Sounds amazing! Checkout & learn about electroculture gardening while your at it. You can feed your community with much more massive crop yields while eliminating the need for pesticides & fertilizers.
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It’s difficult to find any part of this policy proposal that comports with the very short list of enumerated federal powers found in Article 1 Section 8 of the US Constitution.
The tendency to want the government to do everything is understandable, to a degree, but the US Constitution limits the powers of the federal government to what is explicitly written in Art. 1 Sec. 8. Everything else is a state power under the 10th Amendment.
A better policy would be to put a wrecking ball through every federal program that is not directly tied to an enumerated federal power (e.g. the Farm Bill, sugar and other crop subsidies- soybeans, corn for ethanol, etc) because they are all unconstitutional. After resetting the system to comport with the Constitution, THEN put forth policies you want that actually fall under an enumerated power.
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I agree. The FDA should be a formal agency built in transparency and ran by public audits. The budget should be treasured in Bitcoin and publicly auditable.
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Thanks Roamer
I agree the feds have exceeded their authority… I’d like to negate Wickard v Filburn for starters… 
I offer that the policies discussed here on all subject areas must be viewed through that lens. My job here is to filter and help assess what policies for food people want, not how best to implement them. I would rather see the Farm Bill shaped to serve farmers (and split in two as proposed) rather than persist the way it is. Some national farm policy is obviously essential; the nation’s farming would not work well state-by-state for a number of reasons. I am fully supportive of states’ rights and completely agree with your sentiments, but I invite people to discuss what are the best food and farming policies here and then a second (and potentially very complex and controversial) assessment of implementation can be undertaken.
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Support resources and education for regenerative farming. It is PROFITABLE to work with nature, not against it, for our food needs!
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We need to reimagine the farming landscape. Giving power back to family farms and away from industrial moncropping and unsustainable farming practices.
Regenerative practices, transitioning from strict farming of crops and implementing a holistic farming approach that coexists with the ecosystem it inhabits.
We would need to build a large infrastructure that focuses on these regenerative practices. Like composting, and carbon sequestration through bio char and other organic matter.
Nutrients back into the ground, and creating sustainable ecosystems that thrive together.
The need to end the use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides is at an all time high. Which also feeds into the health sector.
Our largest issue healthywise is exactly as you state. Our farmers are and food shares are in severe trouble, and we MUST prioritize these issues above all else. For the safety and health of our great nation.
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It’s not my area of expertise by far, but what about reseeding/GMO’s? My limited understanding is that farmers have to pay top $$ for seeds modified to fight against pesticides so they can be sprayed, but are sterile, causing them to spend lots of money for resilient seeds.
Is there a way we can support farmers by limiting how much these can be charged, patent length on the GMO’s, and/or maybe we just need better research on ways to protect crops without modification (i.e. alternative to pesticide).
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Start by banning all foods and ingredients currently banned in Europe. Then get tighter from there.
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I love the passion around this subject! We need MASSIVE changes in our food supply chains.
In general, yes, we have to get government out of our food. Outside of ensuring transparency in risks, ingredients, and actually regulating harmful ingredients, they really need to just leave us alone.
I will say, I would like to add to this proposal consideration for inspiring home gardens (like WWII Victory Gardens).
We will always need mass food production, and I think we have tons of examples here on how that can be better.
But let’s also encourage singular homesteads where families can grow their own food needs; even if just 5, 10, 30% of their needs.
We can help support this by including agriculture and basic endocrine education in schools as stated previously, but also, ensuring food labels list the hazards associated with the ingredients. This can be easily done on packaging with little to no costs to businesses (they are printing on packages anyway). There is an app, Yuka, that does all of this already, but why shouldn’t producers be required to list it? This transparency not only allows citizens to make informed decisions at the grocery store but can also inspire a desire to grow their own food.
Economically, land needs to be more affordable and families need more time to tend to their homesteads. It should not be near impossible to maintain a job and be able to run a small homestead that supports even just a to y portion of your family’s food needs. We can achieve this by fixing our inflationary debt required economy, helping reduce the requirements for dual income, and even helping communities obtain community gardens at a large scale.
This empowers citizens, gets people outside, is conducive to fellowship, and ultimately, puts more food control closer to the consumer.
Obviously, we will always need mass food production. But educations and empowering consumers in food supply chains and helping self sufficiency to be within reach for those who desire it is another key success in all of this.
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Without the use of innovation to create GMO crops, we would not have many of the foods we have today. It should also be noted that very few crops raised have been genetically modified; corn, soybeans, cotton, potatoes, and apples being the crops that make up the majority. These modifications allow us growers to better control invasive weeds in our fields as well as feed the ever increasing population. The amount of available land dedicated for agriculture is not increasing, therefore raising the need to better ourselves to get more yield out of what little land we do have.
To your point on ‘community land’, there is so much that goes into growing crops that the general population does not understand. I was fortunate to grow up in agriculture and now have made a career of it; the amount of money, energy, and time that goes into producing crops is huge. Apples specifically require a high amount of attention as they are incredibly prone to many diseases and insect damage. It would be incredibly difficult to raise valuable crops on ‘community land’.
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As someone who works directly with specialty crop growers, this is the hottest topic of every conversation. People don’t understand the amount of regulations, audits, inspections, etc that growers have to go through year after year. As if having the biggest threat to your livelihood being something that is 100% out of your control (weather) isn’t stressful enough, you pile on tons of government regulations and hoops to jump through just to market your crop for bare minimum! Yet we as a country import tons of thousands of dollars worth of imports into our country instead of helping out OUR people by buying from within our boarders.
The cost of even getting into farming has also gone up drastically over the past decade. You either have to be born into a farm, or have an outside source of income that can jumpstart your dream of being a farmer. It seems as though no matter how hard someone is willing to work nowadays, it still doesn’t seem like enough. Something needs to change soon or we will no longer have family farms. We will be left with huge cooperations that operate our entire food system.
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There should be something about non-reliance on pesticides.
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As raised as a farm boy the food needs protection from GMO and be all natural it will take awhile to destroy some of the bugs out there but it will get better. In your county we use to have produce stands and sell fresh produce and families always stopped and if we had any left or was ripening we would donate to the convent or ole folks homes . My idea to help with population is to talk to neighborhood schools and their teachers to come to the farm on days noted and start to finish as in the greenhouse because most kids think it comes out of a can and put in microwave. Teach them to grow good food that they can help their parents as well
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CRGordon: Amen on all counts!!!
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Thanks for commenting, Kylie.Watson
Those GMO crops you list – corn and soy especially – are dependent on glyphosate and other chemicals that are killing our soils and sickening us. They must go. GMO crops developed to resist drought or produce yield rather than just create dependency by humanity on corporate chemicals are welcome. Nor is it suggested that we simply abandon all GMOs overnight, but chart a way to transition back to sustainable systems. This is a not a war of organic v industrial farmers, but it is a search to improve the overall system dramatically over time, for the benefit of all. Thanks so much for your important contribution!
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Food labeling requirements need to be very strict. At grocery stores majority of the exotic canned or packaged foods from other countries (Within aisle categorized as “International Foods”) do not contain ingredients information.
Additionally, we don’t know whether the contents of those packaged foods truly contain what they say they contain. I propose a much stringent process for laboratory examinations of toxic materials in our canned, bottled, packaged foods.
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What’s obvious to you is entirely unclear to me. It was also deemed unessential by the Founding generation all the way up until the Marxist “Progressives” destroyed the economy in the early 20th Century, then created a bunch of unconstitutional programs (including various farm policies) to “solve” the problems they created. Crops grow with or without fed gov meddling. Subsidies are unconstitutional. Central planning of “what shall be grown and for what purpose,” price controls, “gov’t cheese” etc are positively Soviet.
We’re in a post-constitutional era in part because the left ruthlessly pursued the American version of the USSR because they want centralized power. But there are others who had good intentions and went along with it to accomplish wishes that, strictly speaking, are unconstitutional and, therefore, un-American.
I’m opposed to all of that, in part, because I know what the road to hell is paved with .
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I cured disease and cancer by using Food…
I can also make my own antibiotics
I have cured 4 ppl from Cancer and Fibromyalgia
My idea is to make basic foods free
Once you make a dish of it… you can sell it…
Trade with other countries and states cities… so everyone can learn about cultural medicinal foods from everywhere being available to EVERYONE?
I want to be President in 2050 on my Birthday I will win…
I have the Courage…
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You’ve got my vote! I definitely think we need a national initiative I would call Good Clean Food! Incentivize clean food production (organic / biodynamic / regenerative ag) with tax incentives and grow this food everywhere…instead of “chemlawns”! Also have clean food as primary medicine – instead of drug prescriptions, have subscriptions to local CSAs with foods tailored to your health needs (use surveys to determine that). I really think we are creating a freedom / health / love revolution so let’s construct something totally amazing together…and share the good word! God bless!!
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Thanks Roamer.
I don’t disagree at all. I simply submit that though as an attorney I am a big proponent of states’ rights, I 1) am limited to work with what I have within an existing system and I have been commissioned to help people share their thoughts about the best food and ag policies, and that 2) the issue of jurisdictional implementation is outside the scope of this discussion but not at all being ignored.
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