When will our nation’s farmers and ranchers stand up and be heard — or is it too late?
Many of us are trying to make sense of what’s going to develop with the expired Farm Bill. As of early December, it looks more like another one-year extension versus getting a new bill signed.
Meanwhile most farm organizations and all the various commodity groups are busy carrying water and greasing the wheels of the powerful lobbying interests in Washington D.C.
When I joined NFO 55 years ago, I was taught that our grain, meat and milk had value before it left the farm, and it was our responsibility to join with other farmers to collectively price it on the farm.
The buy-side mergers and consolidations, along with various forms of market manipulation, have contributed to the demise of the family farm.
Today’s producers are not getting any easier to organize. The landscape and the attitude continues to evolve and not always in a good way. Production agriculture in today’s world has become heavily reliant on government subsidies and off-farm income to maintain their habit of farming.
Production agriculture is still the backbone of America and a huge part of our nation’s economy and GDP. The problem is the true value, or in other words, the true wealth of what we produce is being manipulated; or shall I use the terms used, misused and abused?
Today’s parity scale points that out clearly. Another good example in recent memory is dairy farmers or livestock producers believing they have enjoyed some relatively better prices these last months. The truth is, it’s been at the expense of the grain farmers and much lower costs of grain and protein.
The system was designed by the multi-national corporations in the food chain to pit one famer against another, one region of the country against another, and one commodity against another to divide and conquer. It seems to me the plan has worked very well for them, and we are the pawns that let it happen.
Whether it’s the last Farm Bill or the yet-to-be-signed next Farm Bill — you will feel you got the shaft, and someone else will get the gold mine.
It may help you farm for a few more years, but is that the solution? Is this the best that the American farmer can do; is this what we have become? Maybe Uncle Sam will throw us some more crumbs next month or send us a life jacket if we’re sinking.
In closing, I just want to say that I know I’m speaking to the choir, but every one of you deserve so much better! Your investment, your risk, and your blood, sweat, and tears-not to mention you are expected to pay the freight both ways.
I hope it’s not too late for today’s farmers and ranchers to pull themselves up by their bootstraps and think for themselves.
