Contextualizing the Farm Bill: questions of food, land and agricultural governance

• Published in: Renewable agriculture and food systems Vol. 35; no. 4; pp. 352 - 357
• Main Authors: Graddy-Lovelace, Garrett, Diamond, Adam, Ichikawa, Nina F.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Cambridge, UK Cambridge University Press 01.08.2020
• Subjects: Agricultural land; Agricultural policy; Agricultural production; Agricultural subsidies; Agriculture; Bipartisanship; Commodities; COVID-19; Crop insurance; Debates; Discrimination; Farmers; Farms; Food stamps; Geopolitics; Households; Legislation; Logistics; Nutrition; Political activism; Pricing; Racism; Rural areas; Soil conservation; Special Issue:U.S. Farm Bill: Policy, Politics, and Potential; Subsidies; US exports; United States > US; Farm Bill; land use; agricultural governance; farm policy; food justice; interdisciplinary
• ISSN: 1742-1705; 1742-1713
• DOI: 10.1017/S1742170520000125

According to USDA ERS forecasts in early 2020, median farm income earned by farm households increased in 2019 to -$1,383 from -$1,735 in 2018 but was expected to decline to -$1,840 in 2020. The Farm Bill's structure attests to the fact that nutrition and soil conservation are inextricably related in a much larger system of production, distribution and consumption, and need to be governed and analyzed as such. [...]the term ‘renewable’ encompasses the urgency of Farm Bill logistics—it is iterative, being passed every 5 to 7 years. [...]it must acknowledge the dynamics of racism, sexism and other axes of discrimination in US agricultural policy, and community-led initiatives working to overcome them (White 2011; Doan-Crider et al., 2013; Graddy-Lovelace, 2016; Fagundes et al., 2020). Reading the Farm Bill: major themes and titles Commodity policy and crop insurance The past four decades of federal farm policy has seen a general shift away from supporting farm commodity prices with commodity reserves, marketing