"Farmers, ranchers and rural residents need affordable and accessible health care. We remain concerned that mandating individuals and businesses to buy insurance will impose an expense that creates economic hardship, particularly for self-employed individuals and small businesses." ~ American Farm Bureau Federation President Bob StallmanJune 28th 2012, Washington, D.C. -- The Supreme Court ruling upholding the constitutionality of the Health Care Reform Act has increased concern among intelligent individuals who are preparing for when the store shelves are empty. Mandatory health care will generate increased expenses for small farming families who make their living performing a dangerous occupation. Insurance companies have always been reluctant to insure farmers, and if they did create a policy, it came at a huge expense. High deductibles, matched with limited coverage, make it almost impossible for farmers to successfully produce food and pay for health care. Today they have a choice, but what happens when that choice is made for them?
I would like to know if the president, along with the entire Supreme Court, understands that consumers spend $547 billion for food originating on U.S. farms and ranches. Of each dollar spent on food, the farmer's share is approximately 23 cents. The rest is for costs beyond the farm gate: wages and materials for production, processing, marketing, transportation, and distribution. Now, add in the fact that each farmer will be required to purchase health care, and you get a net income well below poverty level.
Now, what happens when they are faced with the decision to continue farming, or break the law? My guess is that they will sell what land they have, hang up their boots, and look for a job with benefits.
There has never been a better time to start growing your own food!
Sadly, this isn't the first time the government strong-armed the
food and farm industry. One of the most ambitious grabs for control over
food production since the administration of Franklin D. Roosevelt was
the Food Safety Modernization Act of 2010. After months of wrangling,
the Food Safety Modernization Act passed the House and Senate, and
received the president`s endorsement. The Food Safety Modernization Act grants the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) almost unlimited power to regulate the food supply across the nation. Those new powers, many believe, could virtually take the food off your plate. That's because the new law could bankrupt many small farmers across the nation. As small farmers vanish, consumers will no longer have access to fresh, local, organic produce. It's a huge blow to those who believe in the right to choose what foods they eat. Most consumers, and even farmers, didn't see it coming.
Local food movement threatens corporate profits
As the local and organic food movement has gathered steam in recent
years, small farming has enjoyed resurgence. The items on your dinner
plate have traveled an average of 1500 miles from farm to fork--unless
you buy from a local farmers market or farm stand. More and more,
people want to know where their food comes from. Nationwide, food
recalls are one reason driving the trend. In 2006, fresh spinach from a
multinational corporation sickened hundreds of people. Three people
died. In 2008, fresh produce used to make salsa at a leading fast food
chain sickened hundreds across the country. And most recently, on June
24th 2012, a major corporation recalled over 1,000 bags of lettuce due
to a possible listeria risk. It's no wonder that farmers markets have exploded in the past 15 years, growing by 245%. In 1995, there were only 1,775 farmers markets across the nation. Today, there are 7,175. Many communities now even have winter markets as farmers use innovative growing techniques to meet year-round demand.
The local and organic food movement, however, has not escaped the notice of industrial giants. In recent years, agri-biz public relations campaigns reflect a "damage control" strategy aimed at protecting their turf. With major portions of the Food Safety Modernization Act shaped by agri-biz lobbyists, many local food advocates suspect the bill is also part of that strategy. Burdensome new regulations, small farm advocates say, will squeeze out small farmers. It's a blatant attempt, they believe, to quash the local and organic food movement.
Big Government to micromanage all farms
That's because the Food Safety Modernization Act gives the FDA broad
new powers to dictate to farmers how they must grow produce. New
regulations will control every aspect of farm production. Almost nothing
is left to a farmer's discretion--not soil composition, water use,
what chemicals are permitted or even required, harvesting techniques,
packing processes, production temperatures, and more. The Tester Amendment was added to the bill to appease critics. The amendment exempts small facilities from the same types of large, expensive food safety plans that larger operations use. Small facilities are defined as farms with less than $500,000 in gross revenue that sell directly to individuals, restaurants, or grocery stores within a 275 mile radius. The mountain of documentation to qualify for the exemption, however, is almost as onerous as the safety plans themselves. The cost of complying with other parts of the bill, including record keeping, will still be a huge burden for small operations. Small farmers will find it almost impossible to grow or innovate.
Next season, when you go to your local farmers market, you could find that your favorite farmer has gone out of business. The prices you have to pay to farmers who have managed to remain in business could skyrocket, reflecting the huge costs of the new "food safety" regulations, and mandatory health care.
In the face of shrinking supplies and rising prices, many will turn to gardening instead. After all, if you can't buy the vegetables you need, you can grow them, right?
Today you can. But the next growing season ... perhaps not.
Will heirloom seeds be confiscated, or even outlawed?
According to the FDA, seeds are food. That means they get to regulate them. The FDA decides what seeds are "safe" and what are "unsafe." And just as with contaminated food, they can seize or even outlaw any seeds they deem "contaminated."
Today, there's a robust community of farmers, gardeners, and environmentalists who use heirloom seeds. Heirloom seeds are seeds that have been cultivated for hundreds of years. They don't grow well using modern industrial methods. That's why you seldom see heirloom produce in your grocery store. Heirloom varieties yield crops that offer superior flavor and nutrition. If you grow your own heirloom crops, a few simple techniques will allow you to save the seed from one harvest to use in the future. (You can't do that with modern hybrid and genetically modified seeds. Instead, you must buy new seeds each year.) On a larger scale, seed cleaning equipment is necessary to clean enough heirloom seed to meet commercial demand. The seed is then stored in special facilities on its way to farmers and gardeners.
It's these equipment and facilities that have recently come under the scrutiny of the FDA. According to the FDA, seed cleaning equipment and seed storage facilities could "contaminate" the seeds. Complex regulations are now on the books to prevent this "potential contamination." It's those costs that are squeezing many small seed cleaners out of business. Only the global giants can afford to comply with the convoluted and numerous regulations.
When small seed cleaners do manage to scrape together the capital to install expensive equipment to meet regulations, they're often bullied out of business. Giant agricultural corporations have a history of suing small seed cleaners because they "might" have inadvertently cleaned patent-protected genetically modified seeds. In the strange world of agricultural law, the seed cleaners are "guilty until proven innocent." Many can't afford the years of litigation and hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal costs to prove their innocence. They simply give up and shut down their businesses.
The FDA hasn't reached into the home gardens of citizens to impose seed saving laws on them - yet. But they might as well have. With the passage of the Food Safety Modernization Act, the small companies that provide home gardeners and small farmers with heirloom seeds are in the FDA's crosshairs more than ever before. It may just be a matter of time until heirloom seed companies are forced out of business.
