Photo: Infrogmation/Flickr

By any reckoning Sunday’s Farm Bill Teach-In was a success. Cahners Theatre at the Museum of Science was packed. The audience spanned ages and ethnic background. Waistlines varied. There was plenty of laughter, thoughtful silence, note-taking and Tweeting throughout the afternoon. And, at the event’s conclusion, there were calls to action.

Being a public educational forum, it was important that the keynote addresses deliver. They did. NYU nutrition professor and public policy expert Marion Nestle launched the Teach-In with a roughly 30-minute, straight-talking presentation about what the Farm Bill IS, what it does and doesn’t do, and whom it benefits. U.S. Rep. Chellie Pingree of Maine followed in turn with an equally compelling, equally charismatic talk. Local farming initiatives are a viable model for change on a national scale. She argued why and how.

Here’s a recap, with specific information on what YOU can do after the jump.

According to Nestle, the current Farm Bill (passed in 2008) is massive in scope, “incomprehensible” to Congress in its totality and therefore “extraordinarily vulnerable” to special interests. Direct payments support only some crops; none of that money goes to the production of fruits and vegetables. High-yield commodity crops (e.g., corn and soy) receive the bulk of payments, yet such crops do not feed PEOPLE. They feed animals. In the specific instance of corn, farmers are incentivized to produce ethanol, which most experts agree is having a direct, deleterious affect on food prices.

Enter the conundrum of the food stamp program. Food stamps, or SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program), account for $188 billion — almost 70% — of the $283 billion dollars budgeted under the 2008 Farm Bill. Why are food stamps included at all in this legislation? “Log-rolling,” Nestle believes. In other words, they constitute part of a vote-getting strategy. This seems to be the only logical way of understanding the illogic behind supporting massive, single- and commodity-crop farms — the bill’s primary modus operandi — while simultaneously funding, at huge cost, that portion of our citizenry struggling to buy food.

Despite the Bill’s gloomy prospects and mire of political interests, Nestle spoke optimistically. Portions of the bill are changeable. Millions of dollars newly directed towards organic farmers may seem miniscule, relatively speaking, but ‘we’re talking millions of dollars, and that’s a good thing.’

Most promising, there is a unique confluence of market realities, working ideas and political will nationwide that suggest certain practices will be up-ended moving forward. Take direct payments. These are likely to end in the 2012 version of the Farm Bill. What’s critical right now is proposing alternative, beneficial initiatives that vested parties can rally around. The uniqueness of THIS moment in time as a real moment for change was voiced by several other speakers at the Teach-In.

Congresswoman Chellie Pingree (ME) was one of them. Billed as the second keynote speaker, Pingree spent her time at the podium contending the fundamental economic and nutritional soundness of supporting local farms. Her opinions carry moral weight: she herself is an organic farmer, she serves on the House Committee on Agriculture, and she recently proposed for inclusion in the 2012 Farm Bill several new initiatives that promote and protect small farmers (HR3286 Local Farms, Food and Jobs Act).

Pingree’s overarching message was that getting back to our roots is not rocket science – we used to do this, and we did it well. In the 19th century New England was its own breadbasket. Farmers from her neck of the woods produced barley and rye. Fresh, top-quality produce was regularly shipped down the coast overnight for arrival at Boston’s high-end restaurants by lunchtime the next day. Clearly, a great deal has changed for New England farmers since then. But Pingree observed that we’re trending back to young people choosing to get into farming — and they’re very well educated, thank you.

The values upon which Pingree’s recent legislation is built are so basic as to seem mundane. Diversifying crops protects the land, feeds the local population with nourishing food and bolsters the local economy. Her Local Farms, Food and Jobs Act therefore enacts several initiatives that support such ends, including the creation of a crop insurance program specifically suited to organic and diversified farmers (we had learned from Nestle that crop insurance is a contentious issue in the 2012 Farm Bill).

But how ‘palatable’ is this bill to Pingree’s colleagues in D.C.? To date, it has attracted 65 co-sponsors in the House. Congressman Jerrod Brown (OH) has introduced a companion bill in the Senate, which currently has nine co-sponsors. Massachusetts Senators John Kerry and Scott Brown have yet to sign on.

Which brings us to the ultimate take-away of this Teach-In. It was mentioned by Annette Higby, Policy Director of the New England Farmers Union, and summed up by Chris Coffin, New England Director of the American Farmland Trust: your voice does matter in Washington.

So, contact your senators and local representatives. Make them aware of the programs or initiatives or bills you want them to support. It doesn’t matter which side of the political corridor you find yourself on, or what your entry-point is to the Farm Bill — be it school lunches, organic farming or alternatives to direct payments. Vote with your voice, and your fork.

Links for further reading

• What is the Farm Bill? from the National Agricultural Law Center
• An interactive Farm Bill budget visualizer from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health
• SNAP to Health from the Center for the Study of the Presidency and Congress

The slides from all the presentations given at Sunday’s Teach-In will soon be available at the Let’s Talk About Food website. This will be an efficient, streamlined way of educating yourself about the issues related to the 2012 Farm Bill. Check back in!

Watch them on YouTube

In the meantime, the Museum of Science has posted edited videos of all three Teach-In sessions held in Cahners Theatre:

Session I: Keynote speakers Marion Nestle, Chellie Pingree
Session II: Ellen Parker of Project Bread, Annette Higby of the New England Farmers Union, and Tim Griffin of Tufts
Session III: Wrap-Up