Federal ag policy

Subject: Re: FedGov encourages ag centralization
Date: 2001-08-13 11:15:13 PST

Wendell Berry and Gene Logsdon, in their various writings,
make these points far more eloquently. "Living at Nature's
Pace - Farming and the American Dream" [Logsdon] is
probably the more readable of the relevant works. It is
made up of a series of essays previously published in
periodicals.

"The Unsettling of America" [Berry] is an almost scholarly
exploration of the failings of U.S. agricultural policy. As
such it is more thorough than [Logsdon] in its exploration,
and less anecdotal.

I found both works to be somewhat dated in places, but, taken
as a whole, still valuable.

* * * * *

Farmers don't make agricultural policy. They work within
it and are stuck with it. They end up committed to the
existing agricultural policy by virtue of money committed
to land, buildings, and equipment for a particular way
of farming. Then, many of us lobby to maintain the status
quo.

I would imagine that the land my family farms now would
lose half its value if the Mississippi River were permanently
closed to barge traffic as a result of discontinuance of federal
subsidies. But the economic and environmental costs of
keeping the river navigable have been well documented.
So what's fair? I guess I'm grateful that I don't have to
decide.

> Has the LP diagnosed the problem correctly? What of their solution?
>
> -----
>
> America's free market in agriculture, the system that feeds much of the
> world, has been plowed under by government intervention. Government
> subsidies, regulation, and taxes have encouraged the centralization of
> agricultural business. Government export policies hold American farmers
> hostage to the political whims of both Republican and Democratic
> administrations. Government embargoes on grain sales and other obstacles to
> free trade have frustrated the development of free and stable trade
> relationships between peoples of the world.
>snip<

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