The Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy promotes resilient family farms, rural communities and ecosystems around the world through research and education, science and technology, and advocacy.

6/4: In These Times. Who's Subsidy Is It Anyway?

6/03: Des Moines Register. Biofuels' Plants Thirst Create Water Worries

6/1: Baltimore Chronicle. Fixing Our Broken Food System

6/1: Bloomberg. Schwab, Mandelson Try to Jumpstart World Trade Talks

5/31: Tompaine. U.S. Food System Deeply at Risk

5/29: The Standard (China). Warning Not to Copy U.S. on Food Safety

5/28: St. Petersburg Times. Ethanol Faces Big Hurdle: Water Use

5/28: Reuters. China Urged Not to Copy U.S. Big Farms on Food Safety

5/27: Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel. Eating Dangerously

5/27: Minneapolis Star Tribune. Law Means Schools Must Find Mercury Free Alternatives

5/25: USA Today. China Says U.S. Shares Blame in Food Scandal

5/20: San Jose Mercury News. How Farm Policy Affects Our Health

5/15: AgriNews. Speakers Deliver Opinions About Global Trade

IATP launches new initiative on China

IATP announced a new initiative this month to integrate sustainability into food systems in China. IATP President Jim Harkness met with researchers, international organizations and nongovernmental organization (NGO) leaders in Beijing to discuss the program.

"Food safety issues that have been in the news recently are one reason why China should rethink its shift toward an industrial and chemically intensive approach to agriculture," said Harkness. "By drawing on its rich history of farming ingenuity and ecological agriculture, China could build a safer, more sustainable food system with far less dependence on fossil fuels, pesticides and genetic engineering."

IATP will work to facilitate exchanges between government agencies, researchers, entrepreneurs and NGOs in China and similar experts in other countries. There will be a focus on integrating key aspects of sustainability-social, economic and ecological-into all sectors of the food system. Harkness has worked on Chinese environment and development issues for over two decades.

Press release

Fixing our global food system

IATP President Jim Harkness writes in a new commentary, "The recent discovery of an industrial chemical in animal feed imported from China has added to the mounting criticism of U.S. food safety agencies. But this case represents much more than simply governmental incompetence. It exposes the inherent weaknesses of an industrial global food system designed to benefit multinational agribusiness companies at the expense of public health."

Read the full commentary

Fighting for a fair Farm Bill

The debate over a new U.S. Farm Bill is heating up in Congress. The House and Senate are working to complete their versions of the Farm Bill by the end of July, with a final vote expected in September. IATP has published six briefing papers on how the Farm Bill affects family farmers, renewable energy, public health, the world's hungry, and market concentration.

IATP's Farm Bill web page includes all six briefing papers, related documents and proposals, and our e-newsletter Farm Bill News.

Behind the secret trade deal

A controversial deal on trade between House Democratic leaders and the Bush administration shows once again how deeply flawed outcomes inevitably result from closed and non-transparent processes. IATP's Dennis Olson and Alexandra Spieldoch write that the deal completely ignores one of the most damaging and controversial aspects of international trade: agriculture.

Read "Behind the Secret Trade Deal."

WTO still not confronting the real challenges

The chair of the agriculture negotiations at the WTO has released two parts of a long-promised paper that summarized the conflicts in the negotiations and challenged the membership to conclude the Doha Round. But according to IATP's Sophia Murphy, the paper ignores the real challenge, which is how to ensure that agricultural rules support sustainable rural livelihoods.

Read Murphy's "Still Not Confronting the Real Challenges" and the Chair's papers on the agricultural negotiations at tradeobservatory.org.

Ag trade rules and developing countries

IATP's Trade Information Project in Geneva is holding a series of briefings for developing country negotiators on aspects of WTO agriculture trade rules that are often out of the spotlight. Topics covered have included food aid, state trading enterprises, and the special safeguard mechanism. Representatives from more than 40 countries, many from Africa, have attended. Future briefings will continue throughout the summer.

For more on what's happening on the WTO negotiations, read Geneva Update.

Rethinking agriculture trade

Global agricultural trade policies over the last several decades have resulted in price declines, increasingly concentrated market power of a few companies, and the industrialization of agriculture at the expense of people and the environment. Last month, the EcoFair Trade Dialogue put forth a series of reform proposals designed to fundamentally rethink global agriculture policies.

The EcoFair Trade Dialogue is a project carried out by the Heinrich Böll Foundation in cooperation with Misereor and moderated by the Wuppertal Institute. IATP's Sophia Murphy was one of the contributors.

Read the EcoFair reform proposals in "Slow Trade-Sound Farming: A Multilateral Framework for Sustainable Markets in Agriculture."

Minnesota bans
mercury-containing products

The Minnesota state legislature passed a bill last month to reduce the unnecessary use of toxic mercury in products. IATP helped draft the bill and worked closely with the chief authors to get it passed.

Along with banning the use and sale of a number of mercury-containing devices such as blood pressure cuffs, thermostats, and some cosmetics, the bill also eliminates the use of mercury in K-12 schools and expands labeling and recycling requirements for mercury-containing products where there are no viable mercury-free alternatives.

"We know the health dangers of mercury exposure, and unfortunately we're finding it more and more in Minnesota lakes and fish. Why expose mothers and children, in particular, to mercury when there are safer, cost-effective alternatives?" asks IATP's Carin Skoog.

Read IATP's press release on the victory.

Minnesota jump-starts cellulosic biofuels

In May, the Minnesota legislature passed two groundbreaking bills that will shape the future of the biofuel market in the state. IATP helped to draft the legislation and worked to get the bills passed. One bill would require that 25 percent of the state's ethanol content in gasoline be made from cellulosic ethanol when either of two triggers is passed: 1) 60,000,000 gallons/year of cellulosic ethanol is produced in Minnesota, or 2) 2015.

According to IATP's Don Arnosti, the bill "guarantees that new cellulosic ethanol producers will have a market and cannot be 'locked out' by long-term contracts with refineries by existing corn ethanol producers."

The other bill authorized a new program for easement agreements with farmers who would be paid to plant native perennial crops for bioenergy. The program bridges the divide between traditional annual crops and conservation reserve lands, with a "working lands - perennial" focus. A technical committee will work over the summer to detail the payment rates and expectations of landowners in a proposal to be presented to the 2008 legislature for funding. This new program, called "Reinvest in Minnesota - Renewable Energy" (RIM-RE), is designed to be matched by federal dollars, which could come through the new Farm Bill.

More details about the RIM-RE program can be found in the bill starting in section 119, page 84.25.

Rural America meets Somali refugees

The demographics of the Midwest's rural communities are changing; immigrants and refugees from Latin America, Asia, Africa and South America are adding diversity to many small towns. Refugees from Somalia face a number of challenges in rural Midwestern communities, including: housing shortages, limited transportation options, difficulty sourcing culturally appropriate food, lack of interest-free business loans, few job opportunities due to limited English proficiency and challenges building cross-cultural relationships.

In May, IATP and the City of Minneapolis hosted a Midwest Rural Somali meeting to better connect rural Somali refugees from different communities. Participants came from rural Minnesota and Wisconsin to network with one another, find common solutions to concerns, share resources and plan for future events. A larger follow-up meeting will be held later this year.

Check back at IATP's rural communities blog, In the Field, for more details.

Peace Coffee named best coffee... Again!

For the second year in a row, City Pages readers named Peace Coffee the best coffee by the pound in the Twin Cities. Peace Coffee is IATP's 100 percent fair trade and organic coffee company.

Read more from the City Pages.

Latest on Radio Sustain

On the latest Radio Sustain, you can listen to IATP's Sophia Murphy talk about problems with U.S. food aid; author David Korten on the "economic perfect storm;" and IATP's Jim Kleinschmit on including sustainable biofuels in the new Farm Bill.

Listen here

What's Happening "In the Field"

Want to learn about the struggles of Somali refugees in rural America, how to start an organic farm at your school, or how Madelia, Minnesota is revitalizing its small town? It's all at IATP's rural communities blog - In the Field.