NSAC Archives for the 'Rural Development' Category
Path to the 2012 Farm Bill: House Agriculture Subcommittee Holds Hearing To Identify Duplicative Rural Development Programs
Wednesday, March 21st, 2012
Today, the House Agriculture Subcommittee on Rural Development, Research, Biotechnology, and Foreign Agriculture held a hearing to identify duplicative federal rural development programs. The hearing focused on reducing duplication, fragmentation, and overlap in rural development programs for a 2012 Farm Bill. USDA Under Secretary for Rural Development Dallas Tonsager and Government Accountability Office (GAO) Director Read the Rest…
Path to the 2012 Farm Bill: NSAC Releases 2012 Farm Bill Policy Platform
Monday, March 19th, 2012
Today, the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC) released its 2012 Farm Bill policy platform, Farming for the Future: A Sustainable Agriculture Agenda for the 2012 Food & Farm Bill. The platform is the culmination of two years of policy work with a broad, diverse coalition of over 90 grassroots organizations from across the country. It Read the Rest…
House Holds Agriculture Appropriations Hearings
Wednesday, March 14th, 2012
Earlier this month, the House Agriculture Appropriations Subcommittee held a series of four hearings on the Obama Administration’s fiscal year (FY) 2013 budget request for the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). The hearings precede and are meant to inform the markup of a FY 2013 agriculture appropriations bill. The four hearings covered the President’s budget Read the Rest…
Path to the 2012 Farm Bill: Senate Kicks Off Hearings
Wednesday, February 15th, 2012
In its “Path to the 2012 Farm Bill” series, NSAC gets into the details of the 2012 Farm Bill debate. On Wednesday, February 15, the Senate Agriculture Committee held its first in a series of four hearings for the upcoming 2012 Farm Bill. Hearings are an important part in the farm bill process because they Read the Rest…
Obama’s FY 2013 USDA Budget Request
Tuesday, February 14th, 2012
On Monday, February 13, President Obama submitted his budget request to Congress for Fiscal Year (FY) 2013. For sustainable agriculture interests, the budget proposal is a mixed bag, with big cuts to working lands conservation programs, and both cuts and increases to discretionary spending accounts for sustainable agriculture programs. As far as the upcoming 2012 Read the Rest…
Lenders Learn how to Bank on Small Farms, Local Food
Thursday, February 2nd, 2012
Financing team offers training as part of healthy food initiative By Patty Cantrell Nic Welty employs himself full time year-round raising lettuce, spinach, and other leafy greens in three low-cost passive solar greenhouses, which together cover less than one acre of land. His Nine Bean Rows farm near Traverse City, MI, is one of many Read the Rest…
It’s Time: Help us Speak up for Sustainable Agriculture
Thursday, January 12th, 2012
Check out our Path to the 2012 Farm Bill blog series for updates on the 2012 Farm Bill process – and be sure to sign up for NSAC Action Alerts to stay in the loop on speaking out and taking action! The summer’s bounty may feel far away, but even in January, farmers and ranchers Read the Rest…
Generations Bookend Rural Great Plains and Midwest
Tuesday, December 20th, 2011
by Jon Bailey, Director, Rural Research and Analysis Program, Center for Rural Affairs A new Center for Rural Affairs report released finds that rural areas in the Great Plains and Midwest continue to lose population and are caught between “bookend generations” – the youngest and the oldest – with a demographic valley in between. The Read the Rest…
If you eat and live in America
Tuesday, December 6th, 2011
If you eat and live in America, you should be concerned about the future of farming in this country. The average age of our nation’s farmers is 57 years old, with more than a quarter of all farmers 65 or older. There are many people inspired to farm, but as recent studies show, our nation’s Read the Rest…
Food and Farm Bill Alive in 2012!
Monday, December 5th, 2011
Dear Supporters, We previously reported to you that a 2011 Food and Farm Bill appeared imminent. Days before Thanksgiving the Congressional “Super Committee” failed to reach agreement on $1.2 trillion in budget cuts. With that, the 2011 Farm Bill proposal intended for inclusion in the Super Committee’s deficit reduction bill is thus no more. The Read the Rest…
