'Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food' is a joke

That article is a joke right Mr. Keller?

Sounds like the middle man is upset that he will not be getting a cut of my grass fed beef and fresh picked fruits and vegetables. Big Ag. is scared of the local movement because farmers are learning to market direct to the consumer with better quality and freshness at competitive price.

Too many years, Mr. Keller, has the commodity system paid the farmer squat for his product. You mean to tell me that last year's $80/h on prime beef cattle was a fair price to the farmer. Two years earlier the same steer would have brought $125/h. Inputs have doubled for farmers yet they get paid less and less. Over 80% of farms get most of their income from off farm jobs.

Mr. Keller seems to forget that 90% of the farms in this country are still family run. And by making statements like this article he attacking each and everyone.

Be afraid Mr. Keller, there is a change coming. You and your kind have cheated the small farmer far too long. Sure there will always be a demand for cheap crappy over processed food but it is unlikely that it will come from US farmers. It is cheaper to produce overseas.

So keep pushing the rock hard strawberries and woody tomatoes, because I will wait for mine to come in season and sell everyone to very grateful customers. What I don't sell either goes in the freezer for jam production for next year's market.

BTW. What I don't sell or use myself goes to the local food pantry and refuge centers. So you see, local producers are doing something about the hungry.

What exactly have you done?

The system we have now is cheap only because it's subsidized. The problem with pricing is not that local and organic are overpriced, it is that industrial food is underpriced. We may say that we want cheap food, but between large crop subsidies and companies like Wal-Mart that can sell cheap only by keeping workers below a living wage... that cheap food is, in fact, costing us more in taxes than that "overpriced" local or organic food. My mom sees countless Wal-Mart employees on MediCare and MediCaid, and we all know farmers of all varieties are underpaid for their product. To complain about funding for small farmers, or to claim that our food system has "evolved" as all things, naturally, as one of your readers has claimed, is absurd in its ignorance of the huge costs of large-scale industrial agriculture (including the cost of cleaning up SuperFund sites as another reader mentioned).

On your impressively informed thoughts about food deserts, the cheap snacks that poor people "want" are only "wanted" because they're cheap and addictive. What makes them cheap? Corn subsidies: government subsidies, which keep enormous companies like Monsanto with a monopoly in the industry. What might people want if those subsidies disappeared and if sugar weren't added to all cheap food?

You're obviously not the expert on what constitutes "real farming." Take government funding out of the picture entirely, and my bets on large-scale gardening to get us through. Without the government, your "real farming" that works against every natural system to produce as much as possible with any chemicals needed and by pouring nitrogen (produced by an oil-intensive nitrogen fixing system) on fields that are unable to rebuild their own nutrient content would be a financial impossibility.

There are many valid concerns about the local food movement: you've made several points that have nothing to do with those valid concerns. And my final point: Cuba's undernourished population, according to the U.N. World Food Program? Less than 2.5%. The United States households that experience hunger? 5.7% according to the USDA, and another 10% are at risk of hunger. Is the current U.S. government subsidized "private enterprise" system really working that much better than Cuba's?

Richard, I think we could agree that the supply of local high quality food can meet the demand without interference from the government. I don't think we are there yet but we will get there. I agree that throwing government money at agriculture will not change the basic causes of food deserts. I agree that government money is seldom well spent. Many farmers don't like the way money was spent over the years for farm subsidies of all types. I am with you for several paragraphs, but after that I have difficulty following your line of reasoning. You ask does using small plots of land around cities to provide antioxidants, vitamins and minerals in our diets make sense? Sounds reasonable to me. You ask if people in the United States can eat locally? Our forefathers did exactly that for several generations. Numerous farmers are doing it now. Elliot Coleman is one of the more famous ones eating locally year around. He farms in Maine, a place with a relatively short growing season. Personally, I can't grow all the citrus or bananas I want, but I eat a lot better than the average person who doesn't have the same access to local food that I have. What happened to a balanced diet with meat and dairy? Meat and dairy isn't the only way to balance a diet but I eat that way and so do a lot of other people. I have drunk my share of unpasturized milk from grandpa's cows, my aunt's cows, and a neighbors cows. I don't have the knowledge to rehash that particular arguement but I know a lot of healthy men and women that drank unpasturized milk their whole life. I will state that some dairy regulations that claim to be about food safety are not about food safety. By the way, I do know my livestock producers. I like it that way. But maybe we can agree that the government didn't need to throw money around for it to happen.

ignorance on display. richard pull up your pants.

4.8 million is chump change in the scheme of things these days. There are a lot more important places that need addressing where Congress is 'wasting' money and this is not one of them. I am one of those small farmers. My customers want organic food because it is the right thing to do for the land and they want a local farm because it is the right thing for the community. Others have chemical sensitivities and regular food makes them sicker.

When diesel hits $5/gallon, which I hope is sooner than later we will finally turn a profit. I can gross 21K/acre in the mountains of Western North Carolina and I have a lot of food that goes to charity every year instead of putting us in the black simply because I can't sell it. I grow over 200 varieties of small fruits and vegetables on 11 acres. Our farm spends 80K in overhead to paychecks and supplies in our local economy. We price our food at the prevailing wholesale price for retail sales...overpricing is not the reason we don't sell everything we grow.

Walmart is the number one grocery in the nation. Their choices leave a lot to be desired, but the American people shop there because they have no budget for anything else. I haven't stepped into one of their stores in several years, nor will I. I know a super grower (6000 acres) for McDonalds who won't eat the potatoes he grows for them because they are sprayed with chemicals so toxic he cannot step into his field for four days after spraying. Many of these super growers are akin to feed lots...a cesspool of toxic poisons in concentrated amounts. We have an abandonded apple orchard in a neighboring county that is/was a superfund site because the ground itself was toxic.

I don't have to have Organic food on my plate to be happy, but I do have to have an organic back yard. The government is supposed to be into Organics because the consumer cannot on his own detect a cheat. There are many crooks in the produce business; read the Packer newspaper if you don't believe that, or Red Book credit services. USDA is not and cannot at present enforce their own regulations. It would be good for consumers to find out just what and how their food is grown and lessen the need for enforcement of the USDA Organic regulations. I compete with many growers who claim to be growing organic, but are not certified. If they only sell to direct consumers no problem, it's when they get involved with the supermarkets that a problem arises for consumers. Who can say that product is free of toxic chemicals?

Our local food also is vastly superior in taste and freshness. It will keep two to three times longer in the refrigerator than the good looking stuff from Chile or Mexico. Food is going to be grown where labor is cheap unless it is by the super growers who can afford the million dollar machines. Unless folks try us and experience the better quality, how are they to know?

Farming is farming whether it is on five acres or fifty thousand, the methods are different, the seed is different, and the return to the community is vastly different. Americans are after cheaper food, and that means it is going to be grown outside of these borders more and more.
Food safety is becoming a huge issue and that is another story. Coming regulations will end small farms as we know it before long anyway.

Your article is a joke. During WWII, 40% of all produce country in the country was grown in Victory Gardens. Small and medium sized farms can and eventually will feed the nation, because they are efficient, not subsidized and provide healthy food. Per acre yields are better. This also keeps farmers on the land, since as you know the average age of farmers under the industrial model is 57.

What happened to farmer growing our food we want to eat? Nothing. What happened to the farmers when the Congress realized food is a weapon, one that stops the possibilities of revolution within the US. Is it not the full stomach syndrome that stabilizes America? The food producing capacity of the US farmer scares every other country on earth, far greater than our military and probably our Congress has on Earth, so Congress has harnessed this independent machine that could easily function without money, as food carries its own value. The Congress has intertwined their leverage by disrupting the free enterprise of competition between farmers, even those overseas. Farmers like to make money and Americans like cheap food. What else drives average Americans? The only problem with obesity is the social service govt program's cost of health care. Between welfare and medicare for elderly, the obesity is driving Congress to the poor house, and the taxpayers are bailing out Congress's poorly ruled programs. All food is organic, if it goes uneaten it rots. Rotting food is the driving force that controls farmers. Simple.

I just had a meeting with the director of the USDA org. operation. When I asked why it is ok to raise vegies in greenhouses with controlled conditions but animals need to be in uncontroled outdoors? He said "people ask for it". I said "milk is milk, right?", he agreed so then I asked, "So let me be clear that the USDA is making policy and rules based on marketing/feeling not on facts and science.". He softly said "Yes". I said "thanks for making my point.". The entire Roosevelt era USDA needs a overhaul but seeing 6 slides of new regs and hearing how many they need to hire to manage the organic programs is pathetic. Most farm organizations are against cutting subs but the farmers seem to be for getting the Govt outta thier buz. Let us compete and leave us alone! The organic guys are willingly encouraging the USDA to manage their lifes! Crazy

Economies of scale. Think, economies of scale. Someone didn't sit down and decide to invent agriculture as we know it. Agriculture as we know it is an evolution of good and bad practices tried over 100 years. If you're into farmers markets, they are there for you. If you think organics are the way to go, they are there for you also. Mass produced food is what most consumers want. If that were not the case, it would not exist. And don't believe for one minute that subsidies keep the dairy industry or any other ag industry afloat. Most subsidies are a result of government intervention to deal with a problem that would probably have been better dealt with without the intervention. Unfortunately, once the government sticks its nose into something, it usually becomes permanent. Subsidies to ag were originally meant to guarantee supply. They have outlived their usefulness but continue on. There aren't that many opinions on this page but respondents mostly seem to suffer the same problem as they do on other blogs. The writers think being opinionated is the same as being informed. It isn't. Before you write, get the facts.

In reading some of the comments on your article I feel the need to add my own comment. Either I have misread your intent or some others have. As I understand it you are not opposing the local farmers markets or organic foods and I would agree that there is a demand for them. More power to those who choose that route but don't run down traditional agriculture in favor of it; small organic and natural production will never be able to feed the world. Traditional agriculture also produces a safe and nutritious product. The small operations will not take less land but more, so that is not a valid argument. You are correct that there are many areas which would be unable to provide fresh food year round. I feel that part of this whole argument stems from some peoples dislike of large operations and social envy which definitely has been fed by the current administration and the media. Believe it or not, a large farmer is not your enemy (and "no" I am not a large farmer!). We all need to work together in this and offer safe and healthy choices to consumers.

Your rant is way off base. I don't know any small farmers around here raising products for local consumption that receive any government dollars. Can that be said for the farmers raising corn, cotton or peanuts?

I also don't know any small farmers who hope to replace the big ag/grocery store model. They simply want to provide an alternative for those who seek it. What's wrong with freedom of choice?

The concept has many good qualities,
1. It increases the public's awareness of roadside farm stands, farmers markets etc. Not everybody who buys from the grocery store does it because of a conscious decision. And many times the farm direct produce can be cheaper for the consumer.
2. It allows the public to interact with farmers, learn about farming and maybe even produce they would not normally purchase.
3. Large scale agriculture is great because it produces cheap and bountiful food, but the more streamlined agriculture becomes the fewer people are needed to run or own farms. This helps create local jobs and keeps money in the local economy rather than part of a purchase going to the headquarters of the grocery store. It will also help keep land in many areas under cultivation rather than wasting fertile soil for housing developments.

These types of initiative if successful could be very beneficial to farmers and local communities.

I believe there is a wheat/corn/soy/cotton/rice annual subsidy of about $25Billion. Much of this ends up being subsidy for protein.

Small food growing farms (hobby or moderate income) do add many things to a community. There is more to food than just "cheap." The programs to support local and smaller scale programs are just a drop in the bucket of where our money goes.

If you want to get on a bandwagon - look at the major subsidy programs for 99.99% of the money.

It is not a joke. It may not be the answer for everyone, but neither is big commercial ag. If we want to really say on what the US was built, it was built on REAL competition. The 4.8 million dollar subsidy to small farmers is a timy drop in the bucket of big ag subsidies. If you really want to be fair take away ALL subsidies for agriculture. The dairy industry would collapse, the poultry and pork industries would go under. Corn would no longer be such a simple money maker. Farming would be tougher for everyone but it would be a more even playing field.

I don't think forcing carrots into a market where no one desires them is the answer either. I agree much of what Obama is doing is bunk. I do think that small ag has a very important place however, especially in this job market where so many folks are out of work. If a market garden or a herd of grass fed beef cattle can support a family through the years when work is scarce, then it IS farming. Just because you don't drive a quarter million dollar tractor and are 5 million in debt does not mean you aren't farming.

i agree completely with your article. Please move this discussion forward with "our" employees at the USDA. They must really know better than to mislead the general public into believing this is going to be the method by which agriculture can raise their standard of living and provide large quanitities of high quality, safe and affordable foods for all the citizens of this world.

Richard, You have absolutely hit the nail on the head!!! On one hand USDA crows about our agricultural export surplus; and in nearly the same breath they decry how modern agriculture in "unsustainable!" What is truly unsustainable is the phoney idea that backyards will feed the world! Thanks for taking this on!

Agree that most consumers in the U.S. purchase food based on price. Was speaking with the grocery manager at the local Walmart yesterday. He was asking how our swine operation is weathering the economic downturn. He stated that while traditional grocery store chains have seen declines in sales, Walmart's grocery section has seen increased sales because the prices are lower.