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  • From: "Tradingpost" <tradingpost@lobo.net>
  • To: livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: [Livingontheland] Speakers Discuss Farm Bureau's Support of Family Farms and Big Ag
  • Date: Tue, 27 Oct 2009 17:28:36 -0700

For Immediate Release
Monday, October 26, 2009

Contact
Matthew Alschuler, Press Agent for HOMES
815-745-2500 or 312-969-6288
Speakers Discuss Farm Bureau's Support of Family Farms and Big AgFarm
Bureau's Leadership is Helping Corporate Agriculture rather than Family Farms
Galena, IL,

H.O.M.E.S. (Helping Others Maintain Environmental Standards) sponsored 2
speakers on independent family farming and how it has been affected by Farm
Bureau's support for industrial agriculture.

Chris Petersen is president of the Iowa Farmer's Union, and an independent
family farmer since 1974 near Clear Lake, Iowa. Petersen is a consultant for
SRAP (Socially Responsible Agriculture Project), and sits on the Boards of
I-CASH (Iowa Center of Agricultural Health & Safety) and ICAN (Iowa Citizens
Action Network), among others. Petersen started the meeting by having the
audience watch a video from 60 Minutes with Mike Wallace. The video showed
how FB (Farm Bureau) is investing in many non-agricultural corporations such
as Access Air, a small airline in Des Moines IA. "All their decisions are
made for corporate America because they own part of it", one farm bureau
member said in the film.

Petersen explained, "There used to be 60,000 hog farmers in IA and now there
are only 9,000 left, counting the big ones, producing the same amount of
pork. When the independent farmer produces and owns the livestock, the money
turns over in the local community 7-8 times creating a $1.6 billion economic
activity. An industrial farm turns the money over 2-3 times and then it
leaves the state and country." He also said, "What they (industrialized
dairies) are doing now is exactly, I say, exactly, what they did to us hog
guys 10 years ago. They are finding a way to get rid of us by monopolizing
and vertically integrating the industry."

Petersen also stated "huge growth is going on right now in sustainable local
farmsĀŠthat's our future. We need to localize and get an equal fair share of
the 'piece of the pie' so maybe our kids can have an opportunity to raise a
family and we can have our grandkids close to us." He stressed, "we need to
blend the old and the new, but traditional family farming is the key to our
future."
The next speaker was Karen Hudson, a national grassroots consultant for the
Socially Responsible Agricultural Project (www.sraproject.org). Hudson lives
on a fifth generation family farm in West Central Illinois, and is President
of F.A.R.M. (Families Against Rural Messes www.farmweb.org), a grassroots
organization that was formed when livestock factories targeted Illinois for
expansion. She has had ties with FB for over the last 20 years.

Hudson read a deposition sent to her by her attorney. It stated that the
IEPA (Illinois Environmental Protection Agency) is so closely tied to FB that
when a reporter sent the IEPA a Freedom of Information request, the IEPA
faxed it directly to FB. She asked, "Why is there such a conduit from the
IEPA to FB?" She also noted, "People have called me saying FB is trying to
take away local control. I feel FB has hijacked our democracy by not
supporting local control and I have asked them to change their ways. IDOA
(Illinois Department of Agriculture) wants to end the public hearings on
CAFOs coming into the communities, saying no one is interested in attending.
Yet when the public hearing on the Nora megadairy was held in Warren, over
500 people attended."

Hudson added, "There was a lawsuit against a mega dairy where there were 19
plaintiffs. Eleven of them were family farmers," She said, "FB keeps saying
that the people opposed to factory farms are from Chicago and decided to
build their homes in the country. No, we're people that have been here for a
long time." She ended by saying; "We need to keep the communication lines
open with FB. FB has many policies we don't agree with and I encourage
people to join FB to help change their policies."

Later, Petersen noted, "Farm Bureau was started in 1911 by the Chamber of
Commerce in upper NY State in response to farmers organizing, trying to get a
fair price out of the market place." FB is listed as a tax exempt,
non-profit organization that owns and operates a financial service that's
listed on the stock exchange. There are about five million FB members and
less than 1.5 million farmers in the U.S. which means the majority of FB
members aren't even farmers.

This was an important informational meeting on FB's lack of support for
local, sustainable farming. Although FB expresses support for all levels of
farming, industrial agriculture is displacing local family farmers. This has
devastating effects on the areas and counties where the industrial facilities
are hosted. In these very difficult financial times, we need the solid base
that family farms bring to our communities.

For more information about HOMES and our continuing lawsuit, visit:
www.StopTheMegaDairy.org
HOMES (Helping Others Maintain Environmental Standards) is a 501(c)(3) tax
exempt, pro-agriculture group of farmers and citizens dedicated to protecting
family farms, rural communities, human health, and the environment by
promoting sustainable agriculture and conserving our natural resources.





  • [Livingontheland] Speakers Discuss Farm Bureau's Support of Family Farms and Big Ag, Tradingpost, 10/27/2009

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