Farm Bill Update

Well, honestly, I haven't had much time yet to figure out who is coordinating any grassroots organizing to pressure Congress to reform the Farm Bill, but I did come across this blog at Environmental Defense and this blog over at the Environmental Working Group (EWG). Both websites give good summaries of where the legislation stands (it's about to be "marked up" in the House, which means that the relevant committee--in this case the House Agriculture Committee--will consider the legislation and amend it before sending it to the full House for further amendment and a vote). Here is the House Agriculture Committee's summary of the bill as of July 10th. This looks like a fairly comprehensive listing of the current reform-minded bills pending in either the House or the Senate, though most of them will not move (meaning they won't ever make it out of committee (forgive the legis-speak, but I don't have a chance to use it very often any more)).

One of the things that strikes me as odd is that the Ranking Member (the senior most Republican on the committee) of the House Agriculture Committee is Rep. Bob Goodlatte, who represents the 6th Congressional District of Virginia. I was born and raised in the 6th District, in Lexington, Virginia. What's odd about the fact that Goodlatte is the ranking member is that the 6th District, according to the Ken Cook's Mulchblog and the analysis of the EWG, comes in 42nd or 5th from last on the list of committee member districts that receive agricultural subsidies. Cook's assertion seems to be that the 6th District would benefit from a change in farm policy that would shift subsidies away from crops grown primarily in the Mid-West to crops grown by smaller farmers across the country like the one in Swoope, Virginia (in the 6th District) that I wrote about here. I doubt Goodlatte will buck the status quo. As Ranking Member and former Chairman my guess is he's firmly in the pocket of agribusiness, but I could imagine that he might make some small effort to amend the bill if he received pressure from his constituents. Even a small change in the subsidy scheme could be a good start to eventual farm bill reform. Do I have any readers in Virginia?

I also came across this blog on food policy.

More to come.