May 22

Food Politics, the book we’ve been reading by Robert Paarlberg, along with our first-hand experiences so far on FARM, have confirmed that the arguments surrounding agricultural practices and policies are highly contentious. Paarlberg tells us that the current dispute between commercial and small farming operations is rooted in the pull between demand for quantity and variety of food versus the demand for cultural foods. While he says it’s mostly the responsibility of a democratic governance system to find ways to appease both sides, for now the system has decided “not to use [its] tax and regulatory powers to force farming back toward a smaller, more local, more diverse, or less science-based model” (Paarlberg 2013). And the representatives from Natural Resources and Conservation Services (NRCS) and the Iowa State Extension modelled this idea. Although they are both from organizations that regard scientific research highly, the goals of agriculture as expressed by these two individuals was seemingly contradictory: conserving soil for sustainable agriculture in Iowa versus making the most money in your operation.

Nickie from NRCS told us that while NRCS is a governmental organization, the agency was created not for regulatory purposes, but to promote soil conservation and scientific research in US agriculture. She told us that the prospects of grain productivity in the state within the next century was grim if farm management continued as it is now. She also said that farmers are highly motivated by tradition and what their neighbors are doing and less motivated by the science that supports soil health, such as cover crops, no-till farming, and other practices. Her husband, for example, listens to his farmer buddies about farm practices more religiously than he listens to her, despite the surplus of hard data she has to support her case for soil-sparing behaviors.

Although NRCS and other government and non-governmental conservation programs offer excellent opportunities for achieving more sustainable farming, the behaviors that support commercial agriculture still seem to be winning. The primary advice that Kelvin from Iowa State Extension offered was to “follow the money,” apparently even if it means risking health and safety via exposure to hazardous agricultural chemicals. He reminded us that old, rich farmers receive the biggest subsidies, a testament to the government’s rewards for large and highly productive operations. This problem with this model is that agriculture becomes less of a tactic to ensure food security and more of a by-product of capitalism. Instead of rewarding this method and accepting the over nitrification, soil damage, and pollution that are often outputs in agriculture, supporting a healthy mix of food quantity, variety and culture should be our primary goal. This means reallocating funds to pro-environmental farm behaviors and pushing the envelope of “the political equilibrium of the moment” more toward common ground.