Food System Change Not Coming From the Top

Yesterday President elect Obama nominated his pick for the Secretary of Agriculture, former Iowa Governor Tom Vilsack. Like many other people, I have been watching the nearly daily announcements of cabinet nominations with some degree of excitement, waiting to see if any nomination points towards actual change. To date I've been pretty uniformly disappointed (though not altogether surprised) and the nomination of Vilsack marks another disappointment.

If you think the Department of Agriculture is a small department without much influence on the average American, think again. The USDA operates on a $97 billion annual budget, is responsible for administering all of the food and nutrition programs (including the school lunch program, which feeds over 25 million young people each day), all agricultural subsidies, conservation programs, the forest service etc. etc. We are all food consumers, and as such, USDA policies affect each and every one of us. Unfortunately, in his acceptance of the nomination, Vilsack failed to mention the words "food" or "eaters," instead, promising to protect the interests of farmers and ranchers, who represent less than 5% of the American population (for a concise review of Vilsack's nomination, listen to this NPR interview with Michael Pollan).

The past several weeks have been quite full of outreach and organizing within the sustainable food and nutrition communities around the appoinment of a new Secretary of Agriculture. Most prominently, Michael Pollan wrote an 9-page piece in the New York Times magazine, an open Letter to the Farmer in Chief, imploring the president elect to recognize the centrality of food to influencing many of his key campaign pledges--addressing climate change, the health care crisis and energy independence. This article is a great introduction to understanding how we got where we are today with our agricultural system, and how we cannot make meaningful change in energy use, climate change or health status without dramatic reforms in the way we produce food.

Unfortunately, few major reforms are likely to be driven by the Department of Agriculture with Vilsack at its helm. As Governor of Iowa, Vilsack ardently embraced the production of corn and soy-based ethanol, one of the largest contributors to the worldwide spike in food prices. He supported legislation which stripped the rights of local governments to regulate confined animal feed operations (CAFOs) or regulate the production of genetically modified foods. He has been a leading voice for pharmaceutical crops and was named Governor of the Year by the largest biotechnology industry group, the Biotechnology Industry Organization. For those of us who seek an end to the dominance of agribusiness in the US food system and a return to regionalized, family sized farming operations, we do not have a champion in Vilsack. However, there are a few areas in which he may support important reforms, including a cap on farm subsidies for those farmers earning more than $250,000 ($250,000! Yes, apparently in the world of US farming, that is the benchmark for "low-income". Incrementalism at its finest.) Additionally, Vilsack has indicated support for livestock market reforms, one of the most obvious instances of agribussiness abuse in the food system.

The sustainable food and farming communities are at odds for how best to provoke change in the next administration. The Organic Consumers Association and Pesticide Action Network are calling for an opposition to the nomination of Vilsack. Other groups such as the Center for Rural Affairs argue that the key is not to oppose the nomination, but to organize strongly to influence the policies that the USDA supports, including regulation of anti-competitive behavior in the agriculture industry (particularly consolidation in the meat industry), safety nets for family-sized farms, regulation of CAFOs, support for new (young!) farmers, and incentives for local and organic agriculture.

In the lead up to this nomination, many groups came together to propose more sustainable choices for Secretary of Agriculture. Unfortunately, our thousands and thousands of emails, calls etc. were not recognized. However, the sustainable agriculture and nutrition infastructure was clearly strengthened in this effort. What is clear is that we cannot wait for change to come from above. We must continue this organizing and creating sustainable food solutions quite litereally from the ground up. While a champion of intelligent food and farm policy at the presidential level could do wonders to change the current food system, individual farmers, community organizers and most importantly, eaters, will continue to serve as the true advocates for a sustainable food system.