No Luck for the Small Farmer

December 31, 2007 by: Josh

I remember my grandfather waking me up at 5:00 a.m. every Saturday morning to help work the garden. We would take our freshly picked vegetables to the farmers market, where he would back the truck up into the crowded parking lot. Not long ago, I was in middle school at the time, in the early 90s. He always gave me our earnings, usually around $100. Looking at it now, he gave me more than that. I learned values, responsibility, and work ethic.

I grew up on a small farm, where daily chores were the norm. While my friends were playing the new Sega video game system, I was outside. Some of my favorite activities included: bailing hay, riding the tractor, fishing, catching chickens, rounding up cattle, and watching deer in the fields.

My grandfather grew up in the Great Depression, a time when farms were going out of business left and right. Farming to him was more than just a side hobby; it was putting food on the table. Thanks to Franklin Roosevelt and his New Deal programs of the 1930s, there was a temporary solution to assist these family farms; it was called the “Farm Bill”. The first legislation established target prices for commodity crops (wheat, corn, cotton, & rice) and provided payments for farm land and conservation efforts.

70 years later, this promised temporary measure to bring family farms out of the Great Depression, has now turned into a monopolizing funnel where huge government payments (2007 reform bill - $286 billion) are sent to the biggest producers (mostly corporations), making it even harder for the small family farm to exist. Thanks congress, for now making farming a corporate affair.

Get this; one doesn’t even have to be a farmer anymore to receive subsidies. Corporate land investors are buying up land with farm subsidies, getting rights to those payments. They don’t even have to own a tractor. I wonder why land prices keep skyrocketing.

So why does this hurt the small farmer? If corporations have more incentive to over produce and receive greater subsidies, this floods the world market with product, while shrinking available land resources. Over supply decreases prices. Small farmers cannot compete within these conditions. Corporations can now set the pricing structure for our nation’s commodities. Not even mentioning the violations of international rules set by the WTO, for free trade.

How about the statistics?

I recently stopped by that same farmers market, which used to be lined with over 50 farmers brining in produce to sell. Guess how many trucks? Only 3. Every farmer there does it as a retirement hobby, not one of them younger than 60.

I dream of buying a small farm to raise my children on. I won’t be able to do it full-time, it will have to be a side hobby. I want to instill the same values in them, which my grandfather did in me. It will be hard, as small farms today are rarely self-sustainable. This year’s farm bill, the “Food and Energy Security Act of 2007”, is not looking good for the small guys.

- Josh