Recent ZBloggers
Recent Sustainer Blogs
By Brad Wilson at Aug 08, 2012
Dairy farmers have been in acute crisis through the 2008 and 2012 farm bills. This is the most acute farm bill injustice of our time. The Food Movement has failed to see these injustices, and advocate for just solutions. The leaders of this movement have again overwhelmingly failed to help lead in the fight for fair trade and living wage prices for dairy farmers for other commodity farmers. How can this be, when the rhetoric of the food movement so strongly supports food justice? I find the answer in a variety of food movement myths. These myths are widely shared across mainstream media, as well as both conservative and progressive blog sites.... (More) Comments (0)
Hidden Farm Bill: AgBiz Trillions
By Brad Wilson at Jul 16, 2012
Mainstream media, progressives, conservatives, legislative agriculture committees, and government agencies all mislead people about the farm bill, by focusing on what I call the VISIBLE Farm Bill, and by ignoring the much bigger key part of the farm bill, the HIDDEN Farm Bill. What's typically VISIBLE is Farm Bill Spending, such as in the "Farm Bill Visualizer" or the Farm Subsidy Database. What's HIDDEN is another part of the farm bill, market management. Market money is much bigger than government spending, and has a much larger impact. Spending is NOT what changes markets. ... (More) Comments (0)
Slides: Dairy Crisis, Dairy Justice
By Brad Wilson at Jun 14, 2012
This is a short, pictorial analysis of the dairy crisis in relation to the farm bill. It's quick and gets right to the point. It links to 20 "Dairy Crisis Slides" (or Dairy Policy Slides). It illustrates larger farm bill issues, like farm subsidies, and Commodity Policy for crops corn, soybeans, wheat, cotton, etc. ... (More) Comments (0)
By Brad Wilson at May 13, 2012
USDA and DOJ held antitrust hearings around the nation. The results are poor. Congress gutted the proposed revisions. We must call for the Obama Administration and Congress to support the 11 antitrust measures that were recently excluded by Congress under corporate pressure.... (More) Comments (0)
Talking Points: Farm Subsidies 2012
By Brad Wilson at May 13, 2012
The Farm Bill is being written right now. The biggest issues of economic justice are those of the Commodity Title. This blog contains some key talking points to address the biggest injustices and the most common misunderstandings of the farm bill.... (More) Comments (0)
By Brad Wilson at May 11, 2012
The biggest issues in the US farm bill, both domestically and globally, are those of the Commodity Title. Historically these are multitrillion dollar market management issues, hugely affecting sustainability, (crop rotations,) farm income, food prices, rural development, research, There are 3 key proposals available for farm and food justice advocacy. These are the Food from Family Farms Act of the National Family Farm Coalition, the Farmer Owned Reserve proposal of the National Farmers Union, and NFFC's bill to end the devastating dairy crisis. These proposals go far beyond trendy alternatives, such as subsidy caps and other subsidy reforms, which do not address the underlying problems.... (More) Comments (0)
Revenue Insurance: 2012 Farm Bill
By Brad Wilson at May 11, 2012
Revenue Insurance was included in the 2008 Farm Bill in a major way, in the ACRE Program and also in SURE. Now, as the 2012 Farm Bill is being debated and introduced into Congress, Revenue Insurance represents the main direction of further change to farm subsidy programs (in the Commodity Title of the Farm Bill). The "Primer" here is a collection of online articles that explain what's happening in a consistent way, that show some of who's doing what, and that provide a deeper, historical context for understanding this, the biggest issue in the 2012 Farm Bill.... (More) Comments (0)
Factsheet: Key 2012 Farm Bill Proposals
By Brad Wilson at May 11, 2012
The biggest issues in the US farm bill, both domestically and globally, are those of the Commodity Title. Historically these are multitrillion dollar market management issues, hugely affecting sustainability, (crop rotations,) farm income, food prices, rural development, research, There are 3 key proposals available for farm and food justice advocacy. These are the Food from Family Farms Act of the National Family Farm Coalition, the Farmer Owned Reserve proposal of the National Farmers Union, and NFFC's bill to end the devastating dairy crisis. These proposals go far beyond trendy alternatives, such as subsidy caps and other subsidy reforms, which do not address the underlying problems.... (More) Comments (0)
By Brad Wilson at Mar 08, 2012
This video is about how my videos looked, FROM MY CHANNEL, prior to the change on March 7, when you ONLY saw, on my channel, the videos that I specifically choose, when you clicked on the icons. From my playlists, you ONLY saw other videos in the same playlist of mine, in order, and that stayed true? as the viewers who came to my site continued to make selections, more and more and more. Now, since March 7, having been trained to choose from the right, you quickly exit my channel, as I prove here. We all lose our viewers from our channels in this way. Whatever our topics, without awareness, OUR viewers quickly leave OUR channels.... (More) Comments (0)
By Brad Wilson at Feb 23, 2012
The implications of the US Farm Bill for farm and food justice (or Food Sovereignty) are almost always misrepresented by USDA, academics, mainstream media, progressives and conservatives. These charts provide a corrective, a picture to show major missing stories in the fight for justice.... (More) Comments (0)
By Brad Wilson at Feb 23, 2012
Corn farmers have received billions of dollars in subsidies as partial compensations for the lowering of farm prices in farm bills. Farm commodity prices do not self-correct to balance supply and demand, so price floors were used to prevent farm depressions and stimulate wealth. Since 1942-1952, corn price floors (and therefore prices) were lowered 1953-1995, then eliminated, drastically lowering corn farm income and US income from corn exports. Taxpayer subsidies, totally unneeded during the farm programs of 1942-1952, have compensated corn farmers by a small fraction of the amount corn income was lowered. The same applies to other major farm commodity crops.... (More) Comments (3)
Subsidy Recipients Aren't Farmers
By Brad Wilson at Feb 21, 2012
Only a fraction of Farm Subsidy recipients are close to being full-time family-sized farmers, or even half of that size. Data on federal farm program Recipients is available at the Farm Subsidy Database compiled by the Environmental Working Group. EWG emphasizes that the "Top 10%" (of recipients) get most of the subsidies and the "Bottom 80%" get very small payments. In fact, however, by a Corn/Soybeans standard, only the top 10% of recipients are full time family-sized farms. The bottom half are only 3.3% of full time, or less (retired, dead, tiny). Only the top group can be validly called "farmers." Essentially the same holds if my standard (a small, 200-acre corn/soybean farm) is cut in half. EWG's analysis is wrong. Dead farmers who received less are not victims relative to family farmers who work full time.... (More) Comments (0)
By Brad Wilson at Jan 19, 2012
The article, “Reform or Transformation? The Pivotal Role of Food Justice in the U.S. Food Movement,” by Eric Holt-Gimenez and Yi Wang, demonstrates some deep thought about the food movement and related movements. It has merit, but leaves out most of the farm justice aspect of the movement, which was the bigger part historically in the US. That then leads to less than adequate conclusions, as I show in this review.... (More) Comments (3)
By Brad Wilson at Dec 09, 2011
Here's another detailed explanation of how a well meaning group fails to understand the farm bill Commodity Title. This time it's a "Liveable Future Blog" by a doctoral student at the Center for a Liveable Future at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.... (More) Comments (2)
By Brad Wilson at Nov 13, 2011
This is a general introduction to my method of "prophetic" pathos as a process for social change. It's part of a series of "debriefing" blogs following the recent conference of the Community Food Security Coalition, and the US Food Sovereignty Alliance assembly.... (More) Comments (0)


