Farm Act Could Boost Florida Family Farm Subsidies
(Posted June 13, 2011 07:05 am)
OCALA, FL - Legislation introduced in Congress could level the playing field for farmers in Florida and elsewhere.
The Rural America Preservation Act of 2011, sponsored by Sens. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and Tim Johnson, D-S.D., could help small and mid-sized farmers by changing the cap on farm commodity program payments in an effort to limit subsidies to larger, corporate farms.
The largest farming operations have the resources, capacity and political connections to maximize subsidy payments, says Taylor Reid, representing the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition, and that leaves smaller farmers in the dust.
Links of interest:
Am Farm Bureau Fed
Fl Farm Bureau
"When we subsidize on the basis of the amount of
product produced, we disproportionately subsidize those
farms that are already making a lot of money."
Republicans in Congress generally favor continuing the
direct subsidies, whether commodity crop prices are high
or low. They say farms of all sizes are being squeezed
by higher prices for fuel, land, equipment and
fertilizers. However, Reid says the subsidies no longer
serve their original purpose and should be given based
on economic need.
The federal government is cutting deep into agriculture
programs and hurting the local family farms, Reid says,
while tax dollars are being spent on subsidies for
big-profit farms which don't trickle down to Florida
towns and cities.
"Very little of that money comes back into the local
economy. When you have a family farmer, they're buying
food at the local grocery, they're contributing on
Sunday at their local church, they're buying coffee at
the local coffee shop."
From 1995 to 2009, Reid says, 10 percent of Florida
farms collected more than 70 percent of the commodity
program payments.