Editor’s Note: This post was written by Nourish Colorado, an NSAC member. This is part three of a five part series. See part one, Budget Reconciliation: An Unwanted Outcome for Coloradans, and part two, Impacts of Budget Reconciliation and Coloradans’ Health.

“Welcome” is an odd word to use to begin this post, given the profoundly and universally negative information we’re here to convey. Thank you for being here with us and reading along! This series elevates the many damaging impacts of the recently passed budget reconciliation bill, referred to as the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act”. The more we can share accurate information about what is going on, the more effective we will collectively be in changing these policies! Our third blog post in this series focuses on some of the ways this new law hurts farmers and farming communities. (If you haven’t yet, catch up on our first and second posts in the series.)   

At a high-level, this bill: 

• Will increase subsidies for large commodity growers; 
• Includes little to no supports for small, diversified, and local agriculture; 
• Makes drastic cuts to programs like SNAP and SNAP-Ed that connect more households to growers and help keep dollars local; and
• Ultimately delays the passage of a comprehensive, forward-looking, bipartisan farm bill.  

Farm Bill Catch-Up

Budget reconciliation, as a reminder, barely passed out of the Senate and House, with all Democrats in both chambers voting against it. The bill pays for tax breaks and commodity subsidies by cutting SNAP.  In so doing, it has bypassed, perhaps for years, the opportunity for the government to draft a bipartisan farm bill that reflects the many needs of rural and urban communities across the country. For many decades, the “Farm Bill Coalition” of Democrats and Republicans have worked together to draft and adopt a farm bill every five years or so that supports agriculture big and small, conservation, rural issues, and nutrition assistance. The farm bill, like all major legislative policies, requires 60 votes in the Senate to pass, meaning it must be bipartisan in nature. Legislators have long worked together to make sure many priorities are included so that the government can keep on functioning for the American people. In contrast, the budget reconciliation bill needed only 51% to pass, making it highly partisan with the majority party (Republicans) able to push through legislation without needing bipartisan support.

With the inclusion of so many farm bill provisions in budget reconciliation and the complete abandonment of bipartisan policy-making, this process means we may not see a complete, new farm bill until we have a new Congress. The 2018 Farm Bill has already been extended twice. These kinds of delays in changing or improving government programs hurt ALL sizes and shapes of agriculture and clearly will result in increased food insecurity. In the absence of a new farm bill, and to sustain most farm bill programs in any capacity, Congress must now pass an extension (again!) of the current bill before the end of the year.  

How Cutting Nutrition Assistance Hurts Farm Communities

Much has been written about the economic impact of SNAP – every dollar of SNAP generates between $1.50-$1.80 in economic activity.  This is critical – food dollars benefit farmers, and the more food dollars one has, the more benefits farmers reap. The House Agriculture Committee released an analysis of budget reconciliation that summarizes the impacts that cutting SNAP will have on farm country.They point out how 25 cents on every dollar spent on food (whether SNAP or otherwise) goes to a farmer, and for every dollar cut from a person’s SNAP benefits, food purchases will decrease. Cuts have a compounding effect on SNAP food purchases, leading the House Ag Committee to estimate that this new law will eliminate $30 billion in farm revenue due to SNAP cuts alone.  

To better understand the compounding effects here in Colorado, let’s dive deeper. The loss of food dollars through SNAP alone will decrease farm sales, and in Colorado, SNAP is the foundation of two SNAP incentive programs – Double Up Food Bucks and the USDA pilot program Colorado SNAP Produce Bonus, which has over a 99% redemption rate. Collectively, these produce incentives for SNAP shoppers are available at over 150 locations and over 250 farmers accept payments from one or the other of these incentives. Farmers markets, and retailers that gain critical income from SNAP and SNAP incentives will lose customers from decreases in SNAP participation. Compounding this loss is the elimination of SNAP-Education, which has for over 10 years connected limited-income households with their local food system by supporting programs like Double Up, offering shopping tours at farmers markets, and integrating local and seasonal produce into cooking classes. The farm bill is the only mechanism to not only sustain sufficient SNAP benefits, but also to restore SNAP-Ed and secure the future of high-ROI SNAP incentive programs.  Laurel Smith, owner of Here & Now Farm in Wellington, CO, sums up this damage to farmers such as herself: 

“Like many people, I became a farmer because I wanted to feed people—not just middle- or high-income people, but everyone who wants to eat fresh fruits and vegetables. One way I can make sure this is possible is to accept SNAP payments. And since I run a pilot program called Colorado SNAP Produce Bonus, SNAP shoppers can get up to $60/month in additional produce from my farm for free—a healthy food incentive. But all this is in jeopardy since the passage of the budget reconciliation bill. I am furious that almost 300,000 Coloradans might lose some or all of their SNAP in years ahead. Farmers like me will see that revenue stream shrink and we’ll lose some of our favorite customers. Economists have shown that when someone shops with SNAP, it has a significant impact on our local economies. Why would we take that? These are programs that we dreamed up as a society. We asked our legislators for them, and we designed them into existence. For generations, we made changes to these types of programs through the Farm Bill instead of rushing bad ideas through budget committees. A proper farm bill is where we’ll be able to decide to keep Colorado SNAP Produce Bonus going past 2027. Many farmers I know are unhappy with our representatives who voted this appalling bill through, and we’ll be fighting for ways to rebuild a robust SNAP program for the communities we live in and love.”

A Multitude of Attacks on Farm and Food Systems 

The budget reconciliation bill, referred to by the University of Illinois’ farmdoc policy analysts as the “Reconciliation Farm Bill”, wreaks much more havoc for farmers big and small than simply decreasing revenue through SNAP. Analysts opened farmdoc’s recent blog, The Reconciliation Farm Bill: The Top Five Most Problematic Changes to Farm Policy, thusly: “Were it not for the protective cover of the budget reconciliation process and its fundamental warping of the deliberative process as designed in the Constitution, it is extremely unlikely that these five changes would have become law.”  

In its comprehensive overview of impacts on farms and farm systems, the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC) calls attention to the significant expansion of farm subsidy programs, all benefiting large commodity growers and corporations, and paid for by cuts to SNAP. NSAC elevates how the Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the increases in subsidies through the nation’s largest loss, in addition to risk coverage payout programs for commodity crops (which do not include fruit and vegetable crops), will cost over $54 billion over the next 10 years. Given that only 27% of farm acres are enrolled in these programs and only 31% of farms are even eligible given their base acreage, these massive subsidies will not benefit most of America’s farmers. In moves that seem determined to widen the divide between large, commodity growers and smaller farmers, the bill does not expand access to crop insurance for most small to mid-sized, multi-crop, or direct marketing farms. 

The bill is a confusing mixed bag for on-farm conservation support as well. The major problem is that conservation programs need to be authorized and strengthened through an actual farm bill. Refer back to NSAC’s What’s Really Inside the Final Budget Reconciliation Bill: A Breakdown of Food and Agriculture Provisions for an extensive review of how the bill does not extend the authorization of the $2 billion Conservation Reserve Program (it needs a farm bill!!) but it does rescind unobligated Inflation Reduction Act funds that were an unprecedented investment from the Biden Administration, including from the Conservation Stewardship Program, Environmental Quality Incentives Program, Agricultural Conservation Easement Program, and Regional Conservation Partnership Program.  The bill also does not increase funding for programs such as the Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program and the Organic Research and Extension Initiative. These are just a few examples of the types of programs that rely on a bipartisan farm bill for continuity and impact that will not experience support since the budget reconciliation seemingly picked and chose some agricultural provisions to support, and others to ignore.  

Bottom line, this process bypasses the decades-old Farm Bill Coalition and provides few opportunities for local efforts that support regional food systems and connections between nutrition assistance and farming communities.  Stick with us next week to read more about the unfortunate ways that cuts to SNAP hurt not just SNAP recipients, but impact many food assistance programs, leading to concerns for food security.

The post Cross Post: Impacts of Budget Reconciliation and Colorado Farms: Hurt for Farmers and Farm Communities, and the Need for a New Farm Bill appeared first on National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition.

Contact: Laura Zaks

National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition

press@sustainableagriculture.net

Tel. 347.563.6408

Release: Bipartisan Senate Bill Boosts Local Farmers and Expands Access to Healthy Food for Families

Washington, DC, July 22, 2025 – On Friday, July 18, Senators Jack Reed (D-RI) and Jim Justice (R-WV) introduced the Strengthening Local Food Security (SLFS) Act of 2025 (S. 2338). The SLFS Act would catalyze new market opportunities for local farmers and food businesses while providing nutritious foods to communities in need. The National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC) applauds Senators Reed and Justice for offering a bipartisan solution that readies producers with reliable markets, allowing them to invest and expand their operations. 

“The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) purchases billions of dollars of food annually for federal nutrition programs, yet these purchases are mostly made from a small number of the largest businesses. By localizing purchasing decisions, buyers can work with farmers based on both their existing scale as well as the needs of the community. The Supporting Local Food Systems Act would create local channels that allow for small, mid-size, and beginning farmers to successfully secure contracts in federal nutrition programs,” said Hannah Quigley, NSAC Policy Specialist, in response to the bill’s introduction. 

“The recent growth in local supply chains has demonstrated real economic benefits for agricultural communities. Farmers are establishing new relationships with institutions, diversifying their wholesale farm revenue, and investing in on-farm infrastructure to meet this new demand,” Quigley added. 

The SLFS Act creates a pathway for USDA to enter into cooperative agreements with states and tribal governments to purchase locally grown and raised foods from small, mid-sized, beginning, veteran, or underserved fishers, farmers, and ranchers for distribution in school nutrition and community food assistance programs. These agreements will strengthen the burgeoning relationships between local producers and institutions. The bill also includes support for technical assistance initiatives to support farmers in food safety planning, training, and upgrades required to scale to new commercial wholesale markets. 

“The double impact of this initiative puts more healthy, local foods on students’ plates, while getting more dollars directly to producers. It’s an important step toward making sure federal child nutrition programs can be market channels that strengthen the resilience of our supply chain in each community,” commented Karen Spangler, Director of the National Farm to School Network, an NSAC member. 

Find more details in the bill text. 

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About the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC)The National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition is a grassroots alliance that advocates for federal policy reform supporting the long-term social, economic, and environmental sustainability of agriculture, natural resources, and rural communities. Learn more: https://sustainableagriculture.net/

The post Release: Bipartisan Senate Bill Boosts Local Farmers and Expands Access to Healthy Food for Families appeared first on National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition.

Editor’s Note: This post is part of a multi-part series exploring some of the key sustainable agriculture and food systems challenges that the farm bill can address. Through a series comparing the House and Senate Agriculture Committees’ proposals, we provide an assessment of how each chamber’s bill would address a given challenge, and our recommended path forward. Additional posts explore how the next farm bill can tackle issues in meat processing, crop insurance, organic and sustainable agriculture research, and more.

Seventeen million households across the United States – or one in eight – experienced food insecurity in 2022. The farm bill is the piece of federal legislation that provides a critical lifeline for seniors, individuals, and families who cannot readily access the food they need. 

The National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition has a longstanding history of advocating for win-win programs and initiatives that allow families to utilize their federal nutrition benefits in direct marketing settings, like farmers’ markets and farm stands, while simultaneously generating revenue for small, beginning, and local farmers.  

When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, Congress relied on these initiatives to reach vulnerable communities everywhere by increasing the financial benefit for families, providing flexibility in program delivery, and funneling excess agricultural products into emergency feeding services. These decisions paid off. Food insecurity rates decreased while programs were in full effect. But as additional benefits and programs expired in 2022, food insecurity increased again to a level higher than any previous single year since the Great Recession in 2008. These rates have continued to climb in 2023 and are signaling significant food affordability issues for families. 

As Congress is in the middle of reauthorizing the farm bill, they have an opportunity to ensure programs have sufficient funding to meet the growing needs among families and ensure accessible market opportunities for farmers. Current proposals in both the House and Senate attempt to address this issue to varying degrees. While both offer funding increases, only the Senate includes solutions to eliminate persistent barriers to participation and offers sustainable approaches for local food system development.

The Senate’s proposal addresses food access and affordability in a number of ways that provide autonomy to households and increase spending with small farmers and local markets. 

• It responds to insufficient funding for the Senior Farmers Market Nutrition Program that has left numerous states and Tribes from being able to participate by providing $100 million over 10 years and prioritizing underserved areas. 
• It recognizes the Gus Schumacher Nutrition Incentive Program’s (GusNIP) efficient and effective approach to increasing fruit and vegetable consumption among participants and promotes program expansion by scaling funding by $750 million over ten years, increasing the federal cost-share, and offering pathways for cooperative agreements with partners who have the capacity to implement state-wide programs. 
• It also directs the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) to streamline vendor program applications so farmers can readily participate in programs that currently often require four separate applications. This in turn will ensure federal nutrition benefits can be easily used in direct-marketing settings.
• It permanently authorizes the Local Food Purchase Assistance Program whose primary purpose is to strengthen local supply chains and promote new market opportunities for underserved farmers, but also encourages local control over the types of foods reaching food banks and pantries, creating greater consumer satisfaction. 

The House approach in the Farm, Food, and National Security Act of 2024 (FFNSA, HR 8467) also increases resources for programs targeting food security and nutrition within low-access areas, though not to the levels truly needed to address demand. Moreover, the FFNSA sorely missed the opportunity to create programs that generate simultaneous benefits for our nation’s farmers.

• It provides an additional $2 million annually for the Senior Farmers Market Nutrition Program, which will not be enough to ensure all interested states and Tribes can participate.
• It seeks to expand nutrition incentive offerings through GusNIP by offering a match waiver for persistent poverty areas and increasing funding to $75 million annually, which will take an incremental approach to improving program access. 

It ignores the momentum and success of the Local Food Purchase Assistance Program and instead of authorizing a permanent program, it creates an entirely new Food Box Pilot Program that unfortunately resembles the disappointing Farmers to Families Food Box Program that ended in May 2021 after a number of incidences of not adequately serving communities or the small and mid-sized farmers heavily impacted by COVID-19.

The Final Path

The unique timing of this farm bill offers an opportunity for Congress to reflect on the tumultuous years of the COVID-19 pandemic and on the effectiveness of established and novel programs in meeting the nutrition and food security needs of our communities. It is imperative that the farm bill provides flexibility and autonomy for consumers utilizing their nutrition benefits and that farmers and local markets have ready access to benefit from the billions of federal dollars invested in these programs. That means a final farm bill must: 

• Ensure enough funding is available for all states and Tribes to participate in impactful senior nutrition programs while providing program model and implementation flexibility to meet unique rural needs, 
• Promote the expansion of highly popular and effective nutrition incentive programs by lowering the match requirements, encouraging statewide applications, and providing sufficient investment for adequate scale, 
• Identify barriers to Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) program modernization in farmers markets, roadside stands, and Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) and invest in solutions that ensure local farmers can readily access the market opportunity, 
• Invest in localized food access solutions such as the Local Food Purchase Assistance Program that support the viability of local farmers and increase the availability of high quality local and culturally appropriate foods in food pantries and other emergency food settings. 

The post Path to a New Farm Bill: Increasing Access and Affordability in Local Food Systems appeared first on National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition.

Editor’s Note: This post is part of a multi-part series exploring some of the key sustainable agriculture and food systems challenges that the farm bill can address. Through a series of posts comparing the House and Senate Agriculture Committees’ proposals, we provide an assessment of how each chamber’s bill would address a given challenge, and our recommended path forward. Our first post focused on local and regional market access. Future posts will explore how the next farm bill can tackle issues in meat processing, crop insurance, organic and sustainable agriculture research, and more.

Urban agriculture is a longstanding practice in communities to serve as a form of food sovereignty, resistance, mutual aid, and entrepreneurship. Urban farmers and community garden networks cultivate, process, and distribute food utilizing micro-scale and innovative production techniques. While these practices predominantly exist in urban and suburban areas, incorporating support for these practices throughout the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) has the potential to extend economic and social benefit beyond urban centers.

USDA and Urban Agriculture

The Office of Urban Agriculture and Innovative Production (OUAIP) promotes the viability of urban farms and addresses food insecurity in neighboring communities. The Office itself is a fairly new USDA initiative, yet it has already had a significant impact in communities nationwide. The Office invests in organizations and localities through grants and cooperative agreements to: 

• Increase the capacity of agricultural production in urban areas and through innovative methods; 
• Research and develop local policies or zoning regulations that support agricultural production in urban and suburban areas; 
• Develop and implement food waste reduction or management plans that promote soil health through compost;
• Provide educational opportunities to youth and communities that encourages gardening and promotes health and well-being.

Additionally, USDA has recently established seventeen new Urban Service Centers with urban conservationists to bring farm financing and conservation funding to urban areas. In light of historical distrust and skepticism of USDA within communities of color, the Farm Service Agency funded organizations in these seventeen regions to conduct outreach about incoming new services. However, a number of these partners were not community organizations that held established relationships with urban producers in those regions or had experience in urban production methods. Many of these agreements were initiated earlier this year, and to date, only a few of the new Urban Service Centers have physical locations. Therefore, the effectiveness of these partnerships to drive farmers to new USDA services remains to be seen. OUAIP received funding for the first time in FY2020. It saw small but steady increases (from $5 million to $8.5 million) from FY2020 – FY2023, but has since been caught in annual funding fights, risking its progress.

Farm Bill Opportunity

The National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC) has worked with Congressional leaders to identify legislative opportunities to ensure investments better reach farmers and the Office has stable funding, which was introduced as the Supporting Urban and Innovative Farming Act (S. 2591, H.R. 5915) last year.

Both the Senate and House Agriculture Committees include a number of these provisions in their respective farm bill strategies. 

The Senate offers a comprehensive solution to addressing funding shortfalls and improving the accessibility of supports to urban producers by incorporating the vast majority of provisions from S.2591: 

• Expanding the responsibilities of the office to better serve the conservation and business planning needs of urban producers; 
• Enabling community partners to act as an extension of the Office through cooperative agreements, prioritizing organizations that have established relationships with underserved population and experience providing technical assistance to these producers; 
• Generating business growth for urban producers by supporting microgrant opportunities and expanding grant eligibility to farmer cooperatives; and
• Investing in the long-term development and growth of the Office by providing mandatory funding at $10 million annually. 

The House also includes approximately half of the provisions from H.R. 5915 that would: 

• Improve the delivery of USDA conservation and business planning services to urban and innovative farming operations; 
• Create more access for funding among producers by supporting microgrant opportunities and expanding grant eligibility to farmer cooperatives; and
• Enable community partners through cooperative agreements. 

Unfortunately, the House bill does not include a directive or prioritization for organizations with urban farming experience like the Senate does. This would likely lead to the Farm Service Agency partnering with institutions and inexperienced nonprofits that have the capacity for managing federal grants but not necessarily the experience in supporting urban farmers. Furthermore, the House bill does not provide any mandatory funding. As a result, the House approach could result in additional unmet demand as the applicant pool widens but the funding pool remains unstable. 

The Final Path

Adequately resourcing the Office of Urban Agriculture and Innovative Production is only one step to ensure all scales and agricultural production techniques are represented in USDA programming. Any final farm bill must additionally: 

• direct USDA to consider and develop resources that meet the unique needs of small scale farmers operating in urban and metropolitan areas, 
• create opportunities for trusted community partnerships to lead outreach and build relationships between growers and USDA through cooperative agreements,
• expand the reach of grants by funding farmer cooperatives and offering microgrants to urban farmers, and
• invest in research and data collection to understand the prevalence and economic impact of urban and innovative production. 

Senator Stabenow (D-MI) has proposed a more comprehensive approach to addressing urban and innovative production services throughout existing USDA services. However, neither the House or the Senate offer the financial resources to fully implement the urban, indoor, and emerging agricultural data collection initiative authorized by the 2018 Farm Bill. Incorporating these practices consistently into the Census of Agriculture is imperative for USDA to adequately understand and serve these producers. 

The post Path to a New Farm Bill: Securing Resources for Urban Agriculture and Innovative Production appeared first on National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition.

Editor’s Note: This post is the first post in a multi-part series exploring some of the key sustainable agriculture and food systems challenges that the farm bill can address. Through a series of posts comparing the House and Senate Agriculture Committees’ proposals, we provide an assessment of how each chamber’s bill would address a given challenge, and our recommended path forward. Future posts will explore how the next farm bill can tackle issues in meat processing, crop insurance, organic and sustainable agriculture research, and more.

Local Agriculture Market Program

The farm bill has a longstanding history of supporting market development for local producers and food businesses through grant programs such as the Value-Added Producer, Farmers Market and Local Food Promotion, and more recently, the Regional Food System Partnership programs. Over time, Congress has authorized programs to respond to the unique needs of markets and regional supply chains. A recent report from US Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) demonstrates how Local Agriculture Market Programs address these needs and spur economic growth through job creation and an increase in customers and revenue. Recent Agricultural Census data further shows the continued growth of the sector. In 2022, 60,332 farms sold their products to retail markets, institutions, and food hubs marketed as local and regional products, with sales valuing $14.2 billion. This is an increase by 57% from 2017.

Demand for local and regional food grant programs has increased in recent years. Since 2018, AMS has awarded more than 3,000 grants across the Local Agriculture Market Programs (LAMP). Part of this increase can be attributed to the increased reliance on our local and regional food systems in light of fractured national supply chains during the COVID-19 pandemic. While food hubs often serve an essential role in these local food systems, they have had a difficult time securing relevant LAMP funding. Only 8% of relevant awards have included food hubs. Additionally, NSAC members have shared how difficult it is to navigate program applications, particularly for documenting matching requirements. Generally applications require over 100 hours to complete. 

Congressional leaders have heard this need clearly from their communities with the Senate and the House each taking a different approach to alleviating participation barriers. 

The Senate’s proposal would improve access programs by: 

• removing match requirements for Value-Added Producer Grants, the Farmers Market Promotion Program, and the Local Food Promotion Program, 
• directing USDA to collect feedback from stakeholders on how to simplify the application process, 
• and increasing authorization levels to $30 million annually. 

The House responds to these issues by incorporating provisions from the Local Farms and Food Act (H.R. 2723) that seek to increase programmatic access by creating a simplified application for Farmers Market and Local Food Promotion Program grants that would support underfunded activities, such as equipment and staff time. 

In addition to the provisions noted above, each proposal responds to local market changes by enabling food hubs as an eligible grant entity. They both clearly recognize the highly effective and popular nature of the program, and seek to correct the overly burdensome application process for producers and organizations but in slightly different ways. 

While the House targets short-term issues, the Senate proposal goes further to address programmatic growth by removing the match requirements and enabling additional funding. NSAC members and other local food stakeholders have consistently identified the match requirement as a significant barrier to access program funding. The reality is, even without a requirement, organizations and farmers are contributing their own resources to their business or community initiatives. Incorporating proof of this contribution into the application process is more often preventing highly qualified applicants from applying than it is ensuring private or public contribution to a project. While an increase in funding authorization is truly welcomed, recent precedent for the appropriations cycle leaves stakeholders nationwide concerned about the long term growth of the program. Without sufficient and guaranteed funding, the proposals risk creating more unmet demand for the program. For this reason, NSAC continues to advocate for an increase from $50 million to $75 million in mandatory annual funding in addition to the increase to $30 million in discretionary in the final bill. 

Access to Food Safety Resources

To support growers in complying with regulatory and market-based standards that have expanded under the Food Safety Modernization Act, the 2018 farm bill included changes to the Value-Added Producer Grants and the Farmers Market and Local Food Promotion Program to cover costs associated with food safety certifications and upgrades to equipment for maintaining food safe standards. 

Yet these changes have yet to be fully implemented under either program. Applicants can still receive financial support for food safety-related activities, but only if they are sandwiched within broader project requirements. Neither producers nor food enterprises can access these grant funds for exclusively food safety reasons. 

Congressional leaders reiterated the importance of these provisions in the Local Farms and Food Act (S. 1205 | H.R. 2723), but the food safety elements of the bill have not been included in either H.R. 8467 or the Senate’s proposed Rural Prosperity and Food Security Act of 2024.

A final farm bill must direct USDA to finish implementing these changes, and ensure the expanded funding for equipment supports food safety standards and compliance. The need for this opportunity will only continue to grow as both the Food Safety and Inspection Service and the Food and Drug Administration continue to promulgate new rules that can pose disproportionate economic burdens upon small and very small producers and processors. 

Local Food Purchase Assistance Program

Beyond investments in organizations and producers, Congress has sought to strengthen the local and regional marketplace by empowering states and localities to develop their own food supply chains through targeted food purchases. Supporting domestic supply chains is not a new concept for the USDA. USDA spends billions on food purchases annually to distribute two billion pounds of food into schools, food pantries, and community nutrition programs serving children and adults. USDA’s Commodity Procurement Department purchases food on a competitive solicitation process. Due to the scale of these purchases, solicitations are often written to cover a large geographic footprint and USDA follows a precedent of selecting bids at lowest cost. As a result, it is extremely difficult for small-scale farmers or localized food hubs to participate in this system. Rather, these contracts often benefit fewer, larger scale food distributors or producers. For example, in 2022, 50% of the total value of contracts were awarded to only 25 businesses. That represents roughly $2.3 billion in spending. 

USDA launched an alternative in 2022 known as the Local Food Purchase Assistance Program (LFPA) where they enter into cooperative agreements with States and Tribal nations for local authorities to purchase food and distribute it in insecure communities on USDA’s behalf. The benefits of LFPA exceed traditional food and nutrition programs. In addition to providing nutritious foods to communities with limited access, it has an explicit directive to support local and regional food supply chain resiliency by purchasing from local, underserved, and historically disadvantaged agricultural producers. As a result, the program has already made purchases from 6,000 unique producers, of which more than 63% have been disadvantaged producers. 

The Senate has recognized the novel program’s potential for reforming federal procurement. The Senate seeks to create a permanent Local Food Purchase Assistance program that: 

• Enters into noncompetitive cooperative agreements with States, Tribal nations, and territories to purchase and distribute local food to insecure communities, 
• Requires foods be purchased from local and underserved producers within their state or region, 
• Ensures access for Tribal nations with a 15% funding set-aside, and
• Offers $200 million in mandatory funding for the program’s duration and authorizes an additional $40 million annually. 

NSAC members and community stakeholders are hopeful that this transformative local food purchasing program has a permanent home in the farm bill. However, some are concerned about the funding levels proposed, which represent a fraction of the original program funding. The current proposal could result in some states receiving such a small annual amount of funding – like $52,000 in Vermont –  that states may pass on the funding opportunity. The House, on the other hand, largely remains focused on filling gaps in existing food and nutrition programs, like the Emergency Food Assistance Program (TEFAP). Their approach would authorize a Food Box Pilot Program that is structured as a competitive, federal program. While the program has the potential to serve communities left out of the TEFAP system, its inherent structure would likely benefit businesses and distributors that primarily purchase from large-scale farming operations, much like previous USDA food box initiatives. NSAC will take a deeper look at this initiative in a future post.

The Final Path

Congress has the opportunity to continue its legacy of creating and investing in programs that promote local and regional food systems for rural and urban communities, alike. It is imperative that the farm bill provide the right resources for these initiatives to be successful. That means a final farm bill must: 

• address barriers for participation and make them accessible for all sizes of operations and experience levels, 
• ensure these programs fund essential elements of local food supply chains, from equipment, to food safety training, and value-chain coordination activities,
• resource programs with sufficient, reliable funding that adequately responds to demand, 
• equip States and Tribal nations to lead food procurement programs that catalyze local markets and ensure access to nutritious, locally-produced, culturally-relevant food, and
• provide USDA the authority to remain nimble and responsive to market trends and supply chain disruptions. 

The post Path to a New Farm Bill: Local and Regional Market Access appeared first on National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition.

Local farmers play an essential role in keeping our communities fed and thriving. While individuals can readily buy freshly harvested items from farmers at the farmers market, options for accessing local food are expanding. Increasingly, families can find it in local grocery stores, restaurants, and schools. 

The local and regional food systems that support this network of local producers, retailers, and consumers are receiving growing recognition and support for their unique value add every time we experience a global supply chain disruption (such as the war in Ukraine, the COVID-19 pandemic, and climate change). In one recent example, President Biden issued an executive order to strengthen supply chains, and with funding authorized under the American Rescue Plan Act, USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) began making unique investments to strengthen supply chains by building on existing partnerships and initiatives and prioritizing resources where they are needed most. Earlier this year, AMS announced the selection of the twelve new Regional Food Business Centers (Centers) that will have three primary responsibilities: 

• Collaborate with a wide range of regional partners and stakeholders to develop a strategic plan for the Center’s region, coordinate existing initiatives, and develop new opportunities to support a more resilient and competitive food system.
• Provide business technical assistance across the supply chain – to producers, processors, aggregators, and distributors – with an emphasis on small- and mid-sized businesses to increase their participation in the regional food system. 
• Deploy “business builder” grants to support businesses in building their capacity or expanding their business. 

Regional Food Business Center Structure 

In May of this year, USDA initiated cooperative agreements with twelve organizations that will lead the operation of their respective regional center, managing project activities and coordinating with a team for planning and implementation. Each Center will cover a distinct geographic area that expands across multiple states or territories, or in the case of the National Intertribal Center the entire nation. USDA AMS staff will be assigned to the Centers to ensure USDA funding opportunities and resources are actively shared out and learnings from the ground are shared back with national programmatic staff. While the Centers will not have a physical location, they will develop online platforms that can be a place for businesses to get information as well as promote connections across the supply chain.

While each Center has one distinct organizational lead, they are led by a wide range of partners that include formal entities like state agencies, institutions of higher education, nonprofit organizations, economic development corporations, and networks of stakeholders such as producer networks or associations, and local food councils. 

For example, Michigan State University’s Center for Regional Food Systems, an NSAC member, will lead the Great Lakes Midwest Center alongside four key partners – Chicago Food Policy Action Council, Northwest Indiana Food Council, Food Finance Institute, and the Menominee Indian Tribe (a partnership of several Indigenous tribes). Each of these partners will play a role in coordinating activities within their service areas, Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, and Wisconsin, respectively.  

Rodger Cooley, the Executive Director of the Chicago Food Policy Action Council, an NSAC member, shared “the Centers will be a great opportunity to serve small-scale and underserved producers through technical assistance and connecting them to impactful USDA programming and resources like the Local Food Purchase Program, Local Food in Schools, and eventually the new Regional Food System Infrastructure grants that will be available in Illinois soon.” Rodger went on to share about how this initiative is unique from other USDA AMS grants noting that “the five year commitment is significant.  We are able to hire someone focused solely on supporting farmers through the larger ecosystem and direct business builder grants to producers. We will be able to take our experience in this work to influence state level policy in Illinois while learning from the other states in the Center.” 

Unique Regional Considerations

While the Regional Food Business Centers are tasked with providing business technical assistance, capacity building awards, and coordination of broader regional efforts, they will implement these initiatives considering unique regional agricultural and organizational assets and gaps within the food supply chain. 

For example, The University of California Agriculture and Natural Resources was selected as the lead organization for the Southwest Center to serve California, Nevada, Utah, and Arizona. While this Center will provide services for a wide range of food and farm businesses in the region, they will dedicate specific attention to serving the predominantly rural Colonias communities to advance business development for socially disadvantaged producers in these often underserved areas.  

One way that the Center will leverage existing partnerships and organizational assets to reach this community is to partner with Agriculture and Land-Based Training Association (ALBA), an NSAC member, in the Salinas Valley. For over twenty years ALBA has operated an organic farm business incubator, helping Mexican immigrant farmworkers – and other aspiring farmers – to make the transition to independent farm ownership. The incubator farm sits on 100-acres in the Salinas Valley. The program is designed to lower the barriers to starting a farm, offering subsidized access to education, technical assistance, farmland and equipment over five years. Their history working with Latino communities makes ALBA uniquely positioned to serve the Colonias border communities, and as a model for other regions through the Center’s network. For the first time, investments from the Regional Food Business Centers will allow ALBA to support the development of other land-based training programs throughout the Center’s footprint.

National Impact

While it is too early to evaluate the success of the program in its early implementation phase, the regional structure and organizations selected showcase the great potential for this program to support community-led efforts to provide business support through trusted technical assistance providers already established in their communities. It takes significant time to build genuine relationships and conduct outreach for new initiatives, particularly in underserved communities where distrust of USDA and short-term projects may be common. To address this challenge, USDA has structured the cooperative agreements for an implementation period between four to five years. This longer project period allows for organizations to hire dedicated staff, provides a longer window of time for businesses to engage with the Center, and increases the opportunities to provide technical assistance. 

The Regional Food Business Centers offer an opportunity to build on the existing assets of organizations and pair outreach and technical assistance with business builder awards. While USDA will invest $400 million across the Centers, a portion of this funding will go directly to food and farm businesses to build their capacity to participate in the regional food value chain. With support from USDA staff, each Center will develop a sustainability plan to ensure the initiative extends beyond federal funding. Undoubtedly, through partnership and business development, the Centers will catalyze economic development opportunities nationwide.  

Sustaining Impact through the Farm Bill

Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, USDA responded to market and supply chain disruptions that left families and farmers vulnerable to food insecurity and unprecedented revenue loss. Last year, USDA announced a food system transformation framework that invested in strengthening essential elements of the food system, building resiliency, promoting greater competition, and generating economic opportunity for small and medium scale producers. 

While these USDA initiatives addressed unique challenges along the supply chain – from production, to processing, workforce development, distribution, and market development – these investments complemented one another to address the supply chain as a whole and build true resilience. The overarching goals are to: 

• build a more resilient food supply chain while reducing carbon pollution; 
• create fairer markets through competition and increasing access for small scale producers to the marketplace; 
• make nutritious food affordable and readily available; and 
• implement all in an equitable manner so investments reach even the most remote or underserved communities. 

The farm bill offers a pathway to carry forward the goals of the Food System Transformation Network, including the Regional Food Business Centers. The 2023 Farm Bill should:

• Sustain historic investments beyond the onetime infusion of funding from the American Rescue Plan Act to ensure the networks and value-chain development continue beyond the life of the initial cooperative agreements. 
• Prioritize funding for agreements in an equitable manner with investments reaching underserved producers, businesses, and communities.
• Ensure sufficient geographic coverage with an emphasis on community-led centers with a smaller geographic footprint to allow for ongoing coordination among trusted partners and networks. 
• Maintain the focus on partnerships of several entities and organization types that can demonstrate their track record of working within communities and readily deploy technical assistance or funding for business development. 
• Require USDA to provide a report to Congress evaluating the degree, nature, and effectiveness of the Centers’ engagement with underserved producers, and make the data on which the report is based publicly available. 

The post Regional Centers Promote Business Development and Stronger Supply Chains appeared first on National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition.

Contact: Laura Zaks

National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition

lzaks@sustainableagriculture.net 

Tel. 347.563.6408

Comment: NSAC Praises Introduction of the Enabling Farmers to Benefit from Processing Nutrition Programs Act of 2023

Washington, DC, July 26, 2023 – Today, the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC) issued the following comment, attributable to Hannah Quigley, NSAC Policy Specialist, in response to the introduction of the Enabling Farmers to Benefit from Processing Nutrition Programs Act of 2023 by Senators Tina Smith (D-MN), John Fetterman (D-PA), Cory Booker (D-NJ), Sherrod Brown (D-OH), Ron Wyden (D-OR), Peter Welch (D-VT), Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) and Representatives Hillary Scholten (D-MI-3), Dean Phillips (D-MN-3), Debbie Dingell (D-MI-6), Juan Vargas (D-CA-52), Shri Thanedar (D-MI-13), Donald Payne Jr. (D-NJ-10), Jill Tokuda (D-HI-2), and Jahana Hayes (D-CT-5).

“The National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC) applauds the introduction of the Enabling Farmers to Benefit from Processing Nutrition Programs Act, which takes significant steps to increase opportunities for local farmers to benefit from nutrition benefits. Creating a centralized application process will reduce burdensome paperwork for farmers. Providing adequate mobile equipment will increase the utilization of federal nutrition benefits in local markets. The reforms offered in the bill will promote access to healthy and fresh products while generating economic impact in local food economies.” 

The Enabling Farmers to Benefit from Processing Nutrition Programs Act makes essential reforms to modernize federal nutrition programs to ensure utilization among farmers and in local markets. The bill establishes a streamlined application process for farmers and producers so that when a farmer submits application materials to accept supplemental nutrition assistance program (SNAP) benefits, they will be considered for other nutrition programs, such as Senior Farmers’ Market Nutrition Program, the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children, and the Gus Schumacher Nutrition Incentive Program. The bill goes further to encourage acceptance of SNAP in farmers markets and other direct-to-consumer markets by ensuring wireless or mobile processing equipment and technology are readily available in existing State agency programs. 

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About the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC)

The National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition is a grassroots alliance that advocates for federal policy reform supporting the long-term social, economic, and environmental sustainability of agriculture, natural resources, and rural communities. Learn more and get involved at: https://sustainableagriculture.net

The post Comment: NSAC Praises Introduction of the Enabling Farmers to Benefit from Processing Nutrition Programs Act of 2023 appeared first on National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition.

The COVID-19 pandemic created social and economic conditions that affected our food system from producers to consumers. Domestic and international supply chains were interrupted leaving farmers without markets for their products and grocery store shelves bare. Local producers and markets such as farmers markets, CSAs (community supported agriculture), farm stands, and community gardens that are often considered niche were now essential food sources for communities across the country. 

While local food economies received new attention during the pandemic, these initiatives and systems have been in development for decades and have received targeted federal investment since the early 2000s. Early programs focused on funding for farmers participating in direct-marketing strategies. Yet these programs have evolved significantly to take a comprehensive approach to providing support for the broader food system, in part due to NSAC’s steadfast advocacy for local and regional food systems. 

The Local Agriculture Market Program (LAMP) includes four grant programs and technical assistance from USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service and Rural Development to establish and promote local food economies that develop, coordinate and expand: 

• farmers markets, roadside stands, CSA programs, agritourism, and innovative direct marketing strategies,  
• food business enterprises that act as intermediaries between local producers and consumers at the individual, institutional, and community level, 
• opportunities for producers to diversify farm revenue by incorporating value-added production and marketing, and 
• partnerships between public and private stakeholders that are committed to building resilient regional food economies through coordinated collaboration. 

Last week Senator Brown (D-OH) and Representatives Chellie Pingree (D-ME-1) and Dan Newhouse (R-WA-4) introduced the Local Farms and Food Act  (S.1205, H.R. 2723) that would offer reforms to LAMP among other programs, to respond to lessons learned throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, sustain investments in impacted communities, and promote a resilient local and regional food system. 

Spending in local food systems leads to healthy and thriving communities

Local and regional food systems build more connections between farmers and consumers. These important connections – including efforts like farmers markets and food hubs – also help grow economic opportunities for small and mid-sized family farmers, increase consumer choice and access to fresh and healthy food, and lead to broader social and community benefits.

Farmers earn more

• Shorter supply chains or fewer intermediaries allows for a larger portion of every dollar to return directly to the farmer. 
• Consumers understand the broader impact of local food products and are willing to pay more for them. 
• Local food markets offer a pathway for profitable operations among beginning farmers and ranchers. 

Economies grow 

• Growers selling locally generate more jobs than producers that do not. Growers that sell locally create 13 full time jobs per $1 million in revenue earned compared to 3 jobs among those that do not. 
• An evaluation of the Farmers Market and Local Food Promotion Programs estimated that every dollar invested generated a $2.67 return in the community. 

Communities are healthier

• Farmers markets offer more than places to buy food; they offer social and community hubs that often include nutrition education and cooking demonstrations that promote family well-being. 
• Research has also shown that communities with more direct farm sales (e.g., from a farmers’ market or a farm stand) have lower levels of mortality, obesity, and diabetes among residents. 

The Local Farms and Food Act will build and strengthen local food systems

The Local Farms and Food Act (S.1205, H.R. 2723), introduced last week by Senator Brown and Representatives Chellie Pingree and Dan Newhouse, offers programmatic reforms and increases funding to scale for existing demand among the Local Agriculture Market Programs (LAMP), Gus Schumacher Nutrition Incentive Program (GusNIP) and the Senior Farmers Market Nutrition Program (SFMNP). 

The proposed changes will strengthen regional food system infrastructure and coordination, reduce barriers for participation in federal grant programs, and increase the impact of federal nutrition benefits in local markets. The ways in which the bill would accomplish this are outlined below. 

Local Agriculture Market Program

• Create a new “turnkey grant” opportunity for a streamlined application process for projects of $100,000 or less for Farmers Market and Local Food Promotion grants (FMLFPP) to support market and business development needs and catalyze growth
• Reduce match requirements for Value-Added Producer Grants (VAPG) from 50% to 25% for smaller growers who have $250,000 or less in gross sales annually 
• Ensure program investments reach underserved regions in the country by prioritizing geographic diversity and balance for awards 
• Update the program’s eligible activities and funding uses to support:
  • physical infrastructure and general purpose equipment purchases 
  • implementation and logistics required for families to redeem federal nutrition benefits at farmers markets 
  • wrap around services critical for local food ventures, such as value chain coordination, outreach, and technical assistance 
• Increase mandatory funding from $50 million to $75 million annually and increase appropriations authority from $20 million to $30 million per year

Gus Schumacher Nutrition Incentive Program

• Increase access to the program by reducing the match requirement for applicants from 50% to 25% 
• Establish a review panel for GusNIP produce prescription grants that includes healthcare provider perspectives

Senior Farmers Market Nutrition Program 

• Reauthorize the program and provide appropriations authority at $10 million per year, in addition to the existing $20.6 million in annual mandatory funding 

Potential Impact

We know that farmers and consumers both benefit from improved access to fresh, healthy, local food in communities across the country – but building more connections between farmers and consumers takes work. Federal investments under LAMP, GusNIP and SFMNP have been essential to the growth of local food sales, which according to a recent Economic Research Service Report totaled $11.8 billion in 2017, but organizations and farmers still report barriers to participating in the program due to the application process or match requirements. 

Kansas Rural Center, an NSAC member and recent Local Food Promotion Program awardee, shared that by serving as a partner on the award, they are acting to support other organizations in the state who would not have applied otherwise due to the lengthy application and match requirements. Kansas Rural Center cited their experience navigating federal awards and ability to provide the match as critical and named it as a barrier for others.  As a result, they will work alongside Common Ground Producers and Growers, Kansas Wesleyan University and St. John’s Baptist Church of Salina to create a “food corridor” along Interstate 135 that bridges Wichita and Salina in central Kansas, in which a new food hub will be established. 

Reforms offered under the Local Farms and Food Act will reduce these barriers and allow federal investments to reach a diverse range of producers and organizations that have not previously had the opportunity.

Get Involved

• Express your support for the Local Farms and Food Act by signing this organizational letter. 
• Contact your member of congress to let them know this is important to your community and to ask them to cosponsor. 
• Share this opportunity within your networks to demonstrate the broad community of support.

The post Local Farms and Food Act Strengthens Regional Food Economies Across the US appeared first on National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition.

Editor’s Note: This post is a guest blog post authored by FoodCorps, an NSAC member organization. The article originally appeared on February 6, 2023.  

The USDA’s proposed school nutrition and local sourcing guidelines are best served with food education.

Last week, the USDA announced a proposed rule to update nutrition standards for school meals. These recommendations build off of the incredible work of school nutrition professionals to deliver nourishing food to students every day—including during the pandemic—and they’ll impact millions of kids who eat school meals.

Here’s an overview of what’s included:

• Updated requirements for sodium, whole grains, flavored milk, and added sugar (a newly added component)
• A proposal that makes it easier for schools to purchase ingredients from local farmers and suppliers
• A request for more information about how to incorporate culturally relevant and traditional foods in school menus specifically for American Indian and Alaska Native communities

FoodCorps celebrates the USDA’s proposal to support schools in buying local menu items and serving culturally relevant foods. School meals are often the most nutritious meals a child will eat during the day, and updated guidelines like these help to ensure consistency in school meals across state and district lines. However, we also know it takes more than a balanced plate to make a meal nourishing and appealing. Here are some things to consider. 

Keep Food Education on the Table

We know kids are more likely to eat the nutritious foods on their plate if they’ve tasted them before—ideally, several times before! That’s where food education comes in. In hundreds of schools nationwide, FoodCorps members teach kids about nourishing food in gardens, classrooms, and cafeterias. These lessons include how to grow, harvest, and cook different nutritious foods—and come with plenty of opportunities to taste those foods, too.

This approach is proven to work; students in schools with more of FoodCorps’ hands-on learning eat up to three times as many fruits and vegetables as students in schools with less hands-on learning, a Columbia University study found. 

In FoodCorps schools, students might follow the growth of a plant from seedling to strawberry, or choose between two preparations of butternut squash in a cafeteria taste test. They might share stories about their favorite family food traditions, or make healthy snacks with veggies grown in the school garden. Later, when kids see those same fruits and vegetables in the cafeteria, they’re eager to reach for them and more likely to eat them. This classroom-to-cafeteria link is an important step when rolling out new options, like a salad bar or a new vegetable on the menu. 

Hands-on, experiential lessons help students develop agency and confidence and get them excited to try new things—and can even improve academic performance in other subject areas. What kids eat at school matters, not just for their daily fuel, but for the decisions they’ll make and the relationship they’ll have with food for the rest of their lives.

Local Food Matters

FoodCorps believes that in order for school meals to truly nourish kids, they must be culturally relevant, scratch-cooked, locally sourced, and served in an inclusive environment. This means serving foods that are important to kids’ cultures and identities and procuring ingredients from nearby farmers and producers. It also means making cafeterias calm, affirming spaces, and ensuring kids have enough time to eat their meals. 

FoodCorps works with countless school nutrition professionals who are innovative and resourceful when it comes to serving delicious, culturally relevant meals. These staff work within a complex set of rules and guidelines just to purchase the supplies and ingredients they need to feed our children. Buying food directly from local farmers and suppliers has many benefits, including more reliability and fewer supply chain disruptions (even during COVID). Purchasing directly from producers also keeps food dollars in the community, stimulating the local economy. 

Even better is that building those local relationships cultivates community and a direct line of communication between schools and food suppliers. Local producers can choose crops and ensure inventory that are most relevant as schools build their menus. 

When pandemic-era supply chain disruptions began affecting cafeterias, FoodCorps listened to school nutrition leaders’ stories of resilience. Their solutions ranged from working with local bakeries for staples like rolls and tortillas, to local suppliers delivering creative grab-and-go packaging solutions, to partnerships with local farms for consistent produce orders.

As FoodCorps alum Phoebe Wong shared during last year’s White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health: “Listen to the farmers. They know what is best for their community.” The provision in the USDA’s proposed rule allowing schools to prioritize “local” in the purchasing process is an important move to better connect farmers and schools and, ultimately, to better nourish our nation’s children. 

Raise Your Voice

The USDA held numerous listening sessions before developing this proposal. Now they want to hear from stakeholders—including parents, students, school district leaders, and food suppliers—before finalizing this rule. The public comment period is open until April 10, so consider sharing your thoughts on the importance of local, culturally relevant food in school! 

We also encourage school nutrition leaders who identify as Black, Indigenous, Multiracial, and/or People of Color to join Food Operators and Leaders of Color in Schools (FOLCS), our initiative for leadership development, mentorship, and networking among school nutrition professionals.

We’re hopeful that, alongside these updated nutrition guidelines, we’ll see continued investments from the government in our kids’ wellbeing, and in the people who feed millions of students every day. Our kids’ futures are counting on it.

The post Guest Post: USDA’s Proposed Rule for School Meals Shines a Light on Local appeared first on National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition.

Editor’s Note: This is the second post in our series covering key pillars of NSAC’s 2023 Farm Bill Platform, the first post is here. You can read the platform and take action to endorse it here.

The Farm Bill plays an important role in supporting the health and prosperity of our rural and urban communities. The 2023 Farm Bill can invest in healthy rural and urban communities by strengthening the resilience of local and regional supply chains, increasing market opportunities for small and mid-sized farms and processors, enhancing job growth and local economic development through workforce development and training, and ensuring the most vulnerable have ample access to nutritious, culturally-relevant, locally-produced foods.

Strengthen resilient local and regional food systems

The growing demand for locally and regionally produced food has fueled a need for increased production, as well as a need for programs and policies that can support the expansion of those markets. The 2018 Farm Bill made significant investments – in physical infrastructure as well as in training and peer-to-peer professional networks – in developing these burgeoning local and regional supply chains through the Local Agriculture Market Program (LAMP), an umbrella program that consists of the Farmers Market and Local Food Promotion Program (FMLFPP), the Value-Added Producer Grant (VAPG) Program, and the Regional Food Systems Partnership (RFSP) Program. These investments provided significant return when the pandemic and other recent supply chain disruptions upended our food system. LAMP helped ensure that infrastructure and relationships were in place to enable local and regional food distribution networks to fill critical supply chain gaps and provide for the most vulnerable in our communities. 

A recent conversation with farmer Brent Biles from Rolling Branch Farm in Naylor, Georgia reiterated this point: “It’s difficult to compete with growers on 5-7,000 acres. We’ve tried to use several programs before we received a value-added producer grant… Despite delays in receiving [COVID] relief funding, we continued to grow food for whoever was hungry. VAPG is the only funding tool that kept our shelled pecan operation open.”  

Existing local and regional food systems responded well to the crisis, but too many producers like Brent and Rolling Branch Farm are still left out of the system. Appropriately sized processing, aggregation, and distribution infrastructure is still inadequate. Technical assistance for producers and entrepreneurs on a range of issues from food safety to business planning continues to make it difficult for many farmers and producers to update their businesses to meet current needs. Federal programs like LAMP can support farmers, ranchers, and fishers who want to take advantage of these new economic opportunities by connecting them with aggregators, processors, distributors, retailers, and institutional buyers and consumers in local and regional marketplaces. The 2023 Farm Bill can ensure this flagship program continues to serve local communities, farmers, and economies by streamlining program administration and expanding program accessibility.

NSAC’s Platform calls for a Farm Bill that will:

• Provide farmers with resources that allow them to compete successfully in new markets through training, technical assistance for financial planning and marketing, and food safety and organic cost share assistance;
• Develop new and strengthen existing physical infrastructure that will allow producers to aggregate, process, and distribute products to local and regional markets;
• Ensure equitable access to USDA funds by ensuring USDA grant funds flow equitably to all regions of the country, demonstrated through rigorous monitoring and evaluation with a racial justice lens; 
• Prioritize access to existing and new resources for historically underserved and BIPOC producers and communities, and work directly with these communities to overcome barriers to access, including through relationship building and data collection and analysis; and
• Expand investment in food safety outreach, education, training, and technical assistance that directly assists small and mid-sized farms, beginning and socially disadvantaged farmers, small processors, and small-scale wholesalers.

Rebuild local and regional meat processing capacity

As the food system begins to recover from the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, there is a significant need for financial investments to address the backlog at small-scale slaughter and processing facilities utilized by thousands of farmers and ranchers across the country. The backlog in slaughter and processing access is not a new concern and was only exacerbated by the pandemic. The lack of scale appropriate processing infrastructure in some areas of the country has been a significant issue for small livestock and poultry producers for the last several decades. 

Congress and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) must continue to take steps towards building more resilient meat and poultry infrastructure. The COVID-19 pandemic displayed this sector’s infrastructure weaknesses. Recent shutdowns, which have also highlighted the impact of consolidation, caused livestock destined for slaughter at large plants to be diverted to smaller facilities that serve local and regional markets. This strained the ability of small plants to continue to process small, pasture raised, and grassfed livestock and poultry. 

Small plants are critical infrastructure for food system resilience. Now is an opportune time for policymakers to address a long-standing issue for thousands of small livestock and poultry producers because the pandemic has intensified the need for a more resilient supply chain, and Congress and USDA have committed funds to support this effort. The 2023 Farm Bill offers the opportunity to recommit support for the independent meat processing sector, address workforce shortages, and enhance opportunities for this sector to inform policy and programmatic decisions with and across agencies.

To build local and regional meat processing infrastructure, capacity, and workforce development, NSAC’s Platform calls for a Farm Bill bill that:

• Directs USDA to sustain and strengthen recent loans and grants for niche meat processing with legislative authorization and permanent funding;
• Reforms direct and intermediate lending programs to increase their effectiveness; 
• Grows participation in the Cooperative Interstate Shipment program through expanded outreach and financial assistance;
• Sustains funding for the Meat and Poultry Workforce Development Programs, with a focus on different training modes, styles, and locations; 
• Directs USDA to study best practices across and impacts of the Meat and Poultry workforce development program and study training needs for inspectors of small and very small plants; and
• Directs USDA to form a Small Meat and Poultry Processing Advisory Group to advise and provide feedback on relevant programs to the Food Safety Inspection Service, Rural Development, and Agricultural Marketing Service. 

Expand and enhance USDA procurement programs and practices

The farm bill has historically included programs to provide domestically produced food to low-income Americans. Over the last decade, stronger market connections have developed between lower-income shoppers, government purchasers, and local and regional food producers. COVID-19 super-charged those relationships in many states as initiatives arose to address the increased food insecurity families faced in light of pandemic-related supply chain shocks, school closures, and job losses. 

Food hubs and local distributors acted quickly to pivot their distribution from restaurants and institutions to agencies providing emergency food to families. The initial rounds of the Farmers to Families Food Box program in 2020 included contracts with many local and regional food hubs to purchase and distribute more healthy, fresh, and culturally appropriate food than ever before. The USDA Agricultural Marketing Service’s Local Food Purchase Assistance Program and Local Food for Schools cooperative agreements have continued this critical support for local and regional food distribution to address hunger and nutrition needs. The 2023 Farm Bill is an opportunity to take the hard lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic and other supply chain disruptions to make long-term investments that build lasting benefits for our most vulnerable communities and producers. 

Building on the positive elements of the first two rounds of the Farmers to Families Food Box Program and the current AMS Local Food Purchasing Assistance Program, the 2023 Farm Bill should:

• Create a permanent, values-based, fresh produce procurement partnership at USDA that empowers farmers, distributors, tribal entities, food hubs, and other community-based entities to provide emergency food distribution programs;
• Establish values-based evaluation metrics for the program that prioritize contracts with organizations led by or that have a history serving socially disadvantaged groups, and that source from local sources and from growers that are socially disadvantaged, beginning and small-to-mid sized farms; and
• Ensure regional distribution of awards that reach areas with high proportions of our most vulnerable communities, or those living in areas with the highest rates of poverty. 

Ensure access to locally-produced, nutritious, culturally-relevant food

First piloted in the 1960s, The Farm Bill’s food stamp program was fundamentally different from surplus commodity donation programs because it provided “cash” benefits to eligible households to purchase foods of their own choosing through a variety of food retailers. Eventually renamed to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) in 2008, the program has evolved to emphasize sound nutrition and caloric quality, as well as quantity.

Farm Bill nutrition programs and policies have expanded since 2008 to include a variety of programs that meet families’ critical nutritional needs and offer economic opportunities for farmers and local markets, including:  

• The Gus Schumacher Nutrition Incentive Program (GusNIP) funds a variety of nationwide innovative models that leverage a SNAP recipients’ benefit to purchase additional healthy products from farmers markets and traditional retail outlets, and most recently a pilot produce “prescription” program for low-income and nutritionally at-risk families. 
• The Senior Farmers Market Nutrition Program increases access to locally grown fresh produce for low-income seniors by partnering with state agencies, farmers, farmers’ markets and roadside stands. 
• Community Food Projects offers an opportunity for community-based organizations to design and implement programs that address food insecurity through a sustainable, local food system model. 

To ensure ongoing program accessibility and maximum impact for families, NSAC’s platform calls for a farm bill that will:

• Expand the definitions of allowable redemption models for programs targeting fresh fruit and vegetable consumption among low-income families and SNAP participants to remove barriers and increase participation. 
• Simplify application and reporting requirements, particularly for smaller award programs intended for one time infusions, such as the Community Food Projects program. 
• Re-evaluate and reduce match requirements across all programs.

NSAC’s 2023 Farm Bill Platform contains more details on each of the policy proposals. We invite you to read NSAC’s 2023 Farm Bill Platform and take action to endorse it here.

The post NSAC’s 2023 Farm Bill Platform: Investing in Healthy Communities appeared first on National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition.