Advocacy, the Farm Bill and Factory Farms

By Harry Rhodes, Executive Director

FACT partners with and participates in several coalitions, which are working together to dismantle the factory farming system and create a more humane farming system that focuses on raising meat and poultry in humane, healthy and safe ways.

Harry (far right) with the Illinois Delegation at the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition's Winter Meeting in Washington DC.

Every five years the Farm Bill comes up in Congress for renewal, and this year is one of those years. This huge policy bill covers everything from farm programs and subsidies to nutrition programs such as SNAP (food stamps). Traditionally the farm bill is a bipartisan bill, but this year, with a divided Congress, it is unclear if that will happen.

We have worked with partners to prepare alternative farm bills. One such bill was prepared by the HEAL Food Alliance. The priorities for making the “farm bill work for us” are:

• Require food and farm jobs to be safer and fairer for working people

• Provide more opportunities for Black, Indigenous, and farmers of color

• Invest in communities, not corporations

• Ensure everyone has access to good quality food they can afford

• Produce food in a way that is good for the environment.

You can read more about HEAL’s Farm Bill Guide at: https://healfoodalliance.org/farmbill.

We are also members of the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC), and have endorsed their 2023 Farm Bill Platform - https://sustainableagriculture.net/take-action.

The priorities of this bill are similar to the ones outlined by HEAL:

• Advance racial equity across the food system

• Build a climate-resilient future

• Invest in healthy rural and urban communities

• Level the playing field for small and mid-sized farms.

As a part of our effort to support humane farmers we are participating in direct meetings with congressional offices in Washington DC. I participated in the NSAC lobbying day last week. Samantha Gasson, our Humane Farming Program Associate, was on a panel for the Food Not Feed Summit yesterday, and met with legislative offices. From March 6-8, Samantha and Larissa McKenna, our Humane Farming Program Director, will participate in NSAC’s Rally for Resilience in Washington DC. As a part of that rally FACT will bring farmers in our network to Capital Hill so that legislators will hear directly from farmers about their needs.

We believe that we can transform our food system by working in broad coalitions to bring about a more humane farm bill that supports farmers and communities nationwide.