Get to know: Religious Working Group on the Farm Bill (and why it matters to you)
The Religious Working Group on the Farm Bill (RWG) is a coalition of sixteen Churches and faith-based organizations: Bread for the World, Church World Service, The Episcopal Church, Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, National Council of Churches, Presbyterian Church (USA), Washington Office, United Church of Christ Justice and Witness Ministries, United Methodist Church General Board of Church and Society, United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Catholic Charities USA, Catholic Relief Services, Lutheran World Relief, National Catholic Rural Life Conference, NETWORK, Progressive National Baptist Convention, and Together For Hope: The Cooperative Baptist Fellowship’s Rural Poverty Initiative.
The reason that such a massive coalition formed is because 2007 represents a critical moment in U.S. agricultural policy.
But perhaps you’re not a farmer, so how does the farm bill affect you?
Daniel Imhoff is a writer and researcher on issues related to food, the environment, and design. He is the author of numerous articles, essays, and books including Paper or Plastic: Searching for Solutions to an Overpackaged World (Watershed Media/Sierra Club Books 2005); Farming with the Wild: Enhancing Biodiversity on Farms and Ranches (Watershed Media/Sierra Club Books 2003).
The group is also urging Congress to address the negative impact current U.S. agricultural and trade policies have on people living in impoverished countries around the world. . .
Church World Service and Oxfam America is especially concerned about recent unprecedented levels of market consolidation in agriculture which make competition unfair and leads to greater poverty in the U.S. and in the developing world. Production controlled by a limited number of corporate interests eliminates market transparency and creates an environment ripe for price manipulation and discrimination. It creates an atmosphere where supply and demand are controlled by the same actors. To remedy this problem, CWS recommends that stronger competition policies with reliable enforcement mechanisms are included in the 2007 Farm Bill
Learn more here.
I’d like to add that the National Catholic Rural Life Conference (http://ncrlc.com/) has been on top of this issue for a few years now. They’re great people and show amazing leadership.
This year, they’re focusing on the Farm Bill- you can find more information on their web site.
The views represented here are well intentioned but misinformed about the Commodity Title of the U.S. Farm Bill. What’s missing is real U.S. and World farmer support for prices in the marketplace. Farmers need price floors with supply management. Religious groups should support the National Family Farm Coalition on this and the food issues below. The Africa Group at WTO has also called for supply management.
For the food crisis they should support strategic grain reserves and price ceilings, again with NFFC.
Daniel Imhoff, Oxfam (ie. Farm Bill 101, Fairness in the Fields, ) Bread for the World (ie. Hunger 2007), Church World Service (Sowing Justice for Family Farmers Everywhere) do not support any of these positions, nor do most, or perhaps all of the Religious Working Group on the Farm Bill. The major mainline church justice organizations supported my position in the 1980s farm crisis and 1990s, just ask Mary Ellen Lloyd at the National Council of Churches, if she’s anywhere to be found.
The anti-subsidy policies of the churches are a smokescreen put up by exporter/animal factory/processor interests in the U.S. and at WTO. Dumping, exporting below cost has been 20-60%, but removing subsidies would only change things up OR down by about 3% for most commodities, as it has no direct economic impact on prices. Instead get rid of subsidies by returning to adequate (living wage) price floors. The Religious Working Group on the Farm Bill’s statement in favor of “alternative forms of support that are more equitable and do not distort trade in ways that fuel hunger and poverty” is itself a smokescreen. Subsidies are unfair (that U.S. farmers don’t also go broke as fast), but they don’t distort trade. Our lack of price floors causes the dumping.
Get accurate information at the National Family Farm Coalition, Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy, Food and Water Watch. Churches must support these positions.