the real cost of food

[Gabe Ayers]

Kristin,

“What if instead we were to subsidize the *consumer* side,”

What do you mean by subsidizing the “consumer side”? Interesting.

I have avoided posting our experience with producing food for sale, I think it has been explained in an earlier post on this site.

[Kristin]

Hi Jason-

I am trying to reconstruct the coffee-addled state I was in when I wrote that. Sorry to be so long responding. I was basically thinking that it seems healthier to me, in the long run, to help consumers to pay the real cost of food than to keep the price of food artificially low through subsidies. I guess when it comes down to specifics I’m talking about expanding programs like WIC, etc., to include even middle class consumers, while ‘defining up’ what those programs pay for, as Michael Pollan says, to fresh and even local food, not chips and soda. That way, farmers and consumers both benefit from the same dollar. At the same time, gradually do away with commodity subsidies. Reduce all these props over time, as people make adjustments in priorities and spending. I know policy doesn’t really work this way but what if it did? Just a thought, and probably not a very good one.

all best to everyone on this chilly and rainy morning –
Kristin

[TBigLug]

Also, something to consider beyond just the price of the land is the taxes. I found out that if I were somehow lucky enough to have my grandfather’s farm willed to me, I would be paying $16,000 / year in property taxes alone. Not to mention estate taxes and such. Around here most everyone on the block (who’s not in the hendley Act) pays around $100 / acre / year.

[TBigLug]

BTW, that’s for bare land also. No house or buildings on property. So i’d probably pay closer to $20,000. That’s approx. $1,667 per month just in taxes. $417 per week. That would be almost all of my income in a traditional job. I’ve sat down and ran the scenarios in my head. I figure I could make enough to pay the property tax OR the payment (if i had to buy it), but not both. I’ll quit before I hijack this thread but I’m going to start another thread later to cover my questions.

[goodcompanion]

@Kristin 3396 wrote:

Hi Jason-

I am trying to reconstruct the coffee-addled state I was in when I wrote that. Sorry to be so long responding. I was basically thinking that it seems healthier to me, in the long run, to help consumers to pay the real cost of food than to keep the price of food artificially low through subsidies. I guess when it comes down to specifics I’m talking about expanding programs like WIC, etc., to include even middle class consumers, while ‘defining up’ what those programs pay for, as Michael Pollan says, to fresh and even local food, not chips and soda. That way, farmers and consumers both benefit from the same dollar. At the same time, gradually do away with commodity subsidies. Reduce all these props over time, as people make adjustments in priorities and spending. I know policy doesn’t really work this way but what if it did? Just a thought, and probably not a very good one.

all best to everyone on this chilly and rainy morning –
Kristin

Policy can work however need dictates.

Currently low-income food subsidies use the general public purse to prevent hunger and malnutrition (defined in the most basic terms) for the bottom tiers.

While there are limited land tax breaks for farmers in some areas, there isn’t any expenditure in real terms on (re)developing small direct-market farms.

On the other hand, there is a massive expenditure of public funds on commodity agriculture. I would like to put a finger on how much federal and state money is used to construct manure lagoons and the like for commodity farms–I bet this figure dwarfs the budget of WIC a hundred to one.

Connecting the need for sound local nutrition with the need for viable local farms through policy could probably only happen after commodity food becomes unaffordable to a large portion of the public, making hunger and malnutrition problems of a scale that can no longer be resolved satisfactorily with a sliver of the budget. The public would have to recognize that commodity farms fundamentally do not address hunger and malnutrition and consequently vote to redirect resources from commodity ag to direct-market ag.

Of course the commodity ag lobbies would not be happy with such a move. Also, if a lot of this public money is spent helping commodity farms with pollution containment, would a drying-up of subsidies mean that farms would then be free to pollute or that they must build such facilities with their own financial means? My general impression is that it is simply not possible for most northeastern commodity dairies to stay in business without government funds to contain massive amounts of manure. And this is where our food and farming tax dollars and personell hours are allocated.

[Carl Russell]

It seems to me the key to getting paid for the true value of food, is to advance the concept that food is not a cost, but an investment that pays real dividends in personal health and energy, and in the support of a vital rural community and land-based economy.

Carl

[goodcompanion]

Carl,

It’s possible that those of us at work “selling ourselves” as providers of the holistic food package, if you will, may make incremental advances into the market. I feel like the tide is turning, and that this kind of community marketing will grow stronger.

But it’s still a precarious place to be. When you hold up a carrot and say, “this carrot is not a carrot. It is soil renewal, perpetuation of hand skills, incorporation of the very young and very old into community life, water quality, preservation of heirloom plants, and a fossil-fuel free life. So it costs $2.00 per carrot. (exaggeration)

Some people grasp this immediately and choose to pay the $2.00. Most don’t, their own lives and budgets take priority until the point is reached when said lives and budgets are unmistakably going over a cliff. I kind of think that the tangled pile of injured people at the bottom of the cliff is where most of the realization takes place–history doesn’t provide any exceptions, unfortunately.

Kristin, you spoke at the beginning of the thread about concern about unsustainable use of cheap labor to operate at all. Worth acknowledging, but I think that the critical issue of our time and place is not the exploitation of willing young people who want to learn, but the loss of human skills. Kristin and Mark do more than anyone I know to reverse this trend when it comes to farming, and hats off to you for it.

Almost anything that truly perpetuates and spreads traditional knowledge and skills seems justifiable to me. Call an approach elitist, call it personally or socially unsustainable, I don’t care, so long as it gets you by for the time being and keeps the knowledge base from being crushed into oblivion by the blind, deaf and dumb Global Marketplace.

[Carl Russell]

My comment about “investment vs. cost” was not really intended to solve marketing issues on small farms as much as a big picture statement re-framing the current cultural debate .

It was mostly as a result of comments Lisa received this weekend after a presentation as part of a panel on local food systems. After she had talked about how our farm primarily supports ourselves because of the high value we place on the food we raise, and how those who we sell to agree to pay premium prices, she was asked “What can we as consumers do to help you reduce your costs, so that you can sell your food at lower (competitive) prices?”

In my mind there are so many aspects of the biological relationship between humans and food that do not have to do with the modern economic/commercial paradigm that it is really a noble undertaking, in this day and age, to even consider taking responsibility to create a private land-base to support a local food system.

One way or another there is substantial investment going on, either by farsighted producers, saving skills, building soil, reestablishing food relationships, or by those few (but growing) aware (awake) consumers.

Carl

[Gulo]

I noticed this old thread, and thought i’d chime in, in case anyone revisits it.

We run a horse-powered CSA. We deliver at a farm market, and sell excess produce and the shares not picked up.

I think getting the true value of food is a matter right now of access to a populace that is both a) educated, and b) relatively wealthy. This describes the folks we market to, mostly. We won’t sell locally, in fact (our market is a major centre of around a million an hour from our farm), because the people, ironically, don’t “get it” yet and still feel a dozen eggs, for instance, over $2 represents a personal insult. I say “ironically” as these are mostly the same people who would wholeheartedly agree with you what a shame it is the family farm can no longer survive.

Anyway, i do my best at market not to cave in to hagglers, in fact, I am known to say things like “yes it’s expensive, and in fact the price for you just went up” and “i’m a farmer, not a prostitute,” or “it’s less than a shot of whiskey – maybe you’d be happier hanging out at the tavern” although of course this is my final line of defense when it is obvious i’m up against truly impenetrable ignorance.

On the other hand, i find myself frequently discouraged by the numbers of farmers out there perfectly willing to prostitute themselves to the tune of two dollars a dozen for eggs, etc.

Thankfully, people are getting smarter about this issue.

[MichaelF]

You’re definitely right.In connection,Twinkies a cream-filled snack cake are not deceased – long live the Twinkies. A successful bid was tendered as Hostess is in bankruptcy court, so the snack cakes seem to be on the fast track to return to stores. Buy your Twinkies online now with a personal loan.

[j.l.holt]

@Gulo 22140 wrote:

I noticed this old thread, and thought i’d chime in, in case anyone revisits it.

We run a horse-powered CSA. We deliver at a farm market, and sell excess produce and the shares not picked up.

I think getting the true value of food is a matter right now of access to a populace that is both a) educated, and b) relatively wealthy. This describes the folks we market to, mostly. We won’t sell locally, in fact (our market is a major centre of around a million an hour from our farm), because the people, ironically, don’t “get it” yet and still feel a dozen eggs, for instance, over $2 represents a personal insult. I say “ironically” as these are mostly the same people who would wholeheartedly agree with you what a shame it is the family farm can no longer survive.

Anyway, i do my best at market not to cave in to hagglers, in fact, I am known to say things like “yes it’s expensive, and in fact the price for you just went up” and “i’m a farmer, not a prostitute,” or “it’s less than a shot of whiskey – maybe you’d be happier hanging out at the tavern” although of course this is my final line of defense when it is obvious i’m up against truly impenetrable ignorance.

On the other hand, i find myself frequently discouraged by the numbers of farmers out there perfectly willing to prostitute themselves to the tune of two dollars a dozen for eggs, etc.

Thankfully, people are getting smarter about this issue.

A friend of mine drives the Amish to a couple of farmers markets in the D C area. When I stopped by I was suprized to see people standing in line to buy 5.00 doz eggs. Its been said if they don’t have enough of their own they just buy. Im not sure of the eggs, but a guy I know delivers a delivery van of baked goods every Sat.morning at about 2:00 to them to repackage and sell along the road and at the stock sale. they are put in un labled bags so they don’t say where they came from. Most people just assume they were Amish home made. My wife ask them one time how they could bake so many cookies,perfict not burnt. Only one offered the real story.

[Eli]

Now your costs set your price stick to it. Remember Busness is busness and charity is charity. Nothing wrong with giving things to some one who need it but seldom is the guy who wants 25 cents off a charity case. Eli

[Author]

Posts