Whose Side Is the American Farm Bureau On?

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http://www.thenation.com/article/168913/q-whose-side-american-farm-bureau

***SNIP

How had this happened? Missouri had become a popular destination for the pork industry. The state produces millions of pigs a year, predominantly for Smithfield Foods, the world’s largest pork producer, which purchased Premium Standard in 2007. The rise of the factory farm has been the death knell for the small family farmer in Missouri, as it has across the country. In 1964, there were 62,000 pig farms in Missouri; as of 2007, there were about 3,000, producing roughly the same number of pigs. To these giant hog producers, who depend on the support of the Farm Bureau to keep their efficient model humming, farmers like Christen and their worries about air and water quality are little more than troublemakers.

Although illustrative, Christen’s case is not unusual. From California to New York, the Farm Bureau leads the charge for industrial-scale food production. It opposes the labeling of genetically engineered food, animal welfare reform and environmental regulation. In Washington, its well-funded team of lobbyists and lawyers seeks to undermine the federal Clean Water Act and the Clean Air Act, opposing pesticide restrictions and increased scrutiny of greenhouse gas emissions and pollution from CAFOs, like the “farm” up the road from Christen.

The Farm Bureau has sued the EPA, which is trying to limit farm runoff from polluting the Chesapeake Bay. At the same time, the Bureau pushes hard to expand international trade and lobbies for the stream of government subsidies that disproportionately benefit the nation’s biggest commodity farm operations and, indirectly, the agribusinesses at the heart of this system.

In Washington, the 2012 Farm Bill has predictably been a top priority for the Farm Bureau lobby team. They have surprised players from both sides of the debate by conceding cuts in traditional subsidies in exchange for a large expansion of subsidized crop insurance that protects against disasters and falling prices at an estimated cost to taxpayers of $9 billion a year. The tactical, philosophical shift garnered praise even from Farm Bureau adversaries. Nonetheless, it should be noted that crop insurance is a small, but significant piece of Farm Bureau insurance companies’ portfolio. In 2011, they collected over $300 million in crop insurance premiums.

[Sherman A1]

1. Their own

as are too many organizations