RAFI-USA e-Bulletin #11 March 2003 ******************************************* Alternatives
for tobacco farmers Sustainable
Ag Program - Labels & More Labels Ark.
House Passes Contract Grower Protections Briefs ********************************************** Alternatives for
Tobacco Farmers By
Jason Roehrig, Project Manager Tobacco Communities
Reinvestment Fund Project
Alan Souther is a tobacco
farmer from Alleghany County. He enjoys farm life and would like to
think that someday he’ll pass his land on to his children. But tobacco quotas, a farmer’s share of the tobacco market,
have declined by almost 50% over the past five years, threatening the
economic stability of many farms and leaving growers like Souther wondering
how to keep things going.
Souther needed some
way to make his farm economically sound.
After some searching, he decided the best way to assure his farm’s
future is to look to the past.
Alleghany County was once a major sheep producing area, and Souther
believes that it could be again.
But Souther needed some help in making his dream a reality.
That’s where
the RAFI-USA came in. RAFI’s
Tobacco Communities Reinvestment Fund was started in 1997 to help tobacco
farmers and community groups start alternative enterprises. According to a continuing study of 1236
tobacco farmers conducted by RAFI and Wake Forest University, farmers
said that lack of capital, markets, processing and profitability stand
in the way of replacing tobacco income with other enterprises. The Tobacco Communities Reinvestment Fund addresses those issues
through a cost-share grant program. Souther received one of those grants
to help with start-up costs for his new sheep operation. "These grants
from the Tobacco Trust Fund Commission and RAFI will point the way to
new, profitable avenues of production and marketing in North Carolina's
diverse farm economy," said Smithson Mills, North Carolina Department
of Agriculture and a Reinvestment Fund Review Board Member.
"The Tobacco Communities
Reinvestment Fund provides an opportunity for farmers to try new marketing
and processing strategies in order to get higher value for their crops,”
said Betty Bailey, Executive Director of RAFI. “We are so grateful to the Tobacco
Trust Fund Commission for recognizing the importance of this program
to keeping North Carolina’s farm families and communities viable." This year RAFI is helping
to develop 20 new producer and community demonstration projects like
Souther’s. The demonstration
projects represent a variety of approaches to replacing tobacco dollars.
Some of the projects
are adding value through processing:
Some projects are filling
a gap in local production:
Other projects are
turning environmental concerns into opportunities:
The demonstration projects
are diverse, reflecting the diversity of opportunities that exist across
the state, but they all attempt to replace tobacco income one way or
another
"There is no shortage
of good ideas among farmers, only the capital to implement them. Funding
good farmer-initiated projects is a wise investment in our agricultural
future and the economic health of our state," said Mills.
************************************************************* Sustainable
Agriculture - Labels and More Labels By Michael Sligh, Director, Sustainable Ag Program (See more
detail below)
1. The Organic Integrity
Project - Our goals are to ensure and maintain the fairest and highest
quality organic standards in a post-USDA final rule implementation process.
We are also committed to providing leadership for the critical
issues that will remain beyond the USDA process.
We have been working
with a team of policy makers and NGO’s to establish priorities
for preserving organic integrity.
There have already been several critical challenges this year.
The most immediate
challenges include: · The inclusion of recent provisions to weaken the organic standard in a $397 billion drought spending bill that would allow meat to be labeled and certified as "organic" even if the animals were partially or entirely fed on non-organic grain. This would severely curtail the market and production of organic feed, driving hundreds of organic farmers out of business. For more information go to the National Campaign for Sustainable Agriculture web site at www.sustainableagriculture.net (action alerts)
·
USDA's failure to appoint an independent public peer
review panel to oversee its accreditation of organic certifying organizations
(the private or state entities that will ensure that organic farmers
are actually adhering to organic farming practices and standards.) The
result has been the acceptance of a number of potentially "sham"
certifiers into the program.
There are, of course,
still many other outstanding issues which have not yet been resolved;
namely building consensus for a national organic transition program,
supporting the role of the National Organic Standards Board, retail
certification and how fairly the farmer-based certifiers are treated
through this implementation process.
The newest work in
this area has been the continued development of farmer and farm worker
(organic and eco-label) guidelines for social justice or what we like
to call "just" foods.
It is our goal to build greater consensus and ultimately a set
of standards that can be tested by certifiers, farmers and retailers
in the private sector. We are now on our 5th revision
of circulated drafts of our "just" food guidelines, which
are out for comments and feedback from our colleagues around the world.
A Social
Stewardship Forum
in Bangkok will be a third in this series to further develop this collaboration
among partners who are developing social, economic and cultural justice
programs and activities in organic and sustainable agriculture. The
meeting will be a catalyst to develop the on-the-ground pilot projects
necessary to test the standards- a very import milestone in our work
thus far.
RAFI is
helping to disseminate a survey to assess the current status of social
justice trends globally. We will be updating our website soon with information
on how to participate in the survey.
See http://www.rafiusa.org
2. Eco-labeling - for
produce raised with environment-friendly practices and rewards from
consumers willing to pay the extra costs The Greener Fields project
was initiated to intensify dialogue among eco-labeling initiatives,
evaluate programs and policies that support these efforts, and to build
further capacity in the sustainable agriculture labeling community.
Phase I of this project was completed in 2000 with the final report
Greener Fields: Signposts for Successful Eco-labels. Phase II: It is our goal to strengthen the US network, to deepen
outreach to similar networks in Europe and elsewhere, and to help build
more comprehensive labeling opportunities for farmers and consumers. To this end, we hosted
a Phase II national forum session in St. Louis in October 2001, a similar
event near Atlanta in mid-May 2002, and held a network planning event
in November 2002 in Boston. We are continuing to develop common principles,
terms, network structure, and codes of conduct. We plan to hold a full
Forum in June 2003 to implement these initiatives. The Eco
– Labeling Code of Conduct is currently being circulated for signators. The Code of Conduct
has been developed by Forum participants to offer a set of standards
by which eco labeled products can be assessed.
3. Biotech/biodiversity
: We are pursuing mandatory,
independent pre-market testing of crops to assess Genetically Engineered
(GE) contamination and mandatory GE labeling, and to shift the burden
of liability to the owners of the biotech patents and away from the
farmers, while preventing or slowing down the new introductions of GE
crops prior to meeting the above goals.
We use the following
venues to achieve these goals: GE legal expert consultations
USDA UN/FAO/WHO Codex US Genetic Engineering
Network
We are also planning
a farmer manual on the legal and practical implications of genetic engineering
contracts or license agreements.
We are working toward
a "seed summit" with the goals of strengthening the ties between
sustainable agriculture advocates and bio-diversity advocates, helping
to foster increased USDA funding for non-GE germ plasm and to encourage
farmer/breeder associations to tackle the specific seed needs of local
farmers.
We have now developed
a team to help shape our campaign to reinvigorate public plant breeding
and held a successful "summit" planning meeting in Iowa in
February with plans for a national summit in Washington DC in September
of 2003.
· Michael is a founder of the Southern Sustainable Agriculture Working Group, (SSAWG), a founder of the National Campaign for Sustainable Agriculture, (NCSA), charter member and founding chair for the National Organic Standards Board, (NOSB), and NGO member to UN / FAO Codex Food labeling Committee. He is a co-author of the Greener Fields Report - Signposts for Successful Sustainable Agricultural labeling and a former farmer and anthropologist. ************************************************************************************* Arkansas House Passes
a Poultry and Livestock Producer Protection Act
In spite of strong
opposition from the poultry and hog companies, HB2573 passed in the Arkansas House by a vote of 58 to 30 (12 not
voting) and has been sent
to the Senate. The bill
was introduced by Rep. Sam Ledbetter
and co-sponsored by Representatives Hathorn, Milligan, and Prater.
Among other provisions,
the bill would require poultry and livestock companies to write contracts
that are readable by farmers and that disclose the material risks involved
in the contract business. While the bill allows for the option of using
arbitration for settling disputes, it also allows for civil actions
against the contractor in court with reasonable attorney fees for the
prevailing party. The bill also makes it clear that the contract growers
have the right to associate with each other to discuss their concerns
and problems.
The action to introduce
this bill is partly the result of Tyson Foods' decision to close its
hog operation in Arkansas and eastern Oklahoma this month. Approximately
159 hog farms are left with large debts on their facilities and no income
to pay them off or to clean up their lagoons.
When the contract growers
planned to sue the company for fraud and misleading information about
the business, Tyson Foods reminded the growers that they had signed
a contract stipulating that disputes with the company had to be settled
in arbitration, not the courts.
Contract poultry growers
have long had the same needs for the protections listed in the bill,
but with Tyson Foods headquartered in Springdale, there seemed to be
little chance of passing any protective legislation in Little Rock.
The Arkansas legislature
adjourns in mid-April.
Briefs:
1. Women in Agriculture,
March 21,
2003, a conference at Appalachian State University, NC featured as the
keynote speaker, Betty Bailey, Executive Director of RAFI-USA on the
topic "Women, Food Systems, and Rural Development.
"This was an opportunity
to remind folks that in these times when the larger world, our families,
friends, and neighbors are in turmoil, it is more important than ever
to be connected with agriculture and to be involved in creating food
security," Betty said. "There is a craving to know the people
behind the food. Consumers want food with a place, a face, and
a taste. That
presents new opportunities for women in agriculture who especially appreciate
these qualities also," Betty emphasized.
2. An Unprecedented
Opportunity in the Tobacco South
Agriculture in the
Global Economy, Bread for
the World Institute's 13th annual report on the State of
World Hunger 2003 included a report from Betty Bailey, Executive Director
at RAFI-USA, " North Carolina's Opportunity to Help Small
Farms and Rural Communities". This report explains
what is happening with the $4.6 billion from tobacco lawsuit settlement
monies which North Carolina expects to receive over 25 years. Half of
the money goes to the Golden Long Term Economic Advancement Foundation
(LEAF). The other half will be split between a Health and Wellness Trust
and a Tobacco Trust that benefits farmers, workers and businesses. The
Tobacco Trust has recently announced a $3 million round of grants for
agricultural and job development, including support for RAFI's reinvestment
fund and complementary projects. See Alternatives for Tobacco Farmers
above.
"The tobacco South
has an unprecedented opportunity to revitalize small farms and rural
communities through wise application of the settlement funds. States
should not forget that small farms are good for the region. They contribute
fresh local food, employment, green fields and forests, and much more
to southern communities," she said.
See Bread For The World's
website for Hunger 2003,
13th Annual Report: http://www.bread.org/institute/hunger_report/index.html Order the complete report in paperback;
165 pages in color with graphs
and tables for $20 Or Download each chapter separately. Betty's document is in Chapter
2 - .U..S. Farm Policy http://www.bread.org/pdfs/Hunger-Report-2003/chapter-2.pdf
3. NEW BOOK Learn what it is like to farm with a poultry
contract
"Plucked
and Burned",
by Sylvia Tomlinson is a new book just now in print
and available from the publisher, Redbud Publishing, or from Amazon.com. Based on experiences of poultry farmers
around the nation, the story draws the reader into that kind of farm
life and its problems. The author has sent copies of the novel to poultry
farmers who have assured her that it is true to life.
Brother David Andrews
agrees. "Plucked and
Burned'….reaches a truth through the form of story that is more
powerful than tons of documentation and argumentation. The truth about
the poultry industry needs to be told…more importantly though,
it needs to be heard, understood, received, and dealt with through justice
and equity. Eating is a moral act. The story "Plucked
ad Burned" blazes with moral insight and passion. My prayer is that it leads to effective
and prompt changes in a system that is morally degrading. Bro. David Andrews, CSC Executive
Director, National Catholic Rural Life Conference Des
Moines, Iowa
Read about the book
and author at: www.redbudpublishing.com
************************************************************************************* Rural Advancement Foundation International-USA (www.rafiusa.org) Edited by Mary Clouse - 919-545-0945; clouses64@yahoo.com |
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