Archives for April, 2009
Weekly Update – April 20-24, 2009
Monday, April 27th, 2009
ACTION NEEDED
SARE Sign On Letter – Deadline NOON Friday, May 1: The NSAC Appropriations Campaign is pushing hard for a substantial increase in funding for the Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program (SARE) for fiscal year 2010. We’re asking for a $30 million appropriation, up from the current $19 million. We all know how important, efficient and successful SARE has been. Still, it’s going to be tough to win an increase for programs like SARE that were not included in the stimulus or specifically mentioned in the President’s budget framework released in February.
Please consider joining the more than 85 organizations that have already signed on to this letter to the House and Senate Appropriations Committees in support of a $30 million appropriation for SARE in 2010. Please distribute the letter among your farm, conservation, wildlife and economic development networks. Help us send a strong message of support from an impressively diverse range of national, state and local groups for SARE. To sign on please respond to: Annette@sustainableagriculture.net by NOON EST on Friday, May 1st. Please include “SARE” in your subject line. Organizations only please.
THIS WEEK
Budget Conference: On Friday, April 24, a tentative agreement was reached in the House-Senate conference committee on the FY 2010 budget resolution. On the big remaining issue of whether budget “reconciliation” procedures would be used to short-circuit Senate filibusters on health care, climate change, or education, there appears to be agreement on using reconciliation for health care reform and for education, consistent with the original House position. If that proves true, it boosts the chances of health care reform this year, while making it even more likely that climate change legislation will still be in process into next year.
Weekly Update April 13-17, 2009
Monday, April 20th, 2009
April 13-17, 2009
Photo: Jamie Collins is the operator of Serendipity Farms, a 45 acre certified organic farm in Monterey, CA. She grows over 50 different varieties of vegetables, herbs and berries sold through farmers markets, community supported agriculture programs, local restaurants and markets, and wholesale markets. Jamie advocates for small, organic and beginning farmers through the Organic Farmers Action Network (OFAN), a project of the Organic Farming Research Foundation (OFRF). OFRF is one of NSAC’s seventy member organizations and works to get more federal funding for organic agriculture research and programs that support organic farmers.
COMING WEEKS AND MONTHS
Budget Deal Awaits: As the congressional recess comes to a close, members will be coming back to DC next week to wrap up work on the FY 2010 budget resolution. Different versions of the budget were passed in the House and Senate before the two-week recess. Both versions significantly scaled back President Obama’s proposed spending levels for appropriations for domestic programs. Congressional staff has been discussing final numbers while their bosses have been out of town. Expectations are for the final number to fall between the bigger Senate-passed cut and the smaller House version.
The bigger sticking point on the path to reaching final agreement will be over budget process. The House version of the bill would use budget “reconciliation” rules for consideration of two major White House priorities – health care reform and student loans. Under those rules, Senate passage of those bills would require approval by a regular majority vote rather than a filibuster-proof supermajority. The Senate version bows to the wishes of the Republican minority and excludes reconciliation rules, enabling the minority party to effectively block any proposal from becoming law if they remain united in opposition.
Before finishing its version of the budget resolution, the Senate approved an amendment sponsored by Senator and former USDA Secretary Mike Johanns (R-NE) that would prohibit reconciliation rules from being used for climate change legislation. The 67-31 vote on that amendment virtually ensures that any climate change legislation that would pass during this session of Congress would need 60 votes in the Senate.
EQIP Comments Due Soon!
Thursday, April 16th, 2009
Environmental Quality Incentives Program Comments Due Friday!
Don’t miss this opportunity to tell USDA how to make EQIP work better
for sustainable and organic family farmers!
Public Comments Due this Friday, April 17, 2009
If we are going to make the most of our 2008 Farm Bill wins under the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP), USDA needs to hear from YOU! We won a new program to help farmers make the difficult transition to organic production. We reduced the EQIP payment limitation from a bloated $450,000 to a much more modest $300,000. We won a new set of National Priorities for EQIP to address pollinator and pollinator habitat protection; organic systems; grazing management and energy conservation.
The Interim Final Rule issued by USDA, however, falls far short of our goals and minimizes our wins. The EQIP rule needs major changes to make it work for sustainable and organic farmers and ranchers. Please submit a comment to USDA making at least a few of the following points:
- USDA needs to make sure that the organic conversion program is made available in every county in every state.
- Restore the ban on the use of EQIP funding to construct massive manure pits for new and expanding Concentrated
Animal Feeding Operations. - Hold fast to the $300,000 payment limitation on EQIP contracts and resist the pressure to provide an easy waiver or loophole.
- Include specific language in the rule recognizing pollinator and pollinator habitat protection, organic systems, grazing management and energy conservation in the list of EQIP National Priorities.
- Make EQIP assistance available to all farmers and ranchers for comprehensive whole farm conservation planning.
Additional talking points and background information are provided below.
Weekly Update – April 6-10, 2009
Monday, April 13th, 2009
ACTION NEEDED
Environmental Quality Incentives Program Comments due Soon! If we are going to make the most of our 2008 Farm Bill wins under the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP), USDA needs to hear from YOU! We won a new program within EQIP to help farmers make the difficult transition to organic production. We reduced the EQIP payment limitation from a bloated $450,000 to a somewhat more modest $300,000. We won a new set of National Priorities for EQIP to address pollinator and pollinator habitat protection; organic systems; grazing management and energy conservation.
The Interim Final Rule issued by USDA, however, falls far short of our goals and minimizes our wins. The EQIP rule needs major changes to make it work for sustainable and organic farmers and ranchers. An NSAC alert with suggested talking points and instructions for submitting a comment is posted here. Comments are Due on Friday, April 17, 2009.
THIS WEEK
Payment Limitations and Cooperative Conservation Comments Filed: NSAC filed comments with USDA this week responded to the interim rules for commodity program payment limitations and the request for proposals for the Cooperative Conservation Partnership Initiative (CCPI).
In our comments on the payment limit interim rule, we argued that the Bush Administration rule did not close the current loophole to the “actively engaged in farming” rule that allows single mega farming operations to collect hundreds of thousands and even millions of dollars annually. We urged the new Administration to close the loophole and provided specific language proposals on that issue and a variety of related concerns. We also argued that the Bush-era interim rule, while it did not go far enough to rein in mega payments, went too far in prohibiting family farm corporations regardless of their size from receiving payments for minority shareholders. Family farms often incorporate for estate planning purposes, for which they should not be penalized.
In our comments on the cooperative conservation request for proposals, we suggest a variety of ways in which future requests could be clearer and more in keeping with the farm bill.
We remind readers that CCPI proposals must be submitted to USDA by April 23. Full information is available here.
Stimulus Money out the Door: On Thursday, April 9, representatives from the Office of Management and Budget and from each of thirteen federal agencies, including USDA, discussed the status of the $787 billion authorized in the stimulus bill (American Recovery and Reinvestment Act) that President Obama signed into law on February 17. The White House has developed a website www.recovery.gov that is the main vehicle for providing general information and timelines and status of the funding. There is more specific information about competitive grants at www.grants.gov, contract opportunities at www.fedbizoppsgov, and loan opportunities at www.govloans.gov. There is currently $24 billion in competitive grants available.
The stimulus funding provided for programs administered by USDA include additional funds for the major feeding programs, rural development, and school lunch cafeteria equipment improvements. For more information on these programs, please see the February 13 issue of the Weekly Update.
In her recap of stimulus funding administered by USDA, Cheryl Cook, Deputy Under Secretary for Rural Development reported that the $173 million in direct farm operating loans administered by the Farm Service Agency has almost been entirely spent down and that half of the funding has been provided to beginning farmers and ranchers.
USDA NEWS
Catching Up with the USDA Appointments Process: Very quietly, without much in the way of public or media notice, the Obama Administration is filling key posts at USDA. Here is a summary of what we know so far:
On April 1, the President nominated Krysta Harden as the new USDA Assistant Secretary for Congressional Relations. For the past five years, Harden has been the director of the National Association of Conservation Districts. Prior to that she lobbied for the American Soybean Association on conservation, environment, and energy issues and was an aid on Capitol Hill for a dozen years, including a stint as a House Agriculture Committee staffer and as chief of staff for Representative Charles Hatcher from her native Georgia.
On Friday, April 10, USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack announced the appointment of Cheryl Cook as Deputy Under Secretary for Rural Development. Cook has actually been serving in that capacity for a week or more. A native of Pennsylvania, Cook served on the lobbying staff of the National Farmers Union in Washington before returning to Pennsylvania where she worked for Pennsylvania Farmers Union and Keystone Development Center, a coop development non-profit, as well as serving as stints as USDA Rural Development Director for the state and as Deputy Secretary for Marketing and Economic Development at the state Department of Agriculture.
Also on Friday, April 10, Secretary Vilsack made official news that had leaked out earlier, naming Janey Thornton of Kentucky as the new Deputy Under Secretary for Food, Nutrition and Consumer Services. Thornton has served as School Nutrition Director of the Hardin County school system, of which she is a product, for over 25 years. She also served as national President of the School Nutrition Association during the 2006-7 school year. Thornton expects to be very involved with the reauthorization of school feeding programs, a measure Congress takes up later this year.
On Thursday, April 9, Congress Daily revealed that Bud Philbrook will be named Deputy Under Secretary for Farm and Foreign Agriculture Services. Philbrook hails from Minnesota where, for the past 14 years he has been president and CEO of Global Volunteers, an organization that sends American volunteers to over 20 countries. He is expected to concentrate on foreign agriculture, trade and food aid issues at USDA.
On Friday, April 10, Secretary Vilsack announced that Doug O’Brien will be the Chief of Staff for USDA Deputy Secretary Kathleen Merrigan. O’Brien has been Assistant Director of the Ohio Department of Agriculture, advisor to Iowa Governor Culver on renewable energy issues, interim co-director at the National Agricultural Law Center, staff attorney at the Drake Agricultural Law Center, counsel for the Senate Agriculture Committee, covering competition and credit issues for Chairman Tom Harkin (D-IA) during the 2002 Farm Bill debate, and associate counsel with the Organization for Competitive Markets. Doug grew up on a farm in Iowa.
Community Food RFA Released: On Tuesday, April 7, USDA’s Cooperative State Research, Education, and Extension Service (CSREES) released the 2009 edition of the Community Food Projects Competitive Grant Program Request for Application. The deadline for applications is May 13. $5 million is available in total funding with an award ceiling of $300,000. For those who may be pursuing grants, here are the essential links:
Grants.gov Synopsis
Grants.gov Application Package
CSREES Funding Opportunity Page
Community Food Security Coalition CFP Page
WIC Farmers Markets and Organic Needs Advocacy at State Level: The Supplemental Food Program for Women Infants and Children (WIC) is beginning the process of rolling out the new food package that includes fresh fruits and vegetables, whole grains, soy milk, tofu and other food products.
Each designated state agency is charged with developing an implementing new vendor rules by October 1, 2009 and has the option of including farmers markets, which would allow participants to use their new, regular vouchers as well as the Farmers Market Nutrition Program vouchers in markets. The monthly fruit and vegetable benefits are $6 for children, $8 for women, and $10 for pregnant or breastfeeding women which makes it a potentially significant market for farmers.
The state agencies will also decide whether organic products, other than fruits and vegetables which have already been approved at the national level, will be permitted in the program.
It should also be noted that the WIC program received $100 million in stimulus package money to help offset state administrative costs, including the option of spending some of the funds for electronic benefit transfer (EBT) systems.
NSAC encourages member groups to contact their state agency to find out what your state is doing on these issues and to send brief reports to Kate Fitzgerald at kfitzgerald@sustainableagriculture.net. Your state agency can be found by going to: http://www.fns.usda.gov/wic/default.htm and clicking on WIC State Agencies.
Nominations Being Accepted for Advisory Committee on Biotech: ARS is accepting nominations for qualified people to serve on the Secretary’s Advisory Committee on Biotechnology and 21st Century Agriculture (AC21). AC21 provides guidance to the USDA on issues related to agricultural biotechnology and examines the long-term impacts of biotechnology on US agriculture. Terms last up to two years. Up to four meetings are held each year, usually in Washington, DC. Nominations must be post marked no later than April 29, 2009. For the Federal Register notice, click here.
ACRE – In or Out? On Thursday, April 9, USDA announced that commodity crop producers can make the election and enroll in the new Average Crop Revenue Election (ACRE) commodity program option starting April 27, with a deadline of August 14. The Farm Service Agency information on ACRE is posted here. To date, FSA has not sent detailed handbooks on ACRE rules to county offices, a step that will presumably happen shortly.
On Tuesday, April 7, USDA’s Economic Research Service issued a new report entitled Economic Aspects of Revenue-Based Commodity Support. The report examines traditional commodity support with revenue-based alternatives for corn and finds that payment variability and revenue variability is less under revenue options. The study also finds that high payment spikes in particular years are also lessened under the revenue support approach.
EPA NEWS
New Appointees: The White House has announced two new nominees for top spots at EPA, which happen to be the heads of the two divisions at EPA that have the most to do with our agenda.
On April 1, the President named Stephen Owens as the next Assistant Administrator for the Office of Prevention, Pesticides, and Toxic Substances. For the past six years, Owens has been the Director of the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality. In the early 1980s, Owen was counsel for the US House Science and Technology Committee’s Investigations Subcommittee and in the mid-1980s he served as chief counsel and then as state director of Senator Al Gore (D-TN).
On April 3, Peter Silva was nominated to be the next Assistant Administrator for Water Programs. Silva, a civil engineer, is currently Senior Policy Advisor for the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, and previously served as Vice-Chair of the California Water Resources Control Board. President Clinton appointed Silva to the Board of the Border Environment Cooperation Commission.
WTO NEWS
Walker Succeeds Falconer: New Zealand has held on to the chair of the world trade agricultural negotiations, with their new WTO Ambassador, David Walker, taking over from his countrymen and predecessor Crawford Falconer. The announcement was made on Wednesday, April 8. Falconer, who chaired the so-far unsuccessful talks since July 2005, has become Deputy Secretary of New Zealand’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade. There was one other candidate for the post – Uruguay’s WTO Ambassador Guillermo Valles Galmes, but his nomination was strongly opposed by India and other countries that backed a robust special safeguard mechanism to protect their sensitive domestic agricultural production, a position that Uruguay and the U.S., as exporting countries, opposed.
DULY NOTED
CDC Report Worries about Food Safety Plateau: On Thursday, April 9, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a 10-state report that finds that after several years of progress, the incidence of foodborne illnesses has reached a plateau for the past three years. Based on data from the Foodborne Diseases Active Surveillance Network (FoodNet), the report says little or no progress has been made in reducing campylobacter, cryptosporidium, listeria, e-coli 0157, and salmonella outbreaks in recent years. Significant progress was made in the 1996-2003 period.A CDC spokesperson said, “We recognize that we have reached a plateau in the prevention of foodborne disease and there must be new efforts to develop and evaluate food safety practices from the farm to the table. The foodborne division at CDC is planning to increase the capacity of several health departments so that outbreaks can be better detected and investigated.”
The full report appears in this week’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (April 10, 2008) and is available online at www.cdc.gov/mmwr.
A New York Time’s story on the report that suggests it will deepen the existing tensions between FDA and USDA is available here.
29,000 Coops Strong: On Wednesday, April 8, USDA released a multi-year study on the economic impact of cooperatives. The study found over 29,000 coops in the US, with revenues totaling over $650 billion and employing more than 2 million workers. The project was undertaken by the USDA Rural Business Cooperative Service, the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the National Cooperative Business Association. The findings are online at http://reic.uwcc.wisc.edu.
Farm Foundation on Food Safety
Wednesday, April 8th, 2009
Written by Mark Hertel, NSAC Policy Intern
On Tuesday, April 7, the Farm Foundation held a forum at the National Press Club in Washington, DC on “The Future of Food Safety Regulation.”
Jim Hodges, the American Meat Institute’s Executive Vice President for Food Safety and Inspection Services, argued that the food safety system for meat and poultry is basically sound, but acknowledged improvement may be possible. He questioned the value of performance standards, saying they have not been shown to relate directly to desired public health outcomes, and he argued that adding to federal enforcement powers would be of little benefit, since federal power already extends to shutting down implicated producers in some instances. Federal authority to initiate a mandatory recall of a food product is of limited benefit to the public, he said, because by the time the government becomes aware of a threat of food-borne illness, industry, motivated by its own commercial interests, would already have recalled the necessary products.
Carol Tucker Foreman, director of the Consumer Federation of America’s Food Policy Institute, by contrast, argued that America’s food safety system is in urgent need of far-reaching reform. Outbreaks of food-borne illness, she said, have come to threaten not only public health, but also the public’s confidence in industry and government. She argued that an effective food safety system will require coherent, coordinated, and consistent effort at the federal level, and that to achieve this, Congress must update the statutes, enacted in the early 20th century, that empower agencies to implement food safety regulations.
In response to a question from an audience member, Tucker Foreman emphasized that performance-based standards must be tailored to a wide variety of diverse farming operations so that excessive burdens are not placed on small operators who generate only small risks. She also suggested that perhaps food directly marketed from farms to consumers should be exempt from federal requirements.
Margaret Glavin, a former FDA official and now an independent consultant working on food safety policy issues, essentially agreed with Tucker Foreman, saying the “food safety system is in crisis,” and emphasizing the challenge global markets represent for domestic food safety.
Scott Horsfall, CEO of the California Leafy Greens Marketing Agreement, gave an overview of how their voluntary agreement in response to the 2006 E. Coli outbreak has been an effective prophylactic, increased consumer confidence, and allowed standards to evolve as new information becomes available. He envisions a national program based on the model of the California LGMA.
In response to a question from an audience member, he maintained that the cost to beginning farmers of participating in LGMA is a cost inherent in the food business, a cost imposed by the market, not by any particular interest group. In response to a question from Defenders of Wildlife on unintended negative impacts of LGMA on conservation programs, Horsfall responded that he is aware of the issue, and that LGMA is working to address it.
Deborah Bryanton, Executive Director of Food Safety and Consumer Protection at the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, joined the meeting by phone to discuss Canada’s positive experience with a unified food safety agency, an institution formed in 1997.
Weekly Update – March 30-April 3, 2009
Monday, April 6th, 2009
ACTION NEEDED
Reminder: Visit Your Representative and Senators Over Recess! As the cherry and magnolia blossoms linger a few more days on the trees around D.C., members of Congress are heading home for a two-week Easter recess. This is an excellent time for sustainable agriculture advocates to attend listening sessions and town-hall style meetings and let Senators and Representatives know about our sustainable agriculture priorities. For tips on how to do this, check out friend of NSAC and Food and Society Policy Fellow, Lisa Kivirist’s post on the NSAC blog this week “Democracy Delivery: Four Tips When Attending Your Congressional Representatives Town Hall Meetings This Spring.” If you’d like any talking points on NSAC’s priorities, feel free to contact staff at our office: 202-547-5754.
Act NOW to Shut Down Multimillion Dollar Farm Subsidy Loophole: Time is running short to urge Secretary Vilsack to finally close the worst farm subsidy loophole on the books. If you have already submitted a comment, thank you! If you haven’t yet submitted a comment, you have until Monday, April 6th. It’s so easy to submit a comment. There is a sample comment letter available here, or you can write your own based on this action alert.
Democracy Delivery: Four Tips when Attending Your Congressional Representative’s Town Hall Meetings this Spring
Friday, April 3rd, 2009
Written by Lisa Kivirist, owner of Inn Serendipity in Wisconsin and Food and Society Policy Fellow
As Congress heads into their annual spring break, hopefully most of our elected officials won’t be using the time to escape reality for some umbrella drinks on the beach. Many will use this time wisely to get back to their home states and reconnect with the pulse of their American constituents. Often called “Town Hall Meetings” or “Listening Sessions,” these open gatherings serve as a direct and tangible means for our representatives to quickly harvest a reality check of what’s important to their constituents.
Cow Sculpture in New Glarus, Wisconsin
I attended my first Listening Session last week when Senator Russ Feingold came to New Glarus, Wisconsin, a small town not far from my family farm. This was not my first Listening Session due to lack of opportunity: Senator Feingold leads as a model representative who holds over 1,100 such gatherings throughout Wisconsin since he started 16 years ago.
Perhaps a perk of these tumultuous times is I’m finally motivated to take my participative democracy up a notch. However you slice it, for the first time I attended, commented, connected, and left with a renewed sense of both energy and urgency that we all need to take a stronger participative role in voicing our opinions.