November Advocacy Update

The Farm Bill is one of the largest pieces of legislation passed in Congress on a regular basis, generally every 5 years. The Farm Bill essentially sets the “The 2024 election is over and we have a lot more context on where the next 2 years of policy is headed. President-elect Donald Trump has already begun naming his cabinet members, including Robert F. Kennedy Jr., publicly announcing he will be the US Health Secretary with plans to remove fluoride from public drinking water and “take on” ultra-processed foods. Furthermore, now that the Senate will be controlled by Republicans, we will see a shift in the Agriculture Committee leadership.

We are currently operating on an expired Farm Bill, though it is expected that ag lawmakers will likely push for adding a one-year extension to a federal funding stop-gap measure before the end of the year. The prediction for a republican controlled congress and executive branch is that climate-friendly ag dollars and future nutrition spending will be on the chopping block. The House released its draft of the new Farm Bill over the summer, which aligns with the previously stated goals. On the morning of November 18th, Debbie Stabenow (chairwoman of the Senate Agriculture Committee) released the text for her Farm Bill. Since the bill is quite fresh, I haven’t had time to dive too deeply into it, however, we know that it “includes over 100 bipartisan bills and… invests $39 billion in new resources to provide certainty to farmers, strengthen the safety net for American families, and grow rural prosperity”. From what I have seen, this bill aligns significantly more than the House version with Slow Food’s core values of good, clean, and fair food.

In reflecting on how Pennsylvania voted, this article about food prices across the Philadelphia region was really enlightening. In short, the Philadelphia area has seen food prices rise more than almost any other city in the country.

Although there is more clarity now, we still have a hazy political landscape ahead. In the coming months, we will hopefully get some more clarity around the Trump Administration’s food and farm policy plans.