From wheeler@super.org Wed Feb 24 17:48:45 1993
Date: Thu, 1 Oct 92 10:32:46 EDT
From: wheeler@super.org (Ferrell S. Wheeler)
To: tms@cs.umd.edu
Subject: BB Farm Policy


FAMILY FARM POLICY

  Beyond Beef Campaign
  1130 17th St., NW
  Suite 300
  Washington, D.C.  20036
  Tel: 202-775-1132
  Fax: 202-775-0074


Beyond Beef Farm Policy

  By Howard Lyman, Executive Director, Beyond Beef campaign, former
     senior lobbyist for the National Farmers Union; and
     Mark Ritchie, Executive Director, Institute for Agriculture and
     Trade Policy

  To an intelligent being from another planet, U.S. food and
agricultural policies and programs would appear deranged.  Today, U.S.
taxpayers are helping to support an agricultural system that feeds
livestock before human beings, devastates peasant farmers, causes food
shortages and hunger for millions of people in developing countries, and
forces tens of thousands of small American farmers out of business.  The
current system also promotes the production and consumption of fatty and
chemical-laden animal-derived foods that are killing us, and is ruining
and poisoning the very soil and water we need to keep our agricultural
system running.

  Beyond Beef is promoting a fundamental restructuring of U.S. food and
agriculture policy in order to reverse these destructive trends.  We
need to make a transition from feed to food production by rewarding the
nation's small farmers with higher prices for growing food for people
instead of feed for livestock.  Those who wish to continue producing
grain-fed beef should have to pay the true market value of the grain.

  The world can no longer afford the social and environmental costs of
producing grain-fed, or even grass-fed, beef at current levels.  Reducing
the production and consumptio of beef by at least 50 percent will help
free agricultural land to grow food for human consumption rather than
feed for livestock.  Fewer cattle will also lessen the environmental
toll on the world's remaining forests and grasslands.  Encouraging
consumers who continue to consume some beef to demand beef from cattle
that are humanely raised under sustainable standards will help encourage
a new commercial market for organic beef -- a market niche that can be
filled by the family farm.

  Only the small family farmer can produce beef and other farm products
humanely and sustainably.  The Beyond Beef program is working to restore
the position of the family farm in American life.

  In the United States today, three voracious multi-national
corporations hold a near total monopoly on beef production.  Their
priority is cheap livestock feed.  U.S. government policies support
these corporations by keeping market prices below the cost of
production; American taxpayers are subsidizing the production of beef.

  The small family farmer is in a box.  He must produce more product at
a return below the cost of production in an attempt to spread his fixed
cost over more volume.  This dilemma makes the family farmer easy prey
for the huge agribusiness monopolies that dictate the rules of the game.
Unable to get enough income, the family farmer is forced to abandon beef
production altogether in favor of maximum yield production of
monoculture feed grain.  Even then, he's not receiving a high enough
price for the feed to cover his costs.  Moreover, attempts to increase
yields requires the use of more and more chemical fertilizers that, in
the end, are self-defeating because they increase costs and lower yelds
in the long run -- they are also polluting the environment.

  Grain sold in the world market for a price that is below the cost of
production is also devastating third world farmers.  Unlike their
American counterparts, however, they are not receiving taxpayer
subsidies to supplement their income.  They must either stop farming,
try to get a job in the city, or expand agricultural production into
environmentally sensitive areas such as the rain forest.

  Efforts by progressive farm organizations to establish fair prices for
corn, wheat, and other crops have been consistently blocked by the
giant agribusiness corporations that feed cattle in huge feedlots.  The
owners of these "beef factories" want to pay the lowest possible price
for feed, and they don't care how many small and medium-sized family
farmers go out of business or which rain forest gets destoyed.  Their
only concern is maximum short-term profit.

  If consumers unite with family farmers to break the monopoly power of
agribusiness, it can lead the way to both financial security for family
farmers and the elimination of ecologically unsound beef production.

  Farmers and consumers also need to work together to defeat new
government proposals which would open the U.S. market to greatly
expanded amounts of imported beef.  Most of this imported beef is
produced on rain forest land in Latin America, making it extremely low
priced.  Not only would the expansion of beef imports accelerate rain
forest destruction, it would drive down even further the price paid to
family farmers, pushing many tens of thousands out of business and
leaving the market solely in the hands of the huge conglomerates.

  For the moment, corporate control over the livestock industry means
that farmers and consumers will have to establish a number of
alternative marketing routes in order to meet the demand for organically
raised beef.  We need to follow the lead of other countries, where
consumer and farmer groups have agreed on specific standards for price,
quality, and ecological considerations, and then established a special
label for meats complying with these standards.

  The Beyond Beef campaign will challenge the unwarranted power amassed
by America's agribusiness corporations and the cattle and beef industry
giants...and promote a new commercial market for organically raised beef
helping to restore a viable market share for the nation's family
farmers.




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