Racial/ethnic inequity with regard to land access is a defining feature not only of the corporate-controlled food system, but also of the US government itself, which, even years after emancipation, has made it nearly impossible for Blacks and other communities of color to acquire and keep land in substantial numbers. For example, in 1920, 926,000 US farmers were Black and they owned over 16 million acres of land, and by 1997, fewer than 20,000 US farmers were Black and owned approximately 2 million acres of land. While white farmers were losing their farms during these decades as well, the rate that Black farmers lost their land has been estimated at more than twice the rate of white-owned farm loss.Though the Farm Bill itself does not deal directly with immigration, the impact of the Bill on farmworkers cannot go unnoticed. The combination of an immigration system easily exploited by employers, and workers’ low income, limited formal education, limited command of the English language, and undocumented status, greatly hinders farmworkers from seeking any retribution or recognition of their rights. With limited legal aid, many agricultural workers fear that challenging the illegal and unfair practices of their employers will result in further abuses, jobs losses, and, ultimately, deportation. Given the fact that the Farm Bill supports many of those companies that employ farmworkers, connections must be drawn to highlight how the Farm Bill upholds and perpetuates structural injustice among farmworkers.In the US, vertical weed grow exposures to environmental hazards have disproportionately impacted low-income communities and communities of color.
As a major contributor to global climate change and the racialized distribution of its impacts, conventional agricultural production practices, in particular, have been instrumental in maintaining and upholding these disparities. Furthermore, low-income communities and communities of color in the United States bear the burden of the impacts caused by climate change. For example, these populations breathe more polluted air than other Americans, suffer more during extreme weather events, have fewer means to escape such extreme weather events, and disproportionately experience greater hardship due to rising energy, food, and water costs.This report found a number of structural barriers to addressing these racial/ethnic, gender, and economic inequities. First, the Farm Bill itself is increasingly imbricated in, and ultimately functions as a pillar of, neoliberalism. The long term shift from the subsidization of production and consumption to the subsidization of agribusiness has structurally positioned low-income communities and communities of color on the losing side of such shifts. This population has also been given fewer options for recourse, given the ways in which the Farm Bill has been designed to be insulated from democratic influence, particularly by way of countless layers of congressional committees. Second, under the current Farm Bill, supporting public nutrition assistance programs and fighting poverty and racial/ethnic inequality, are antithetical to one another, despite the evidence that suggests otherwise. Specifically, while such public assistance programs do provide support to some of the most marginalized communities, they ultimately maintain structural inequity, particularly in terms of wealth, by channeling profits to corporations such as Walmart and other large retailers, which benefit greatly from distributing benefits such as SNAP.
Many of these corporations are then able to funnel profits back to their corporate headquarters outside their respective retail sites, while still paying workers low wages and granting few benefits at every level of the food system. Finally, this report found that supporting the inclusion of producers of color into current payment schemes, and fighting poverty and racial/ethnic [ii]Neoliberalism is a new period of capitalism, particularly since 1970s and 1980s, characterized by unparalleled global reach of economic liberalization, open markets, free trade, and deregulation. Such changes have been facilitated by a mix of high-tech globalized financial systems and labor markets, speculative financial markets, corporate control over the public sphere, increased commodification of human heritages , and increased consumerism. inequality, are also antithetical to one another, despite recent gains in terms of USDA Civil Rights settlements and slowly increasing participation in such programs by such producers. Specifically, while such disparities may be addressed in part by better outreach and assistance, these payment programs, and even crop insurance, ultimately maintain structural inequity, particularly in terms of wealth and land access. For example, producers, be they of any racial or ethnic background, are forced to cut costs wherever possible, which includes: deploying environmentally destructive practices and unjust hiring practices, cutting farmworkers’ pay and working conditions, and relying upon troubling international economies of migrant agricultural labor collectively, which result in regressive racialized outcomes.Socially, economically, politically, and environmentally, the US food system has become characterized by widespread inequity. While corporations control agricultural production and prices, and enjoy record profits, many farmers cannot make a living, are increasingly vulnerable to price fluctuations, and struggle for market access in increasingly concentrated commodity markets.
While corporations reap the benefits of an overworked and underpaid work force, both on and off the field, many consumers, including food system workers themselves, do not have access to nutritious and affordable foods. Additionally, soil degradation, water pollution, and global climate change continue to advance, in part due to large-scale industrial agriculture. The US food system today, however, is not only characterized by social, economic, political, and environmental inequity. Our research indicates that inequity within the food system—such as limited access to nutritious and affordable food, high quality land, or farmers support program benefits—cannot be addressed without addressing inequity within society as a whole, such as low income and limited employment benefits, unfair treatment by public institutions, and limited access to positions of power. Of central concern within this report, therefore, are corporate control and structural racialization within the US food system and society as a whole. Significantly, the production of racial/ethnic and economic inequity in the United States, particularly in terms of wealth, land access, access to positions of power, and degree of democratic influence, is more so a product of cumulative and structural forces than of individual actions or malicious intent on behalf of private or public actors. To challenge and eliminate corporate control and structural racialization in the United States, it is necessary to analyze the ways that public and private institutions are structured, and how government programs are administered and operate in such a way that that reproduces outcomes that marginalize low-income commu-nities and communities of color. Additionally, it is crucial to analyze the genesis and formation of institutions and structures themselves. The US Farm Bill has been the flagship legislation of food and agriculture since its inception in 1933 and is at the heart of policies implemented by public and private institutions that comprise most of the US food system. As such, structural change requires a strong and united movement that is capable of organizing and mobilizing at the state and national level, and that aims to produce conditions required for food sovereignty, including food access, health equity, fair and living wages, land access, just immigration policy, restraints upon corporations, non-exploitative farm labor conditions, and environmental well-being, among others, in particular, and racial/ethnic, gender, and economic justice more broadly. It also reflects a prime opportunity to address corporate structural racialization at multiple scales: from the scale of the food system to that of society itself.
As such, structural change requires a strong and united movement that is capable of organizing and mobilizing at the national level, and that aims to produce the conditions that would guarantee food sovereignty, including food access, health equity, fair wages, land access, just immigration policy, restraints upon corporations, non-exploitative farm labor conditions, and environmental well-being, among others. Such a movement would thus need to encompass grassroots and advocacy organizations that are anti-capitalist, new economy, anti-racist, and feminist, and that are oriented toward environmental justice, labor rights, immigration rights, food justice, climate justice, pipp horticulture racks cost and human rights, among other strategies and goals. Toward this end, the US Farm Bill is a challenging, yet promising, target for structural change within such a movement. This report is of particular importance for two reasons. First, the Farm Bill will be under consideration again in 2019, yet there is no comprehensive critique of the Farm Bill that addresses its underlying contradictions, particularly with regard to racial/ethnic, gender, and economic inequity. Second, it is imperative that campaigns by grassroots, community, and advocacy organizations—generally most active during the period of Farm Bill negotiations in Congress—have enough time to gather adequate information and conduct in-depth analysis for targeted yet comprehensive policy change. As such, the timing of this report is also imperative for coalition-building efforts and the growth of an effective broad-based food sovereignty movement.In terms of structure, the food and agricultural provisions and programs of the Farm Bill are divided into overarching categories called “titles.” These titles are not static and can change between Farm Bills during the re-authorization process. The 2008 Farm Bill had 15 titles, for example, while the 2014 Farm Bill has 12 titles: commodities, conservation, trade, nutrition, credit, rural development, research, forestry, energy, horticulture, crop insurance, and miscellaneous. In terms of scale, the 2014 Farm Bill provided $489 billion in mandatory spending for all titles over the next five years and $956 billion in mandatory spending until 2024. Among the titles of the 2014 Farm Bill, programs under the nutrition title are the largest, accounting for 80% of spending. Nutrition is followed by crop insurance, which accounts for 8% of spending; conservation, which accounts for 6% of spending; and commodity programs, which account for 5% of spending. The remaining 1% of spending includes trade subsidies, rural development, research, forestry, energy, livestock, and horticulture/organic agriculture. Finally, in terms of the process itself, the Farm Bill comes up for renewal approximately every five years. Congressional negotiations on the composition of the bill typically take between two to three years. Many interest groups and corporations shape the Farm Bill by way of lobbying, campaign donations, and other such efforts. Though they vary greatly by their degrees of influence, such actors include large retailers and food manufacturers , suppliers and manufacturers of agricultural inputs , members of government and special interest groups , as well as a diverse set of advocacy organizations . Typically, it is corporate interests and actors that have had the greatest influence in pushing for specific language and policies that advance their respective interests in the Farm Bill.The commodity title includes several programs that aim to protect farmers against sharp fluctuations in prices on primary commodity crops and to keep production relatively profitable. In previous years, the commodity title was primarily geared towards providing large “direct payments” to farmers regardless of how much they actually planted or for how much they would sell their crops. The 2014 Farm Bill cut most of these direct payments by about $19 billion over 10 years, which was the most drastic policy change in this current Farm Bill. Much of this money has gone into other types of farm aid, particularly disaster assistance for livestock producers, subsidized loans for farmers, and the crop insurance program. For example, the 2014 Farm Bill abandoned the 70-year-old practice of setting minimum prices for milk, cheese, and butter, and instead invested in insurance for dairy farmers to protect themselves against price volatility or rising feed costs. Significantly, the shift toward crop insurance programs has largely benefitted private insurance corporations, banks, and the largest producers more than small and mid-sized farmers. The conservation title includes programs to help farmers protect against environmental degradation and maintain their means of production through the use of sustainable management practices. The conservation title also includes programs that pay farmers to retire some of their land, such as the Conservation Reserve Program, the largest land retirement program in the United States. The $4 billion cut in the conservation title in the 2014 Farm Bill marks the first time Congress has voted to reduce conservation spending since the title first entered the Farm Bill in 1985. In every Farm Bill since then—1990, 1996, 2002, and 2008—funding for the conservation title has increased.Trade funding is used to promote US commodity crops and food aid abroad as well as technical assistance to farmers in developing countries. Although President Obama suggested an overhaul of the food aid program—aiming to replace the processes of selling US-produced food to developing countries with direct payments to developing countries—such reform efforts did not take hold and Congress kept the food-aid program intact.