Sad Day on the Farm

Anonymous Poster · Jan 16, 2003

Some small farms are selling directly to customers - there's one in our area that sells by subscription. Customers agree to purchase a certain amount of product (produce, jams, goat cheese, etc.), every week, and the farmer delivers. Evidently it's been pretty successful. Perhaps this might become a trend.

Wingnut · Jan 16, 2003

Dunno, Egon .... never seen free range chicken on sale so I can't tell you. The one I ate out on the farm must've died of old age as I certainly don't have glowing memories of them!

It's pretty hard to compare the family farm of yore to the farm of today. Farms USED TO BE a way of life, not a way of paying for the winters in Florida.You could raise your own food, and - god willing - raise enough extra to trade/sell for the stuff you couldn't raise. There was no need for a tractor that could pull a 4 million gang plow .... 'cause you couldn't farm that much land anyway. My step-dad broke his farm out of virgin forst and farmed for 40 years with horses and then a Ford 8N. He did it well enough to go from a 1/4 to a section and a half ... but he certainly never got rich. It was a way to raise 7 kids.

At some point in the near past, the direction of farming changed from a lifestyle to an "occupation" where the same lifestyle as the citydweller was expected. So ... farms got bigger, equipment got bigger, and the vicious cycle got tighter and tighter.

My uncles family was raised on an old-style mixed farm in Alberta and always (barely) made ends meet ... but never made enough for a vacation, to send the kids to college or anything else other than making do. Welfare made ends meet to that medication could be bought too ... but my aund died because she thought food was more important than her heart medication. Lifestyle choices. If they hadn't had the farm, welfare would have bought all their food and medicine.

On the other hand, many of the farms around mine were strictly into 1) grain ... intensive work for a small part of the year with massive equipment, 2) dairy ... with huge infrastructure costs and invisible margins (except the govenment guarantees profit in exchange for quotas), and 3) livestock. Most of the people that farmed there also worked off the farm and did not consider farming as a lifestyle ... they enjoyed living off the land but wanted all of the amenities of the townfolk. One of the guys that worked with me used his vacations to plant wheat in the spring and harvest in the fall ... made more off that farm than he did at work. Lifestyle choices.

I guess my question is .... are family farms disappearing because of the lifestyle change (better lifestyle demands an income, not subsistance farming), or because subsistance farming cannot exist anymore. (And please be aware I am not using "subsistance farming" with any derogatory meaning).

Bottom line ... to me ... is that it's very hard to compare yesterday to today ... 'cause it ain't.

Is the government really interested in seeing family farms change to factory farms? Well, on one hand, it would be easier for them to regulate (in Alberta, at least, family farms are exempt from OSHA and other regulations) ... but on the other ... the "corporate welfare" payments would likely be the same as the current farm payouts. So, I doubt that they're consciously siding with one or the other. Local governments, however, are looking at it differently. As Richard has pointed out ... they've got dollar signs in their eyes and will swing away from family farms (no tax $$) and over to anything else that will give them the greenbacks to pay themselves big bucks to be our "public servants".

Well ... that got longer than I'd planned!

BB_TX · Jan 16, 2003

This is not just a farm issue. The small farm forced out by the corporate farm is no different than the small five & dime forced out by the Walmarts and Targets, the small hardware store forced out by the HDs and Lowes, the small mom & pop grocery forced out by the Krogers and Albertsons, and on and on. It is a fact of life that volume means market power. The small operations can't buy and sell at the same dollars the big guys can. A few small operations still make it ok, but for the most part it is all moving toward the large operations.

Argee · Jan 16, 2003

Lifestyle choices

Well said Wingnut, I'm a part time farmer, I can't afford(choose not) to live the income it provides, nor can I afford to purchase the equipment and land necessary so I could. I think family farming is headed to just that. One or both members of the family hiearchy working in town to provide a large part of the chosen lifestyle while still farming to provide the grass roots connection. I personally enjoy raising hogs, cattle and veggies, but I wouldn't want to try and make a living at it. I sell my surplus meat on the hoof, to members of the community so as to provide wholesome non chemicalized(is that a word) food to them, and more importantly to myself. This gives me a sense of fullfilment and keeps me in touch with nature, but it certainly doesn't support my chosen lifestyle.

I work part-time at one of those big box stores (Home Depot). Yes there were some Mom & Pop stores that went by the wayside, but there were also a lot of people that received employment because of the growth that box store brought with it. The big box stores sell the same product as the Mom & Pops, but do so more effectively. They provide many people in the community with the opportunity to do the same as I am doing, having both worlds. We can't stop change, we just have to be flexible enough to bend with it.

rancar · Jan 16, 2003

Could you clarify your other statement though, "I don't deny the government is keeping farm prices low. I can only speculate it's done so to keep urbanites from starving and it's these city folk who put our politicians in office."

My intention here is not to demean urbanites or city/suburban folk in any way....it's simply these are geographic areas where the greatest percentage of the American population lives. Politicians are sensitive to urban/suburban issues, especially economic considerations like the ability to put food on the table for the evening meal. What I'm speculating on is this: Consumers right now pay anywhere from $2 to $4 per gallon of milk depending upon where they live. Price is higher in the cities. I consider milk to be similar to gasoline....it's a somewhat inelastic commodity item. People buy it as a major food staple in their diets because they need to and they would pay almost whatever price they have to to purchase it. If milk price controls are lifted and farmers are able to demand whatever the market is willing to bear and they get paid $20-25 per hundred weight or more, then per gallon milk prices will go north to $5-8 per gallon or more at the retail level. The powers that be that control these things start saying to themselves we can't let this happen. This price inflation will inflate the prices of all dairy products and then it starts to influence price inflation in the entire food supply chain if producers and suppliers believe they can get away with jacking up prices. It's perceived the normal working family can't afford this price inflation and, hence, this is the reason we have the price controls we have.

A similar corollary illustration is gasoline. We pay $1.50-1.60 per gallon regular. The Europeans and most other countries around the world pay the equivalent of $3-6 per gallon. It would be economically devastating to this country if Americans paid this same equivalent price and if we're not on the brink of an economic depression right now, this may certainly push this country into one. That's why the government pursues policies to keep milk, oil, and gas prices at the artificially low prices we have now. These are major commodity items in the American economy. If we lose control of prices here, then we start seeing increasingly higher inflation throughout the entire economy. And, then in the broadest perspective we find ourselves back in a stagflation economy similar to what persisted throughout the 1970s. This is certainly not what our politicians want to see.

But, all of this is getting off the topic and don't even get me going on why we're going into Iraq. Hint: It has more to do than getting rid of SH's WMD.

.....Bob

Egon · Jan 16, 2003

Beleive me Pete; when you get the real thing in your mouth you'll know the difference. The same will go for the eggs.

When I was growing up the small farm was a very viable occupation. Vacations, new cars etc. In fact the good farmer located on good soil with moisture was envied by most town people.

Egon

diggerjim · Jan 16, 2003

IMO we no longer have an independant farming industry. What we have are sharecroppers working for uncle sam. Farmers are told what to plant, where to plant, when the best time is to harvest, when to lay ground out, and are paid just enough to keep stringing them along. Mega farms make much more money off of the government than they do the crops. Our countys newpaper for all of its shortcomings posts a list of moneys paid to the farmer and the mega's. Guess who makes the most? Who sent money and trained farmers in othe markets that are now competing with our farmers? Bigbrother..

O.K. I'm off my soapbox. Other markets have produced nice tractors tho (keeping it tractoring)! Its a mess and we all are responsible for electing the right people and raising our voices when needed to get a handle on the situation.

Jim

cowboydoc · Jan 16, 2003

You guys are all right. There's not one thing that has been said since I posted that isn't the truth. There are alot of things that go into it.

The govt. most certainly controls it. Even if you don't want to participate in govt. programs, which is the only way you can really make money, you have so many restrictions with regard to environmental issues, etc. Then if you do participate, which regardless of what you think on a small scale basis you have to do some of the programs to make it if it is your business, you have so many rules you have to go by. I just got a 30 page report that I have to fill out on every acre of property that I have for the govt. It's the law and if I don't fill it out I could be prosecuted. It gets pretty personal. But you don't have a choice.

Then there are the markets. Regardless of what you think it's a monopoly. In our area there are two choices to sell your corn to. When we do contracts it's the lesser of two evils. You can't afford not to do some contracts either. Alot of times you can't even get a program or insurance if you don't have some of your crop contracted. You tell them I cna't even pay my seed bill with you for that price. They say basically tough. The other guy says the same thing. So you basically either farm and go in the hole or you sign for a govt. program to make up the difference. It's a joke for sure. The government has let the commodity brokers get to the place where there is no more competition for. They buy at ridiculously low prices from the farmer and control the price to the factories or "middle man" where they mark it up. Then by the time the product gets to you it's been marked up considerably. The seed man, the fertilizer man, the spray man, the gas man, the commodity man, etc. They all decide what they want to charge but the farmer they get told what price they are going to get. There is absolutely no control at all.

Then you have the enviromentalists. For the last 200 years the farmer and the rancher has made land prodcutive where there was no production. Now 200 years later the rancher has to compete with an environmentalist grazing rights. Rich liberal environmentalist come in and bid on these 100 year grazing rights. They bid the contract for more than anyone can make on it. Then they just let the grazing rights go unused. The govt. does nothing about it.

I could go on and on. I know that these things happen in every business. The truth is with farming and ranching everyone out there would already be out of business if this was a real free market system at the prices we have had the last 20 years. Every single expense has gone up, ever look at the price of a new combine, while commodity prices have stayed the same or gotten lower. I see all the time people ragging on farmers and ranchers because they get x amount in govt. money. Well you can look at it two ways. You either pay triple or more for food prices so the farmer/rancher can make a decent living or you let the govt. continue to subsidize food.

rancar · Jan 21, 2003

And here's yet another account of senseless abuse of farm animals........./w3tcompact/icons/mad.gif

<A target="_blank" HREF=http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/105102_calfclub21.shtml>Calve Killing</A>

Argee · Jan 21, 2003

"Let's use the pure stupidity of this incident as a lesson for other kids about what happens to you when your brain gets fried."

That pretty well sums it up. Let's be thankful they didn't stop by the farmers house and do it to his family!!