In stark contrast to popular myth, older white male farmer activists of the Family Farm (Farm Justice) Movement in the US are a neglected voice in farm and food/nonfood policy discussions today among US and international groups and academic leaders, in books, films, articles and videos. The sames applies to older white female farm justice voices. https://znetwork.org/zblogs/the-women-of-farm-justice-forgotten-by-women-today/ And yet they’re the key voices that’ are evidence based on the biggest (multi-trillion$) US/global farm policy issue and its history. And the US has long been the dominant exporter and price leader, lowering global farm prices.
Old US black farmers have been part of it, (here https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/ensure-that-farmers-receive-a-fair-living-wage-by-jerry-pennick-heather-gray/ and starting at about 17:49 here, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ywo1PX9VYI&list=PL7K_XwGI3jVS4AMDeEdFfHALIOYnoWg53&index=5 [with female/male white farmers]). As Eddie Carthan put it in the booklet Blood on the Plow: “We're facing the same things as all farmers: the high cost of equipment, fuel and chemicals, and a tremendous drop in grain prices." But then he told thestory of the specific black farmer needs, in addition to the core need for distributive economic farm justice. Today, and like the whites above, key black farmers voiceing farm justice have died off. They’ve also generally left the leadership on the core farm justice policies that they need mostly to white allies, as they have much more on their plates. I’m one of the tiny few who publicly remembers these stories.
White farmers/organizations in the Midwest have done massive work in support of black farmers in addition to supporting their specific causes, (like the Minority Farmers Act of 1990,) and fighting against racism in white rural areas. (Including in mobilizing churches to the range of causes, as seen in PrairieFire’s work here,https://familyfarmjustice.me/2022/07/15/church-statements-on-the-rural-crisis/ ) In some cases they have connected with inner city blacks on shared causes as well. https://familyfarmjustice.me/2016/11/12/election-rural-vote-donald-trump-why-and-what-we-need-to-do/
What makes the support for black farmers so massive is that it includes massive work on farm credit reform, which is highly technical and challenging to farmers, especially those with fewer educational opportunities and underfunded organizations. The Family Farm (Farm Justice) Movement produced and shared numerous training manuals on farm credit, (I have about a dozen of them,) and got the Farm Credit Act of 1987 passed.
Also massive was the work we’ve done on the core farm policies that reduce production and oversupply of crops like cotton, wheat, corn and soybeans, while also maintaining strategic reserve supplies for emergencies. These programs also feature minimum farm price floors to secure just farm prices, and maximum price ceilings to protect consumers. When these programs are adequate, no subsidies are needed. Under these programs, during the parity years of the Democratic Party New Deal, the number of full and part time nonwhite farmers in the South increased by more than 10%, and their land, (which is wealth,) increased by a similar amount. The percentage increase of farmers was quite similar for white farmers. If you project the change rates of the parity years ahead, including those for tenants, there would be many more black farmers today, and they’d mostly be owners.
On the other hand, as the Price Floor/Supply Reduction programs were reduced, 1953-1995, the losses of black farmers of all tenures greatly increased, even to rates higher than during the Great Depression, and similar for white farmers. See a groups of slide shows with many data slides on all of this here. https://drive.google.com/drive/u/0/folders/1d12fjgedoAMAAu2DUJzZVqI5PSCoFBnb
Oxfam has brought black farmers from Africa to the US to complain about our farm bill (subsidies), but they apparently relied on mainstream (originally conservative) narratives/paradigms, (farm subsidy myths,https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1ZIOiwv1Nr6jn9SsnE62z1P_hitZKTBaD ) and got it wrong, hurting their causes. That’s in spite of the fact that the WTO Africa Group understood the issue. https://znetwork.org/zblogs/wto-africa-group-with-nffc-not-ewg-by-brad-wilson/ La Via Campesina, the international peasant based Food Sovereignty group, has referred to the U.S. Family Farm Movement as their greatest ally here, and they’ve supported the same kinds of policies. https://znetwork.org/zblogs/via-campesina-with-nffc-support-for-fair-farm-prices-by-brad-wilson/ The Family Farm (Farm Justice) Movement continues to be the leading global voices emphasizing policies that support the multitrillion dollar global macro issues of distributive economic farm justice.
I guess I should add that, though Iowa has been about the leading farm justice activism state over the past 70 years, you can't just come here and talk to farmers and learn much, because you need to talk to activists of the Family Farm (Farm Justice) Movement who have been supported and trained by institutions, our own NGOs. (Our views have been repeatedly supported by the majority of farmers.)
Environmental Working Groups' Ken Cook and NYT writer & Michael Pollan ally Mark Bittman came to Iowa, and talked to some farmers. They then spoke as if they knew the views of Iowa farmers. But they apparently didn't know who to talk to, (i.e. Movement activists,) and didn't seem to learn anything significant. The makers of the film King Corn learned from farmers, as seen in the film, but apparently they weren't activists from the movement, so it didn't prevent the film from getting the major things wrong, like the other food films of that time.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_tyxySOkzw&list=PLA1E706EFA90D1767&index=31
