Food Economics and Your Food Dollar

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Food Economics and Your Food Dollar JoAnn Guest Mar 27, 2005 11:01 PST

 

 

http://www.foodroutes.org/hottopic.jsp?id=4

 

While U.S. consumers spend less of their income on food than ever

before, farmers are continuing to get less and less of the consumer food

dollar and are going out of business at alarming rates. Meanwhile

corporate agriculture profits are continuing to increase.

 

Consider the following:

 

Corporate agribusiness profits increased 98 percent during the 1990s;

meanwhile, in 2002 farmers earned their lowest real net cash income

since 1940.

 

Modern industrial agriculture is making farming unprofitable for many.

For more than 60 percent of farm households in 1998, farming actually

lowered the household’s before tax-income.

 

Taxpayers provided $22.9 billion in subsidies during the first three

years of the “Freedom to Farm” law (1996-9, but 10 percent of the

recipients (144,000 participants) collected 61 percent of the money.

What can you do?

 

Buying food directly from local farmers reduces the portion of your food

dollar going to corporate agribusiness and ensures that farmers get

their fair share of your food dollar. Buy local whenever possible.

 

Local farmers will reinvest more of your food dollar in your region.

Buying local food increases the circulation of your food dollars

locally, in effect “creating” money and economic prosperity in your

region.

 

Buying fair trade products ensures that farm workers and producers

elsewhere get a decent wage and enjoy safe living and working

conditions. Look for the fair trade label and buy fair trade products

whenever possible.

 

NEWS

U.S. Suffers Final Defeat in Key WTO Cotton Case

Reuters - Mar 3, 2005

The United States suffered complete defeat Thursday in a dispute with

Brazil over cotton subsidies which has sent shockwaves through global

free trade talks. (more...)

 

Free Trade Leaves World Food in Grip of Global Giants

CD - Jan 28, 2005

Global food companies are aggravating poverty in developing countries by

dominating markets, buying up seed firms and forcing down prices for

staple goods... (more...)

 

Other Articles on Food Dollar

 

 

 

Library Documents

Eating up the Earth: How Sustainable Food Systems Shrink our Ecological

Footprint

Diana Deumling, Mathis Wackernagel, & Chad Monfreda - Jan 1, 2005

Using the Ecological Footprint concept, this policy brief address three

fundamental questions: 1) What does it currently take to feed us? 2) How

can we avoid the clash between expanding human demand and limited

ecological capacity? 3) What will it take to feed us well for years to

come?

 

Why Worry About the Agriculture of the Middle?

Fred Kirschenmann, Steve Stevenson, Fred Buttel, Tom Lyson and Mike

Duffy - Feb 11, 2004

 

Over 80% of farmland in the U.S. is managed by farmers whose operations

fall between small-scale direct markets and large, consolidated firms.

These farmers are increasingly left out of our food system.

 

If present trends continue, these farms, together with the social and

environmental benefits they provide, will likely disappear in the next

decade or two.

The “public good” that these farms have provided in the form of land

stewardship and community social capital will disappear with them.

 

Read more on Food Dollar

_________________

 

JoAnn Guest

mrsjo-

DietaryTi-

www.geocities.com/mrsjoguest/Genes

 

 

 

 

 

AIM Barleygreen

" Wisdom of the Past, Food of the Future "

 

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