Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["Tradingpost" <tradingpost@lobo.net>]

Today the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) released a new report, Ensuring 
the Harvest: Crop Insurance and Credit for a Healthy Farm and Food 
Future<http://www.ucsusa.org/food_and_agriculture/solutions/big_picture_solutions/ensuring-the-harvest.html>.



The report finds that, while the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is 
urging Americans to eat substantially more fruits and vegetables, its crop 
insurance and credit programs handicap produce growers and instead promote 
commodity crops that are disproportionately used in heavily processed junk 
food.



Ensuring the 
Harvest<http://www.ucsusa.org/food_and_agriculture/solutions/big_picture_solutions/ensuring-the-harvest.html>
 recommends a number of common-sense policies that would help American 
farmers grow more healthy food for our communities.



"If Americans need to eat more fruits and vegetables, why do U.S. farm 
policies make it harder for farmers who grow them to earn a living?" asked 
report author Jeffrey O'Hara, an agricultural economist with UCS's Food and 
Environment Program. "Even though those farmers pose a lower insurance risk, 
the USDA won't give them the same protection it gives to large commodity 
farming operations."



Weather makes farming a risky business, so the USDA offers crop insurance, 
making it easier for farmers to obtain bank loans or credit early in the year 
to cover the cost of seeds, fertilizer and equipment for spring planting. In 
the event of extreme weather-from spring frosts to summer flooding-that 
insurance gives farmers a safety net if their crops are destroyed or their 
price declines. For many farmers, insurance and credit is the difference 
between profiting and bankruptcy.



The USDA offers this crop insurance and credit to large farms growing corn, 
soy and other commodity crops, and to some large fruit and vegetable farms, 
such as tomatoes in California , but the agency shuts out "healthy-food" 
farms-small- to medium-size farms growing fruits and vegetables or raising 
livestock sustainably.



Many healthy-food farms, which sell their products locally at farmers 
markets, restaurants and schools, have become a market force in recent years. 
Currently, their local-food sales total $5 billion annually. But if fruit and 
vegetable consumption increased to meet the USDA's MyPlate dietary 
guidelines, driving demand for healthy, sustainable produce, local food sales 
could increase to as much as $14.5 billion a year and generate as many as 
189,000 new jobs, according to the UCS report.



Jack Hedin, owner of the 160-acre organic Featherstone Farm in Rushford, 
Minnesota, is one of those healthy-food farmers who cannot get crop 
insurance. In 2007, chronic rains brought crop disease and disrupted planting 
cycles. Combined with acute flash flooding, 60 percent of his farm was wiped 
out. Fortunately his farm rebounded and today it is thriving, but he still 
lives in fear of what might happen due to an extreme weather event.



"Without crop insurance, I worry every day about the safety of the farm, my 
family and our 30 employees," said Hedin. "The lack of access to crop 
insurance is one of the greatest impediments that I, and other small local 
farmers, face in keeping healthy-food farms safe and prosperous."



In Congress, Rep. Chellie Pingree (D-Maine), a member of the House 
Agriculture Committee, is the lead sponsor of the Local Farms, Food, and Jobs 
Act, which would expand farmers markets and provide support for regional farm 
and food systems.



"Instead of putting up roadblocks to farmers growing a diverse range of crops 
and livestock, we need to encourage these farmers and make it easier for them 
to provide the kind of healthy foods that are good for consumers and good for 
local economies," said Pingree. "The Senate Agriculture Committee is marking 
up its version of the Farm Bill tomorrow, providing a timely opportunity to 
level the playing field for these farmers."