Corporate Pigs and Other Tales of Agribusiness

Freedom to Fail How U.S. Farming Policies Have Helped Agribusiness And Pushed Family Farmers Toward Extinction

by Ben Lilliston and Niel Ritchie

George Naylor's family traveled to Green County, Iowa from England in the 1880s. They farmed on other people's land until 1919 when they bought their own farm. Now, in face of a growing farm crisis, George Naylor is battling to keep his family's 560-acre farm alive. "Now that prices have gone to heck, we're not getting any money at all," Naylor says. "We don't buy anything we don't need."

Naylor's experience is typical of most U.S. farmers who have been sold down the river by a calculated U.S. farm policy that directly benefits large agribusiness companies and factory-style farming at the expense of family farms. The farm crisis has hit home literally, with plunging farm prices -- the bane of family farmers for centuries -- forcing most farm families to work off the farm to survive. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, almost 90 percent of the total income of rancher or farmer households now comes from outside earnings. MORE>>

Flimflam on the Farm: The American Farm Bureau and the Betrayal of Family Farmers, Taxpayers and the Environment

By Vicki Monks

When farm policy controversies erupt in Washington, D.C. or the U.S. heartland, one of the loudest voices inevitably belongs to the American Farm Bureau Federation. With its roughly 3,000 constituent state and county farm bureaus, and its claimed membership of more than 4.9 million members, the Farm Bureau has artfully portrayed itself as the voice and champion of U.S. family farmers for nearly 80 years.

The vast majority of the Farm Bureau's members, however, are either policyholders of one of numerous insurance companies affiliated with state farm bureaus or are customers of other Farm Bureau business ventures. Such members have no say in establishing or carrying out Farm Bureau policies and, in most cases, have no particular interest in agriculture (indeed, the U.S. Department of Agriculture says there are only one million full-time farmers left in the United States). MORE>>

The Dirt on Factory Farms Environmental and Consumer Impacts of Confined Animal Feeding Operations

By Mark Floegel

"What's in this?" is the gastronomic question for a new millennium. The answer depends on where the food comes from and how it is produced. If the subject of the question is meat, and that meat comes from a confined animal feeding operation (CAFO, also known as a factory farm) then "what's in this?" may include everything from antibiotics to E. coli. Perhaps it's better to eat seafood -- unless the fishing ground was closed by an outbreak of Pfiesteria pisicida, compliments of the waste products from those onshore factory farms. Or maybe the same multinationals which brought you these industrial comestibles will make those threats go away, by exposing their products to high doses of radiation before delivering them to market. Still hungry? MORE>>

The Case for Small Farms

An Interview with Peter Rosset

Peter M. Rosset, Ph.D. is executive director of the Oakland, California-based Institute for Food and Development Policy -- better known as Food First -- a nonprofit "people's" think tank and education-for-action center whose work highlights root causes and value-based solutions to hunger and poverty around the world, with a commitment to establishing food as a fundamental human right. He is author of a number of briefing papers, including "The Multiple Functions and Benefits of Small Farm Agriculture in the Context of Global Trade Negotiations," and is co-author of "World Hunger: Twelve Myths." MORE>>

In The Fields of Indonesia

An Interview with Nila Ardhianie

Nila Ardhianie is executive director of Yayasan Duta Awam (YDA), a non-governmental organization promoting community empowerment, democratization and sustainable development in Indonesia. She has led local and national advocacy campaigns for consumers', farmers' and children's rights, and is currently focusing on pesticide reform and community-based monitoring of multilateral development bank-financed programs and policies. MORE>>