If you’ve lost track of the Farm Bill, we get it. Hot button issues are holding up an already slow, hard-to-understand process. Yet the values driving organic farming transcend politics. Community-scale organic farmers from every state work extraordinarily hard to nourish our communities and ensure our food future. We can’t afford to leave them behind.
The Farm Bill’s next stop is the Senate Agriculture Committee, which may be ready to discuss it next week. The proposed legislation includes much-needed funding for the National Organic Program and more support for identifying fraud. That’s encouraging.
But more help is needed. The Farm Bill should make it easier for farmers to opt out of chemically intensive production. Join our colleagues at the National Organic Coalition in contacting your senators and asking them to:
- Expand financial support for organic certification, known as “cost-share”
- Invest in organic research (knowing what works helps all farmers — even non-organic farmers — during periods of drought and other erratic weather)
- Improve organic dairy market data (accurate, more localized data is key to market viability)
- Invest in infrastructure that will allow organic shoppers to support more organic farmers in the US (much of our organic food is imported, and there’s broad support for food produced closer to home)
- Invest in programs that support farmers in their transition to organic production
Organic is not a blue or red issue, and we urge you to share that view with your senators. Let them know why you care about organic, in your own words.
Thank you for standing with the farmers who are building the food system we need.
