The 2023 Farm Bill: A Hidden Panacea?

Every demographic can prosper from elevating the upcoming renewal of American agricultural funds

In my recent “debut piece” for Medium, I’ve outlined many of the overlooked ways in which the industry of agriculture overlaps with issues that already receive much more traction within the political world — health care, education, climate change, and trade policy being among them.

The 2018 Farm Bill established some modest-but-important provisions — namely the Office of Urban Agriculture & Innovative Production and a Local Agriculture Market Program (LAMP). However, between now and the year 2023 we have a chance, as Americans, to seize upon this innovation and provide USDA funding for a new trajectory in U.S. agriculture that would benefit everyone.

Our food supply is a key national security issue, being central to America’s ability (or inability) to feed ourselves and many of our allies. But it’s easy to forget that.

The Farm Bill is traditionally one of the rare areas of bipartisan cooperation on Capitol Hill, since Republicans and Democrats alike have a vested interest in proving to their constituents how much they value rural workers and nutrition programs.

USDA officials are also the national arbiters of food safety, regulating how much sovereignty individual jurisdictions have for experimentation with local solutions in farming, ranching, or green homesteading.

That’s why this second half of my “debut piece” lays out exactly which sorts of new components should be included the next time the U.S. Farm Bill comes up for renewal. Incidentally, that will coincide with when the 2024 Presidential Primary season is heating up.

For incumbents in tough reelection campaigns, you could become local heroes to voters in your states and districts. And, for all of you political challengers who seek to overthrow “do-nothing” incumbents (or run in competitive open-seat races), picking up the #AgriWarrior mantle will highlight your opponents’ ineffectual records.

I have several suggestions for policy planks that should make their way into the 2023 Farm Bill. Some of them involve agri-research:

• Adopt provisions from U.S. Representative Chellie Pingree’s Agriculture Resilience Act (H.R. 5861)
• Significantly increase federal funding for the USDA’s Office of Urban Agriculture & Innovative Production as well as the OREI (Organic Agriculture Research & Extension Initiative) and the SCRI (Specialty Crop Research Initiative)
• Develop an initiative through the NRCS (Natural Resources Conservation Service) for the research of microbial-rich soil cultivation while building stronger agricultural reserves
• Strengthen research into pollinator protection through increased Integrated Pest Management Practices
• Create a national research program specifically designed to formulate strategies for preserving and protecting wild bee populations
• Expand eligibility for the NIFA (National Institute of Food & Agriculture) program
• Increase research efforts through the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences to find reliable nontoxic pesticide and herbicide alternatives
• Add a new mission area to the USDA that exclusively focuses on R&D, economic promotion, and entrepreneurship resources for marine permaculture
• Heavily invest in fiber processing research for raw materials of biodegradable packaging — such as plantation waste, chitosan, bamboo, hemp, cellulose, palm leaf, casein (not produced for foodstuffs), seaweed, beeswax, pressed hay, bagasse, spider silk, mycelium root, biowaste sugars, etc.

Other new actions can alter the way agricultural spending is dispersed, by making these structural reforms:

• Give tax incentives to farmers who plant long-term perennial crops
• Offer tax credits to growers who expand locally, through agricultural startups or upgrades to existing farms
• Place caps on the sizes of farms that are eligible to receive EQIP (Environmental Quality Incentives Program) grants, so that larger producers are no longer draining resources from their smaller counterparts
• Increase funding for the FDPIR (Food Distribution Program on Indian Reservations)
• Provide grants for dredging, solar-based “eco machines,” and other restoration techniques of deserts, plateaus, and wetlands
• Reinstate COOL (Country-of-Origin Labeling) standards, and develop new COPL (Country-of-Processing Labeling) guidelines to enhance food safety transparency for consumers
• Institute supply adjustment mechanisms to curb excess commodity surpluses
• Retool the Dairy Margin Coverage Program with moderate price “ceilings” and “floors” as well as a federal oversupply management system that establishes an inventory management program and tax-deferred savings accounts
• Ban lobbyists and their business partners/associates from receiving commodity check-off program dollars
• Revise guidelines for termination of cover crops through the Risk Management Agency (RMA) to bring them in line with Good Farming Practices (GFPs)
• Authorize an open-source seed-saving program

A final subcategory of reform needs to involve empowering state and local governments to develop more tools for self-sufficiency. Ironically, the federal government can promote such sovereignty via the following actions:

• Expand regional cooperatives and CSAs through the 2018 Farm Bill’s newly-established Local Agriculture Market Program, including resources for these co-ops to create/run their own farmers’ markets
• Provide grant money for “urban food forests” and “agri-hoods,” modeled after those found in Atlanta and Detroit
• Build off of Dr. Dickson Despommier’s proposed blueprint for state-based vertical farming pilot projects
• Codify a lower-scale version of The PRIME Act, which would subsidize livestock-generating CSAs or smaller ranchers who wish to utilize USDA-inspected mobile meat-processing units in underserved areas
• Survey and map informal “prairie zones” as a guide for beekeepers to safely raise their hives
• Lift rainwater-capture restrictions, by federal mandate, in all jurisdictions or states where it’s currently limited (e.g., California, Georgia, North Carolina, Colorado, Texas, Ohio, Nevada, etc.)
• Change federal statutes to relax local restrictions on hobby farmers
• Offer competitive grants for “mobile-gardening” services, in the mold of D.C.-based Love & Carrots — but to also service rural areas in addition to urban and suburban cities
• Create a public education program to generate a new volunteer corps of “Citizen Gardeners” who learn/teach growing milkweed, clover, and other nutrient-rich plants as an enhancement for backyard and front yard gardens
• Officially designate the month of October as Farmer & Rancher History Month

Many skeptics will accuse these measures of being actions that pick winners and losers within our national economy. However, they are missing one key detail…

If our food systems collapse, we will ALL be losers…with absolutely no winners.

Finally, I’d encourage President Biden to assemble a large National Agri-Sustainability Advisory Board, tasked with promoting and communicating newly-available public initiatives in all types of agriculture. Such a commission should be multiethnic, multiregional, and multigenerational…comprised of restaurateurs, policy advocates, and entrepreneurs (or “hyphenates” whose experience overlaps across these areas).

Off the top of my head, numerous food innovators whom I’d recommend for appointment to this commission: José Andrés, Leah Penniman, Dan Barber, Toni Tipton-Martin, David Chang, A’dae Romero-Briones, Gabe Brown, Danielle Nierenberg, Vikas Khanna, Camilla Marcus, Ido Savir, Regina Bernard-Carreño, Seth Watkins, Roshara Sanders, Brian Canlis, Sanushka Naidoo, Damon Gameau, Shafinaz Hossain, and Sara Menker.

When examining how local activists have organized: Maine and Vermont are two standout states that have begun the process of revamping their food systems in unique ways. Not every state has to emulate the agricultural models followed by Mainers and Vermonters verbatim; however, it is noteworthy that Maine is one of the few states in the U.S. where the average age of its farmers is getting younger.

If we’re serious about overcoming our society’s generation gap by fostering intergenerational solidarity, then why not start with agriculture? It’s the industry that fuels this country…literally.

The Biden/Harris Administration has a valuable opportunity to reimagine the way farming is viewed. Inventive business opportunities can be opened up for Black, Indigenous, Latinx, and APIDA farmers…for women and LGBTQ+ people who want to delve into urban homesteading…for our newest agricultural leaders to be younger, neurodiverse, and of all different faiths.

By creating new resources and entrepreneurship avenues for growers who live in rural, suburban, and urban areas alike, the 2023 Farm Bill can be a widespread bipartisan venture in providing something for everyone. Legislators from every region and district would be able to bring some form of agricultural prosperity back to their constituents — giving themselves bragging rights when it comes time for their individual reelection campaigns.

Changing the narrative is only half the battle. It all starts with agri-sustainability platform planks that, when taken together, can create a Rural/Urban Alliance that has been lacking in the United States for so long.

Since President Biden frequently talks about the necessity of healing the heart and soul of this country, he should recognize that groundbreaking food security will be what keeps our hearts healthy and makes our souls perseverant.

Everybody wants affordable, healthy, and accessible items within our refrigerators and pantries. If problem-solvers offer these specific solutions — in the name of manifesting that goal — we’ll chip away at the assumption that groceries somehow magically appear on the shelves of supermarkets.

Be an #AgriWarrior. Pressure your U.S. Representative and U.S. Senators to get onboard with these measures. And, when organizing with other activists — remind them how agriculture seeps into so many hot topics that we so often assume are self-contained.

The life you’ll be saving will be…well, all of ours!