Dirt Rich, Dirt Poor

America's Food and Farm Crisis

Joseph N. Belden, Vincent P. Wilber, Enid Kassner, Rus Sykes, Ed Cooney, Lynn Parker, Alan Sanders, Cynthia Schneider, Marsha Simon

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2019
• eBook ISBN: 9781000682427
• Topic: Biological Sciences
• Subtopic: Ecology
• Index: Biological Sciences

This book, first published in 1986, is a major reference work for the political discussions arising out of the 1985 Congress revisions of US food and farm laws. It covers production, distribution and consumption of food, analyses international as well as domestic problems, and presents new ways forward. Emphasising public policy and programmes, the book has chapters on agricultural production; environmental and resource problems; food marketing; domestic hunger and nutrition; and world hunger and development.

1 Introduction: The continuing crisis

The American food system is in crisis. That sentence or one very like it has introduced the hundreds of books, articles, reports, bills, laws and debates about food and agriculture of the last century. Such a sentence could have been written in the 1980s, the 1930s or the 1880s, and to an outsider it sounds like the little boy who cried wolf: the food system is always in deep trouble.

But what is the perennial problem? Why the crisis? On the face of it, the problem is a paradox. A growing number of Americans suffer hunger and malnutrition because of recent, severe federal budget cuts and an uncertain economy. On the production side, farm surpluses grow, and, consequently, depress farm income. At the same time, middle-income consumers confront a bewildering array of food products on their supermarket shelves. Many of these products have been so processed that they no longer resemble food. While paying a high price for these ‘foods,’ all consumers are affected by diet-related diseases.

This plenty in the midst of hunger, and disease in the midst of affluence, shows that policy has failed in all areas. During the 1970s, federal domestic feeding programs helped to reduce hunger, but since 1981 these programs have been cut back – with a resultant rise in hunger, malnutrition and infant mortality.

For fifty years, government policy has tried to protect the farm sector. Success has been incomplete at best, but in 1982 and 1983, support programs, especially the payment-in-kind (PIK) program, were disastrous. The farm program price tag reached $34 billion in 1983, but most of the benefits of PIK went to the very largest farm operators -those who needed it least. The program was a bail-out for the rich, financed by the taxpayer at enormous public cost. At the same time, mid-sized farmers were forced out of farming in record numbers.

Hunger and a depressed farm economy are only the most obvious examples of the problems of the food system short- and long-term. Beneath these headline-grabbers are other continuing difficulties in the food system – increasing concentration of economic power at all levels, growing resource constraints and environmental degradation, declining food quality and nutritional standards, starvation and malnutrition abroad as well as at home, and inequity for workers in the system.

The present U.S. food system does not benefit producers, food industry workers or consumers. Policy-makers and activists concerned about these problems need to examine them in a new way. Many groups and individuals have formulated pieces of a solution in the past. Others have concentrated on rearguard actions to defend existing programs.

But what is needed is an overall reform of all parts of food policy. The intensifying problems of the 1980s -problems rooted both in decades of neglect and in recent failures – may soon become irreversible. In 1985, Congress took up its quadrennial rewriting of the major farm and food laws. Some progress was made in 1985, but not enough. The growing need for change in many areas continues to set the stage for a fundamental re-examination of policy.

Problems in the system

The American food system is, from a traditional perspective, a wonder of productivity and efficiency. The history of twentieth-century agriculture seems to be a continuous march of progress – increasingly efficient farmers using new technologies to provide more than enough food for an expanding population, creating so much surplus that it cannot all be sold or even given away at home or abroad. Some statistics point to the astounding capacities of this food-producing machine. In 1900, about 38 percent of the labor force worked in agriculture, while today less than 3 percent of the work force labors on farms. This tiny group produces literal mountains of food and fiber. Government surplus warehouses bulge with dairy products; grain is left unsold in huge heaps; and many fruit and vegetable crops are left to rot in the fields because market prices are too low to make harvest and sale profitable. On top of this American farmers now export 30 percent of their total production – up from 10 percent in the 1950s.

This prodigious efficiency would seem to indicate that the eons-old battle with starvation is over, at least in rich countries, many of which produce enough to help feed hungry people in poorer nations. But this picture of abundance is not as rosy as it appears. Beneath the surface are a number of problems which are intimately linked with how and why the food system has changed in this century and with the role of government in those changes.

Some of the most important problems are related to the control of agricultural production:

• Farmers in the 1980s face hard times not seen since the 1930s. Income fell very sharply in 1980–82 after a record year in 1979, and has continued to drop.
• Bad times mean that farm debt has increased. Farm loan delinquencies and foreclosures are increasing. In mid-1984, more than 40 percent of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Farmers Home Administration loans were delinquent. The $216 billion farm debt of 1983 – up from $29 billion in 1970 – could triple to $600 billion by 1990.
• Farmers are growing older and fewer in number. In the mid-1930s there were over six million farms; today there are about 2.4 million. Seven of every ten farmland owners in 1978 were over fifty years of age, an indication that younger people may not be available to step into the places of their elders in a few years, assuming that the young could afford to make the leap.
• Average farm size has been increasing rapidly. In 1940, the average farm was 175 acres. By 1974 farm size averaged 388 acres, and by 1981 the average was 429 acres.
• Related to farm debt is the now overwhelming cost of starting out in agriculture – an investment of at least $750,000 for a viable, mid-sized operation. Without riches in the bank or an inherited farm, it is almost impossible for young people to get into farming as farm owners, regardless of their skill or experience.
• Economic control of agriculture is becoming more and more concentrated. About 20 percent of all farms account for approximately 80 percent of total farm sales. Less than 3 percent of the nation’s population owns all the agricultural land. Farmers also are increasingly controlled by a dwindling number of inputs suppliers and a dwindling number of buyers for their products.
• Absentee investors and large non-farm corporations own an increasing percentage of agricultural resources – land, equipment, livestock and other assets. Fed by incentives in the tax code, outside investment in agriculture puts real farmers who depend on agriculture for their livelihood at a growing disadvantage.
• Seasonal migrant agricultural laborers are among the nation’s most underprivileged groups. Poorly protected by federal and state laws, these three million workers have made some advances in recent years but still face low wages, dangerous working conditions, employer hostility to labor organizing, and competition from undocumented workers. Even where protections exist, employers frequently ignore them.
• Farm poverty remains a mostly invisible but persistent reality. The poverty rate for farm residents in 1982 was 22.1 percent, as compared to 14.8 percent for the non-farm population. Fifty-one percent of the black farm population and 60 percent of the Hispanic farm population were poor in 1982.

Another group of problems has to do with control of food marketing:

• Economic concentration in the food manufacturing and processing industries is increasing. The 50 biggest firms in food manufacturing increased their control of industry assets from 36 percent in 1950 to 64 percent in 1978. Farmers lose out when they must sell to market-dominating processors, and consumers lose too. Consumer overcharge due to economic concentration in food manufacturing amounts to $15 billion a year. Farmers make on average only about 40 cents of each dollar spent on food; the rest goes to the marketer.
• Food retailing is also moving toward greater economic concentration. In 1948, grocery chains of more than 100 stores controlled 27 percent of sales. By 1977 this control had increased to 41 percent. At the same time, technological changes in this industry threaten jobs.

A third set of food-system problems has to do with natural resources and the environment:

• Agriculture is dependent on energy inputs, particularly those that are fossil-fuel based. Modern production techniques require large doses of diesel fuel, oil and gasoline, electricity, natural gas and other sources of energy to power vehicles and machinery, produce fertilizer and pesticides, dry and store crops, and transport food. As the costs of the resources needed for production and marketing rise and their availability declines or becomes uncertain, farming creeps further out on the limb of energy dependence. In fact, if all the earth’s food were raised using U.S.-style, energy-intensive methods, known world petroleum reserves would be exhausted in only thirteen years.
• Each year about three million acres of the country’s 540-million-acre cropland base are lost to housing construction, commercial and industrial development, water projects, lakes and highways. The best agricultural land – flat, well-watered and drained – also happens to be ideal for suburban housing, industry and shopping centers. In areas of population growth, food production is moving farther and farther away from its ultimate users.
• Wind and water erosion destroy almost 6.5 billion tons of topsoil each year. About one-third of the topsoil base has been lost over the last 200 years.
• American agriculture in many parts of the nation, particularly in the West, is based on elaborate irrigation systems. Once surface water met most of the irrigation demand, but now ground water (i.e., underground) supplies are being tapped and, in some areas, depleted.
• Agriculture also places a great deal of stress on the environment and human health. Livestock feedlots and the heavy use of fertilizers cause water pollution. Pesticides are a health hazard to the farmer and are ultimately self-defeating, as their target species develop resistance to commonly used pesticides and as the poisons kill off natural pest predators. Continuous planting of the same crop year after year (monoculture) depletes soil nutrients and leads to escalating dependence on chemical fertilizers.

A fourth group of issues involves food consumption.

• Many Americans overeat or consume poor-quality diets. The now defunct Senate Select Committee on Nutrition and Human Needs recommended in 1977 that people consume less fat, sugar and salt, and more grains, vegetables and fruits. The food industry vehemently opposed this common-sense approach to diet, and since 1981 the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and Congress have not publicized these recommendations.
• Food safety and quality are also problems for consumers. Since 1970, the number of additives in our food has risen 40 percent – 27,000 additives are now in use. Current federal labeling and testing regulations are inadequate to protect human health.
• Hunger in the United States is on the rise, as a result of the deep budget cuts made in food programs since 1981. Food stamp benefits amount to only about 43 cents per meal for each of the 22 million people now receiving them, while many of the 35 million people now living in poverty are not even on the program. More than $5 billion was cut from the food stamp program in 1981 and 1982.

A final area of concern is international trade and development assistance:

• During the 1970s, foreign demand for U.S. farm products grew about 8 percent per year. In 1960, about 10 percent of U.S. commodities was exported, but by 1980 this had grown to 28 percent. In today’s plummeting farm economy, the constant cry is for more exports. Increased exports are seen as the solution. Yet it is foolish to rely on trade as a solution to domestic farm problems. Demand is uncertain, and the crops needed for an extensive export program will mean production on marginal land, leading to overuse of resources like soil and water. Exports also can compete with indigenous agricultural production in importing countries, and most international trade is controlled by giant multi-national corporations.
• Each year 40 million people, most of them children, die of starvation or diet-related diseases. Hundreds of millions more go hungry. Yet adequate resources exist in every country to produce food for all. The problem is that land and other resources are used in less-developed countries to produce cash crops for export, rather than to raise food for the local populace.

In brief overview, those are the problems. Public policies are, in theory, addressing them – leaving us with the central question: Have those policies succeeded?

Food production is the most heavily subsidized sector of our economy. Government at all levels has long tried to promote food production and protect consumers. It is ironic that – at the federal level particularly – government is also the cause of many of the problems described in the preceding section.

In many government agriculture policies, a sort of schizophrenia is at work that results in programs operating at cross-purposes – and that end up hurting the very people they are supposed to help. Contradictions in the food system cannot be removed without eliminating this schizophrenia. To do this we must first explore the overall goals of the food system and U.S. food policy.

Goals for an equitable, regenerative and healthful food system

A preliminary step toward preparing a national food policy is laying out a set of specific goals. A statement of goals cannot be immutable; it should instead be dynamic, subject to amendment as circumstances change. But it should be founded on certain basic principles: equity, security, conservation and human health.

Economist John Lee of the U.S. Department of Agriculture has offered a simple parable to illustrate the value of long-range goal setting:

The story is told of three stonemasons who were asked what they were doing. The first replied, ‘I am laying stone.’ The second replied, ‘I am building a wall.’ The third, being a person of vision and purpose, replied, ‘I am building a cathedral.’ Perhaps a clearly articulated and well-understood food policy could help program managers see how the stones they lay and the walls they build are contributing to the larger cathedral – to a sound and productive food system and to the nutritional well-being of people here and abroad, present and future.¹

Lee, who directs USDA’s Economic Research Service, has also outlined a long list of food-policy goals:

• Adequate income and returns for producers
• Reduction of risk and uncertainty in agricultural production
• Managerial freedom
• Access to market information for both producers and consumers
• Competitive markets for farm products and fair market practices
• Security of the food supply
• Reasonable food prices
• Safe, wholesome and nutritious food
• A wide variety and choice of food
• Efficient use and conservation of natural resources
• Environmental quality
• An efficient and competitive structure for the food distribution system
• Adequate economic returns to the people and groups necessary for an efficient system
• Equitable distribution of economic returns and power.
• Resilience in the face of stress
• Access to food for all the population
• Consistenc...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Original Title Page
• Original Copyright Page
• Contents
• Series editor’s preface
• Acknowledgments
• Preface to the re-issue of 2019
• 1 Introduction: The scontinuing crisis
• 2 Land and food: Who controls production and marketing?
• 3 Fire in the earth: Technology, resources and the environment
• 4 Glut of hunger: An analysis of federal food assistance programs
• 5 World hunger, world markets
• 6 Conclusions: Toward the year 2000
• Notes
• Select bibliography
• Index