers crafted proposals that were easy to explain and attractive to even just a segment of commodity-crop farmers, we could have made much more progress. Instead, faced with what appeared like a threat to their livelihood, the old guard hunkered down and defended the status quo, refusing even to negotiate on the central issues. Better alternatives could have split this block, and it was our failing not to devise and promote them. What the Old Guard did instead of negotiating a new system of farm support was what it has always done: pick off the opposition, faction by faction, by offering money for pet programs. The history of the farm bill has long been about such trade offs: Urban legislators support subsidies in exchange for rural support for food stamps. That Grand Bargain has now been extended to supporters of organic agriculture, local food systems, school lunch advocates, etc. The reason that, in the end, most of the activist groups wound up urging Congress to override the veto is that, by the end, they all had been given something they liked in the bill. You could put it more baldly, and suggest they'd all been bought off-- that the $300-plus billion bill represents the exact price of buying off all the critics of the farm bill, plus the cost of maintaining the status quo. But this is how the game is played, and the fact is, some good will come of these programs, modest as they are-- they will sow seeds of change and legitimize alternative food chains, or so we can hope.

"The challenge for the next farm bill is clear: it's not enough to engage the public, important as that is; we also have to get much smarter about both policy and politics, and craft some attractive proposals that will divide the farm block as well as move us to a healthier and more sustainable food system-- economically sustainable for farmers and farm workers and environmentally sustainable. This is the project for the next few years. We've got our work cut out for us."

New investigative report on confined animal feeding operations

2008-06-01T16:08:00.001-04:00

Industrial Agriculture
CAFOs Uncovered
The Untold Costs of Confined Animal Feeding Operations

The U.S. livestock industry—a large and vital part of agriculture in this country—has been undergoing a drastic change over the past several decades. Huge CAFOs (confined animal feeding operations) have become the predominant method of raising livestock, and the crowded conditions in these facilities have increased water and air pollution and other types of harm to public health and rural communities.

CAFOs are not the inevitable result of market forces. Instead, these unhealthy operations are largely the result of misguided public policy that can and should be changed.

In this report, the Union of Concerned Scientists analyzes both the policies that have facilitated the growth of CAFOs and the enormous costs imposed on society by CAFOs. We also discuss sophisticated and efficient alternatives for producing affordable animal products, and offer policy recommendations that can begin to lead us toward a healthy and sustainable food system.

Read the Report by the Union of Concerned Scientists

http://ucsusa.org/food_and_environment/sustainable_food/cafos-uncovered.html

2008-06-01T15:59:00.000-04:00

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/31/opinion/31sat4.html?ex=1212897600&en=1b03e3ec4fb94968&ei=5070&emc=eta1
May 31, 2008
New York Times Editorial
The Worst Way of Farming

In the past month, two new reports have examined how farm animals are raised in this country. The report funded by the Pew Charitable Trusts calls the prevailing system “industrial farm animal production.” The report from the Union of Concerned Scientists prefers the term “confined animal feeding operations.”

No matter what you call it, it adds up to the same thing. Millions of animals are crowded together in inhumane conditions, causing significant environmental threats and unacceptable health risks for workers, their neighbors and all the rest of us.

The astonishing increase in the number and size of confined animal operations has been spawned largely by the very structure of American farm supports, which always has been skewed in a way that concentrates farming in fewer and fewer hands. As both of these reports make clear, the so-called efficiency of industrial animal production is an illusion, made possible by cheap grain, cheap water and prisonlike confinement systems.

In short, animal husbandry has been turned into animal abuse. Manure — traditionally a source of fertilizer — has been turned into toxic waste that fouls the air and adjacent water bodies. Crowding creates health problems, resulting in the chronic overuse of antibiotics.

And, because the modest profits in confinement operations require the lowest possible labor costs, including automated feeding, watering and manure-handling systems, these operations have helped empty and impoverish rural America.

The Pew report recommends new laws regulating pollution from industrial farms as rigorously as pollution from other industries, a phasing-out of confinement systems that restricts “natural movement and normal behavior,” a ban on antibiotics used only to promote animal growth and the application of antitrust laws to encourage more competition and less concentration.

These are all useful guideposts for the next Congress and a new administration.

Why We Need a Farm Bill

2008-05-27T13:08:00.003-04:00

http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2008/05/26/why_we_need_the_farm_bill/

from the Boston Globe

By Gus Schumacher | May 26, 2008

THE FARM BILL that Congress has overwhelmingly supported over President Bush's veto has taken a beating from many pundits and editorial boards, especially in the Northeast. Yet there are good reasons even for New Englanders to favor this bill, especially over the status quo.

The bill certainly should be better. It should include more reform on the commodity titles during this era of high prices for wheat, corn, and soybeans, and use savings from commodity reforms to provide additional support for nutrition, conservation, and healthy food, especially for America's 40 million poor. Reduction of the McGovern-Dole International Food for Education Program for overseas schoolchildren at a time of spiking world food prices was especially hurtful.

But there is no question that the bill is better than the veto option proposed by the president. By using his veto pen, President Bush wanted to extend the existing, flawed, and out-of-date 2002 farm bill into the future.

The new bill should be called the Farm and Nutrition Bill. In fact, most of the money in the bill, some 74 percent, is allocated to help America's poor put food on their table and improve their nutrition and diets. To address the growing problem of diabetes and obesity in our children, the new bill also includes $1 billion for the free fresh fruits and vegetable snack program for schools.

Adding another $2 billion annually, Congress will now provide some $40 billion each year to help feed the poorest 11 percent of Americans. For Massachusetts, an estimated 432,000 will benefit just from the improved food stamp provisions of this new legislation. America's working poor will find their local food banks better stocked with an additional $1 billion through provisions in the Emergency Food Assistance Program for Food Banks.

The bill also provides needed resources to protect New England's working farms, to improve the region's water quality and wildlife habitat, advance domestic, renewable energy, promote healthier foods, and expand farmers' markets supporting our local food systems.

Under the current bill, more than 60 percent of the region's farmers with pending applications to improve conservation practices are turned down for lack of funds, and nearly 40 percent of our farmers asking for support to provide permanent farmland protection easements on their farms await support.

New England's farmers want to continue as good stewards of the land. This bill will do just that, helping them to further clean our water and air, preserve our diminishing farmland, and build wildlife habitat. This will help address the backlog of farmers who have wanted to participate in programs but have been turned away due to lack of funds.

In New England, more than 1,000 farmers have applied for conservation and farmland protection funding in recent years, only to be told "no funding." To ensure we protect our local farms from sprawling development, the new Farm Bill nearly doubles funding for the farm and ranchland protection program to reduce this backlog.

This new law makes an unprecedented commitment to support locally produced food and expand access to these healthy products for all. Expanded resources will support additional free fruit and vegetable vouchers for seniors at farmers' markets, such as at the new Allston/Brighton farmers' market and the three new farmers' markets located near health clinics in Dorchester. It will also provide new sources of loan capital to develop locally grown food businesses and support the many farmers in New England making the transition to organic systems. The new bill allows schools flexibility to purchase locally in their school meals programs, to create new markets for local farmers, and to bring just-picked fresh fruits and vegetables to local schools.

The benefits of the new Farm and Nutrition Bill are clear. New England needs it to support our vulnerable families at a difficult time.

Gus Schumacher is the former Massachusetts commissioner of food and agriculture.

On Ethicurean: What 1974 has to do with 2008

2008-05-20T16:26:00.002-04:00

This is on Ethicurean, it is written by Daryll E. Ray, who holds the Blasingame Chair of Excellence in Agricultural Policy at the University of Tennessee and directs UT’s Agricultural Policy Analysis Center (APAC). He is perhaps best known for lead-authoring “Rethinking U.S. Agriculture Policy: Changing Course to Secure Farmer Livelihoods Worldwide,” a debate-changing paper published in 2003. His articles and other work are available at www.agpolicy.org. The piece below, written with APAC Research Associate Harwood D. Schaffer, offers an historical perspective on today’s global food crisis.Times of crisis often shine a bright light on long-standing problems. That was just as true in 1974 as it is today.

"In mid-1974, agricultural commodity prices were triple the level of two years earlier and concern was raised that malnutrition in developing countries was on the rise. We now find ourselves in a similar situation: agricultural commodity prices are two-and-one-half times the level they were at the start of this recent surge in prices and the portion of the world’s malnourished is on the rise.

To put the current circumstances in perspective, we find it helpful to look back at the earlier crisis and see what lessons can be learned. The World Food Conference met in Rome in November, 1974 as agricultural prices hovered near their peak and people were dying as the result of famines, particularly in Bangladesh.

The goal of the conference was to “develop [the] ways and means whereby the international community, as a whole, could take specific action to resolve the world food problem within the broader context of development and international economic cooperation.” In the Conference Report to the United Nations [.doc], representatives of 135 states adopted the Universal Declaration on the Eradication of Hunger and Malnutrition. The goal established was to eradicate “hunger, food insecurity and malnutrition within a decade.”

That goal was not met, and in the intervening decades, the issues of hunger and malnutrition have often fallen off the radar screen of the media and the general public. It takes a devastating famine or a price spike like the current one to garner the world’s attention, and even that attention could be fleeting.

No matter what one thinks about the advisability of using crops for the production of biofuels, the current crisis — culminating in food riots in more than 30 countries — did not develop in just the last 24 months. It has been a long time in the making and the challenges are far more profound than the “food vs. fuel” debate makes it seem. (more…)

Farm Bill Update from Tom Philpott--grist.org

2008-05-10T21:40:00.000-04:00

Congress (almost) passes a farm bill; Bush vows to veto
How should sustainable-food advocates respond to the latest farm bill proposal?
Posted by Tom Philpott at 4:59 PM on 08 May 2008

For months now, the 2007 farm bill has been in limbo, tied up in reconciliation negotiations between the House and the Senate.

On Thursday, the bicameral Farm Bill Conference Report agreed on a final proposal. The latest version will go to the larger House and Senate next week for approval; if all goes well, it will finally go to President Bush's desk.

But since this wouldn't be the 2007 farm bill without a final dose of drama, negotiations seem far from over. "The President will veto this bill," USDA chair Ed Schafer bluntly declared in a Thursday afternoon communique.

The sticking point is subsidy reform, or lack thereof. "This legislation lacks meaningful farm program reform and expands the size and scope of government," Schafer stated.

Many sustainable-ag and rural advocates would cheer a Bush veto. On the Center for Rural Affairs blog, Dan Owens recently laid out their case:

We will have the opportunity to fight again, and ... I have real hope that we can do better, that we can win more, that we can get a farm bill that is better than the one about to pass Congress. And we can try again in 2009. But if the bill becomes law, we will have to wait until 2013.

Others, however, disagree. They argue that the bill contains valuable provisions that need to be passed -- small victories that will be surrendered if farm policy reverts to the 2002 farm bill.

Below I'll try to sketch out what this latest version contains. I'll also be trying to get movers and shakers in the sustainable-ag/food-justice world to give their perspectives.

The most controversial bit in this farm bill is the commodity title -- the program through which the government ostensibly tries to smooth out the financial uncertainty of farming. The title has evolved over the years into a funnel that delivers the great bulk of the title's cash to the largest farms, doing little to balance out swings in supply and demand.

Bush wants to cut the subsidies because they have become a sticking point in global trade deals, and presumably because of Iraq-related budgetary concerns. Most sustainable-ag advocates would like to see them replaced with more equitable and effective ways of smoothing out supply and demand troubles -- ones that benefit farmers and consumers, not the few agro-industrial corporations that dominate our food system.

This Associated Press piece digs into the details of the current commodity title, and how the limits it places on subsidies fall short of what critics including the Bush administration had wanted. In an emailed communique (Word doc), the Sustainable Agriculture Coalition summarized the title like this:

Comprehensive payment limitation reform was not included in the bill. ... the net result is no change in the highly skewed status quo on payment limits for direct and counter-cyclical payments.

The latest version also includes a controversial "permanent assistance fund" worth $3.8 billion. A couple of months ago on Gristmill, Britt Lundgren and Jason Funk of Environmental Defense Fund called this provision a "a disaster for taxpayers, most farmers, and the environment." They say it encourages farmers to cultivate disaster-prone land. Bush, too, has sharply criticized this provision.

If the commodity title and the disaster fund are considered a disappointment, other provisions -- ones that, unhappily, involve far less money -- have drawn support.

The Community Food Security Coalition reported in a Thursday email that the new version contains funding for Community Food Projects -- vitally important programs designed to bring fresh, healthy food to places that now have little access. Writes acting policy director Steph Larsen:

The great news is that Community Food Projects (CFP) is in the final language, and we have $5 million in annual mandatory funding for the next 10 years! As you may recall, this year we started out with no money due to new congressional budget rules that cuts the funding for small programs. New language for CFP should fix this problem so that for the next Farm Bill, CFP will be able to build on the $5 million instead of starting from scratch with zero dollars. And with mandatory funding, we will not have to fight for these dollars every year.

Larsen added the bill also allows public schools to favor local farms in bids for school food. "This change will eliminate [a major] barrier for schools to support local agriculture and will make Farm to School programs easier to establish."

(Before anyone gets too excited, the bill does not add any funding to the miserly National School Lunch Program budget. Now schools can theoretically buy local; but they still have $.70-$1.00 to spend per day on ingredients for each kid's lunch.)

The Sustainable Agriculture Coalition also points to several victories, especially with regard to the Conservation Title. This title tries to balance the produce-as-much-as-possible thrust of the Commodity Title by giving farmers incentives to manage their land in ecologically sound ways.

The SAC declared the Conservation Title in the current version an overall "win," since it delivers "$4 billion net increase in mandatory spending, combined with $2.5 billion in savings from Conservation Reserve Program, for total new funding of $6.5 billion, and a continued rebalancing toward working lands conservation."

SAC also points to several "wins" in boosting funding for organic agriculture, including a "nearly five-fold increase to help cover the costs of organic certification," and a "a seven-fold increase" in funding for organic farming research and extension." It should be noted, though, these outlays amount to sums in the tens of millions over five years, while the cash devoted to industrial-scale farming runs to billions every year.

As for my beloved "packer ban," which would have forbidden meat packers like Tyson and Smithfield from owning livestock -- well, that didn't survive negotiations.

So, should the sustainable-ag community support a presidential veto -- or fight for a Congressional override?

New generation at farmers markets from Russ Parsons, LA TIMES

2008-05-08T11:08:00.002-04:00

http://www.latimes.com/features/food/la-fo-newfarmer07-2008may07,0,919926.story?page=1
From the Los Angeles Times
Farmers markets, the next generation
As farmers age and retire, markets need new blood. A new generation of growers is appearing: idealistic newcomers, immigrants and family following in their parents' footsteps.
By Russ Parsons
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

May 7, 2008

THERE'S been a changing of the guard at the Coleman Family Farm stand at the Santa Monica Farmers Market on Wednesday mornings. Ask Bill Coleman a question and he's likely to answer, "Ask Romey."

Romey -- Romeo on his birth certificate -- is Coleman's son and though his eventually becoming the boss was expected, it nonetheless comes as a bit of a surprise to longtime market shoppers who might still think of him as the kid they watched grow up.

"I remember junior high summers, my dad would stuff us all in the front of the van and we'd drive to the Wednesday market," says Romeo, who is now 38 and sometimes brings his own two kids to the market. "This has always been a dream for me."

Though the handing down of a 6-acre farm is hardly newsworthy -- no matter how idyllic that spot might be -- the transition at Coleman Family Farm is part of a much larger picture.

One of the key questions facing farmers markets in the next decade is just who is going to replace the rapidly graying growers who led the green revolution of the last 30 years. Where will the next generation come from?

Will the markets, drawing on young farmers with new products and fresh ideas, continue to thrive and evolve as they have over the last 20 years, when the number of shoppers attending them more than tripled? Or, as more farmers hit retirement age, will the markets gradually dwindle and diminish?

More older farmers

IN GENERAL, experts say, new farmers market growers tend to come from one of three groups: young idealists looking for a rural lifestyle, immigrants who use farmers markets to make money from small plots of land, and those like Coleman who inherit family farms.

The problem of aging farmers is not unique to growers markets. During the last quarter of the 20th century the percentage of all farmers older than 65 increased from 16% to 26%. That compares with only about 3% of the total American workforce who are that age. And fully half of all American farmers are older than 55.

But the trend is especially noticeable at farmers markets, because the generation of farmers who led their boom in popularity during the 1980s and 1990s still predominate.

Though new faces do show up, they are a definite minority. At the bigger and more popular markets, there might be only one or two new farmers a year.

Though scores of new growers were certified for farmers markets during each of the boom years, more recently that flood has slowed to a trickle.

According to the agricultural commissioners offices of San Diego, Ventura and Riverside counties -- the areas that supply the lion's share of Southern California market farmers -- the number of certified farmers market growers has stayed about the same for the last several years.

"Each year we pick up between five and 10 new producers, but we lose about the same number," says Ron Bray of the Riverside County Agricultural Commissioner's office.

Today the shortage of new farmers mainly means it's more difficult to open new markets, but the implications for the future are more serious as greater numbers of farmers hit retirement age and quit.

"It's crucial that we continue to find young farmers because many farmers are retiring and if we want to continue this wonderful thing we have going on at farmers markets, we need to recruit a new generation to continue what has been done," says Pompea Smith of the organization Sustainable Economic Enterprises of Los Angeles, which manages seven Southern California farmers markets, including the popular Sunday market in Hollywood.

Any newcomer who wants to enter farming faces sizable hurdles. First and foremost, of course, is the price of land. Then there is the inevitable learning curve that goes with any new profession.

And then there's the problem of getting into the larger, more profitable markets, which often have waiting lists that can be years long, particularly for farmers who grow commonly available produce.

Those farmers have to go to several smaller markets each week to make the same income they might generate from two or three big markets. Often that means five or six days a week of packing up before dawn and driving several hours into the city.

Greenhorns to green thumbs

CHRISTOPHER and Johanna Finley of Finley Farms have grappled with all of those issues. They run a popular stand at the Sunday Hollywood market as well as at several markets in the Santa Barbara area and they are in the middle of the small-grower learning curve.

The couple, who embody the young, idealistic farmers market growers, met when they were both working at farmers market stands while attending UC Santa Barbara -- he was an environmental studies major and she studied ceramics. Finding their student jobs more interesting than their undergraduate training, four years ago they started to farm a 1-acre plot they rented north of Goleta.

Because farmers markets were already full of growers selling the same mix of tomatoes, peppers and herbs that they had, the Finleys had to chop up their produce and bottle it as salsa to secure a spot selling at even the smaller Santa Barbara area markets.

"It was a lot of work but we liked it," says Johanna, who is 29. Christopher just turned 30. "We could see the potential but we didn't want to do salsa anymore."

They decided to expand to grow a wider range of crops. They moved to a 1 1/2 -acre plot in the Santa Ynez Valley and bought their first tractor. The next year they started leasing more land from a neighbor, adding another 4 acres. The third year they added a little more leased land to bring them to a total of 10 acres.

Now, the Finleys grow kale, chard and mustard in the winter. There are peas in the fall and spring along with lettuce, arugula and spinach. Summer is sweet corn, melons and tomatoes.

"Anything we could grow in season, I think we've tried it," she says. "We're still in that phase of wanting to grow everything to see what sells and find out what our particular niche is. Everything we grow, we try to specialize in varieties that not everyone is doing."

It's a long and sometimes bumpy road. Some problems are mundane: Finding the cheapest top-quality seeds was one hurdle. Finding out where to buy produce-shipping boxes was another.

But sometimes they're more serious. A couple of weeks ago, a sudden frost killed all their zucchini plants. "We woke up and they were gone," Johanna says. "There's not anything we can do about it. We'll just have to get more seed and start again.

"With farming, there are always mistakes but there is always another season to get it right. And having a variety of products, if one fails, you're not wiped out because you've put everything into one product.

"It's a struggle, but we're lucky enough to be able to make ends meet," says Johanna, "We don't own our own land or any of those other things, but it's just a great way of life. I don't think I could be working for someone else right now."

For Juan Garcia and his son Armando, farmers markets allowed them to create a business of their own rather than just work for other people. Juan immigrated to north San Diego County from Michoacan in 1975 and went to work for Durling Nursery, a first-rate grower of fruit trees. Today, he's a foreman there supervising 50 workers.

But at the same time he was learning that job, with the help of his son he was striking out as an entrepreneur. Starting with just 9 acres purchased in 1990, he and Armando have gradually put together a farm near Fallbrook that now totals 27 acres of citrus, avocado, tropical fruit and mulberry trees.

"We basically just started putting some money aside," Juan Garcia says. "It was a lot of hard work, I'll tell you. But because I was working at the nursery I was able to get informed on everything coming out that was new. We've really concentrated on getting our hands on the good stuff."

Armando Garcia is a 29-year-old spark plug who practically chases customers down to get them to taste his Page tangerines. "You've got to try this, man, it's the bomb!" he says. And he's right. The fruit has the kind of flavor that only comes with great land, the best varieties and careful farming.

But even with all of that going for them, it might have been a different story had Armando not gotten a part-time job working for another farmers market grower while he and his father were establishing their orchards.

When the trees matured and produced fruit, Armando sold it at his friend's stands. Eventually, he took them over, and today Garcia Organic has coveted spots at Santa Monica's Sunday, Wednesday and Saturday markets.

But in most cases, a new farmer doesn't necessarily mean a new farm. Instead, especially at the more profitable markets, established growers pass along their sweet spots to their kids.

At Santa Monica's Wednesday market, right next to the Coleman's stand is Coastal Farms, where Mark Carpenter is working alongside mother Maryanne and father Paul, selling lettuce, squash and grape tomatoes.

A little farther along is Gloria Tamai, part of a farmers market family that is going on four generations (her sister-in-law Daisy is usually helping out at Green Farms on the other side of Arizona Avenue).

The chain started with their father, Jim Tamai, who, along with Bill Coleman, was among the first farmers at the Santa Monica market. He passed away last spring and now, in addition to the two daughters and a daughter-in-law, there are eight grandchildren in the business as well.

Also nearby is Maggie's Farm, run by Dennis Peitso and his son Nate.

And just up Arizona Avenue is Harry's Berries, run by the combined Gean and Iwamoto families and named for the late patriarch, Harry Iwamoto, who got them started growing strawberries for the farmers markets. Today Kaz and Yoshiko Iwamoto run the business side, and Molly and her husband, Rick Gean, supervise the farming and the selling. In addition, there are five assorted children and grandchildren working the markets.

A successful handoff

AS WITH all family businesses, the transition from one generation to the next isn't always seamless. Molly Gean says the secret to Harry's Berries' success was each person focusing on what he or she does best and staying out of the others' ways. "I'd say we try to avoid conflict by staying in our own corners."

"It's funny how attached we get to doing something the way we've always done it," says Bill Coleman, whose gruff demeanor is legendary. "I finally came to the realization that I'm not that important anymore. There's somebody else who is doing what I used to do and he's doing a really good job, too.

"And I'll tell you what, the first time someone came up to me and asked me how it felt to have my son following in my footsteps, I almost cried. I'm so lucky, so very lucky."

For Romeo, the future is a little more mixed. As in love as he is with the farming life, he also realizes "my longest vacation from now on is going to be six days, and I'm never going to have another Wednesday off."

READ MULCHBLOG.COM

2008-05-04T21:20:00.007-04:00

Wow, much to read on mulchblog.com!
Ken Cook, president of Environmental Working Group, a public interest research and advocacy organization sums up two articles he believes are must reads on the farm bill, one I've copied in the post below, "Farm Bill upends normal political order." Tough to read if you're a critic of President Bush and a supporter of Nancy Pelosi.

If you are confused and squirming, read this blogger, who wants you to see Bush in context and if you heard that Pres. Bush recommended eating local foods, read more here... http://expatriateskitchen.blogspot.com/

Thanks to cleanerplateclub.wordress.com for the lead. http://cleanerplateclub.wordpress.com/

Yesterday, May 3, 2008, Ken Cook on mulchblog.com quotes from the Wall Street Journal on The Ethanol Boom: " Washington's Having Second Thoughts".... http://www.mulchblog.com

"Farm bill upends normal political order"

2008-05-04T21:14:00.001-04:00

Carolyn Lochhead, San Francisco Chronicle, Washington Bureau

Sunday, May 4, 2008
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Associated Press photo by Jim...

(05-04) 04:00 PDT Washington - -- It is the rarest of moments: President Bush and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi are on a collision course over a giant farm bill, but it is Bush who is broadly aligned with liberal Bay Area activists pushing for reform, while the San Francisco Democrat is protecting billions of dollars in subsidies to the richest farmers.

A conference committee approved on Thursday most of a nearly $300 billion farm bill that will lock in the nation's food policy and environmental stewardship on millions of acres of private land for the next five years. Hoping to survive a veto, lawmakers doled out money to everyone from thoroughbred racehorse owners to food-stamp recipients.

The package melds last year's House and Senate farm bills for votes in both chambers before going to the White House. Several controversies remain to be worked out this week. The administration threatened a veto, with Bush deriding a "massive, bloated" effort.

Lawmakers are betting that Bush will not dare kill a $10.3 billion increase in nutrition spending such as food stamps, which make up the bulk of the bill, or anger farm-state Republicans in an election year. If he does, they plan to override him.

Congress has its bases covered. Each interest group represented in the sprawling legislation - from tiny Santa Cruz organic vegetable growers to Georgia cotton magnates, from conservationists to prairie-plowers - gets enough money that it would prefer this bill rather than start over with a new president.

Farm bills come around just once every five years and usually fly under the radar of most lawmakers and the public, making it easy for Congress to tout the bills as aid to family farmers. The commodity supports - born as temporary economic aids in the 1930s - are mind-numbingly complicated and get little notice outside the farm press, despite their enormous impact on U.S. food policy. Urban lawmakers are normally happy to vote for crop subsidies in exchange for food-stamp votes from rural lawmakers. It is textbook political logrolling.

This year looked different. The local-food movement, concentrated in the Bay Area, increased attention on subsidy-driven distortions that supercharge the industrialization of agriculture, boost corn-based sugars, fats and starches in the U.S. diet and undermine poor farmers overseas.

California, the nation's farming giant, stepped into the bargaining. Produce growers, left out of crop subsidies since the 1930s, demanded marketing aid. Long-neglected organic growers were desperate for research help. Public health advocates wanted healthier school lunches. Environmentalists saw millions of acres of private land ripe for conservation and improved farming practices to reduce water and air pollution.

These groups allied with budget hawks to try to shift aid from commodities to healthier food and more sustainable farming.

The administration proposed a farm bill two years ago that would have cut off payments to wealthy farmers, modernized subsidies, and moved money to nutrition and environmental programs. When former Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns told groups the administration's plans, "They didn't believe it," said Department of Agriculture spokesman Keith Williams. "He'd get jeers, and he'd say, 'No, it's in here.' "

Pelosi threw her weight behind farm-state Democrats, pushing a bill through the House last summer that protected subsidies, and ostensibly, the newly elected Democrats from rural districts.

"The administration is our ally in wanting more significant commodity reform," said Heather Fenney, coordinator of the California Food and Justice Coalition, a Berkeley-based group pushing for healthier food and sustainable farming.

"We've wondered if we weren't living in a parallel universe," said Ken Cook, president of Environmental Working Group. "The president has been to the left of the speaker."

Instead of cutting subsidies, Congress increased spending, raised taxes and engaged in budget acrobatics to make everything appear to fit.

As the commodities boom accelerated over the winter, boosting farm income to new records, the disconnect between the farm bill and economic reality grew more bizarre. Food riots broke out in Egypt, Haiti and other countries where the poor spend much of their earnings on food. At home, food inflation hit 4.4 percent, squeezing consumers already pinched by fuel prices.

The bill would spend about $5 billion a year on automatic payments, mostly to farmers of five crops - corn, wheat, cotton, rice and soybeans - giving two-thirds of the money to the top 10 percent of growers. Embarrassed by the spectacle, some farm-state lawmakers pushed for payment limits, fearing a loss of public support for farm aid.

Pelosi touted a ban on payments to farm couples earning more than $2 million, 10 times higher than Bush's $200,000 income limit.

At the same time, she backed a 50 percent increase in the actual amount of money each farmer could get. The Senate added a new $3.8 billion "permanent disaster" program to bail out farmers of drought-prone land, intensifying the push to plow fragile prairie.

"This is not even the illusion of reform," said Rep. Ron Kind, a Wisconsin Democrat who intends to fight a $1.7 billion cut in money added by the House for conservation. "Not when you dole out $50 billion in direct payments over 10 years that bear no relation to market prices or production. ... The president is right."

Ferd Hoefner, policy director of the Sustainable Agriculture Coalition, called the administration's proposals a mixed bag, saying administration officials "sit in the room with an incredible amount of leverage and don't negotiate."

Congress, however, produced "an utter lack of effective pro-family-farmer reform," Hoefner added.

To avoid a Bush veto, negotiators devised a complicated scheme to limit payments to extremely wealthy landowners. Hoefner calculated that married couples would have to earn $2.9 million to lose their federal checks.

At the same time, the bill would boost by 25 percent the payments farmers can collect, said Chuck Hassebrook, executive director of the Center for Rural Affairs.

"It's remarkable that anyone could call this reform with a straight face," Hassebrook said.

To secure votes, negotiators added a $93 million write-off for thoroughbred racehorses at the behest of Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, and Arkansas Democratic Sen. Blanche Lincoln. That is nearly as much money as organic farmers will get for research, data collection and certification help for small growers.

The organic money is "a very significant step, but it is very far away from a fair share" given the gains organic food has made in the market, said Mark Lipson, policy program director for the Organic Farming Research Foundation in Santa Cruz. Still, he prefers the bill to pass for fear of losing this money.

"It's just transactional politics at its worst," said Rep. Jeff Flake, a maverick Arizona Republican who plans to attack the bill on the House floor.

Pelosi threatened to blast Bush for killing the food-stamp increase if he vetoes the bill, issuing a statement urging Bush to sign the legislation to "ensure that 38 million Americans - especially children - have improved access to basic nutrition."

Adding to the likelihood that Congress could find the votes to override a veto: California fruit and vegetable growers would be furious if a veto kills their first-ever funding. Conservation groups fear losing $4 billion in new funding for environmental programs, even though that figure was cut back to make way for the disaster program.

Farm-state Republicans met with Bush to pressure him to sign the bill. "We need him to understand that this is good policy," said Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga.

Democratic presidential contenders Sens. Barack Obama of Illinois and Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York supported the farm bill last year. Likely GOP nominee Sen. John McCain of Arizona backed a failed effort at a radical overhaul and told Iowans last week that if he were president he would veto the bill, calling crop subsidies unnecessary.

For a list of senators and representatives serving on the conference committee, go to links.sfgate.com/ZDGB

E-mail Carolyn Lochhead at clochhead@sfchronicle.com.