KSHB 41 journalist Ryan Gamboa covers Miami county in Kansas and Cassouri County in Missouri. It also covers agricultural subjects. Share your history idea with Ryan.
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The US Department of Agriculture has announced a billion dollars in cups in the era of the era of COVID supporting food of local origin to charitable food banks and schools.
Community harvesting network is one of the many organizations affected by the cuts.
“In our case, it was about $ 1 million that we received in each financing cycle,” said CEO and President Stephen Davis. “Over a period of two years, this gave us about 1.5 million dollars in products.”
Jack McCormick / KSHB
Community catering network of harvets serves 27 counties in and around the metropolitan region of Kansas City on both sides of the state line.
According to Davis, the organization received only funds for its services in Kansas, a partnership it created with the Kansas Department of Agriculture.
“It was a program based in kansas and we worked with Kansas farmers to get this food,” said Davis.
Of the billions of dollars reduced, $ 660 million financed the local school program (LFS) and the remaining $ 420 million financed the local food purchasing cooperation agreement (LFPA).
Jack McCormick / KSHB
Harvesters was in the LFPA program which provided funding which was paid directly to Kansas farmers for product products, dairy products and proteins.
“In many cases, they were startups, they were small farmers, they were various farmers,” said David. “They were disadvantaged in a way. It was really a Lifeline program today to give them a distant source of funding.”
Harvesters take nearly 30 million pounds of food each year.
It is based on current donors to invent the deficit, while the organization remains concerned about the impact discounts on local food producers.
“Our hope would have been continued,” said Davis. “It has been proven that it works and the foundation was relaxed to continue showing the success of this program.”
Jack McCormick / KSHB
Reductions of public spending in many sectors are reading the Missouri Farm Bureau between the lines.
“The new administration examines a whole government on spending,” said Missouri Farm Bureau president Garrett Hawkins. “Since the interest in the debt goes beyond the national defense budget, I think it belongs to us that we take a look at public spending; I think that the American department of agriculture,” said Hawkins.
He is and other members of the Farm Bureau meet this week the darling of the Missouri Congress in Capitol Hill to put pressure for new legislation.
American Farm Federation
“I think it is important for viewers to know that we have two years after the food and farm bill,” said Hawkins. “This is one of the key problems that our farmers are talking about this week on Capitol Hill, it is the need to update and reautical the agricultural bill that has an impact on all Americans.”
The 2018 agricultural improvement law, also known as Farm Bill, is adopted every five years in the Congress.
Bipartite legislation is a safety net for producers, many programs that include research, preservation and agriculture research programs.
The 2018 bill is $ 428 billion in total dollars; $ 325.8 million or 76%, nutrition programs like Snap.
Jack McCormick / KSHB
“What you see now is an overview of the expenses of the pandemic era and representatives of the government by watching and saying:” Okay, perhaps we should take a break and take a look at these programs and have to put them online, recognizing that the resources will be necessary to update all the programs within the framework of an agricultural bill “, added Hawkins.” questions are asked about all programs. We can be patient while pleading for a new modern agricultural bill. “
The agricultural bill is generally adopted every five years and is updated to reflect the current economy. The 2018 legislation expired in 2023. The same funding was extended by the order of the congress to maintain the funding of 2018.
“The world has changed since 2018,” said Hawkins. “We have experienced a pandemic, we saw supply chains upset in the pandemic, we have seen the fastest increase in inflation that we have seen for decades.” Everything we affect in agriculture costs much more, the prices we see at Gate Farm are considerably lower in recent years. We have to update an agricultural safety net that reflects modern times. “”
J. Scott Applewhite / AP
Hawkins says that navigating in the USDA cuts could advance new legislation that could have an impact on all Americans.
Harvesters and FARM Bureau understand that a new agricultural bill is an important problem.
For Davis, the question is what cost it should be reached and it should not result from retrosition of programs like LFPA or other programs.
The president of Kansas Farmers Union, Donn Teske, provided KSHB 41 a declaration concerning the recent financing cuts of the USDA:
Kansas Farmers Union is disappointed with the recent sections of local USDA food purchase assistance (LFPA) and local food programs for schools (LFS). Brutal cancellation now threatens to upset all the progress that farms, food centers, schools and food banks had built by relationships, infrastructure and increased production around these programs. We strongly urge the administration to refocus and promote agricultural policy that promotes local and regional markets for the well-being of all producers and consumers. “”
The Farm Bill will continue to do news and KSHB 41 will monitor any change.