Steve Suppan and Karen Lehman, Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy

Kathy Ozer, National Family Farm Coalition

Topic Description: This topic is composed of sub-elements from topics 3 and 8 in the "National Consultations on Food Security Synthesis Meeting" held on June 5, 1997 in Washington, DC. The topic has been categorized as a domestic one although many of the issues raised and actions proposed would also be applicable to international objectives in improving food security. For example, the Synthesis Meeting proposes as a domestic food security measure the re-establishment of regional commodity reserves and the promotion of urban agriculture (topic 3, p. 4). Such proposals also have been made in various international fora to improve global food security.

The increasing interaction between international and domestic policies, and conflicts arising from such interaction was a central feature of U.S. positions at the World Food Summit. For example, the General Accounting Office report on the Summit (November 1996), stated that "the United States was reluctant to endorse a "right to food" because of concern within the Administration that the government might be opening a door to a possible lawsuit by malnourished individuals within the United States" (6-7) U.S. official delegates to the Summit were particularly concerned that if the U.S. government recognized a right to food, the $27.7 billion reductions in public food assistance from 1997 to 2002 under the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act (colloquially known as the Welfare Reform Act) might make U.S. officials vulnerable to prosecution for international human rights violations.

Background: Assessing the "true social/economic cost of cutting welfare" is a sub-element of the "Maintain an Effective Food Security Safety Net" topic, in part, because of the extent of food insecurity in the United States. According to a Food Research and Action Center (FRAC) analysis of a September 15^th U.S. Department of Agriculture study on hunger and food insecurity in the U.S., about 11.9 percent of all U.S. households, comprising some 34 million people, are food insecure. The Urban Institute has estimated that by 2002, when Welfare Reform legislation cash and food assistance budget reductions are fully realized, about 22.8% of the U.S. population will be poor, according to the present federal definitions of poverty. "The U.S. Contribution to World Food Security" report (May 17, 1996 draft) ) prepared for the Summit states "[I]n the U.S. as in other countries, food insecurity is most often a problem of lack of access, or insufficient income." (18). Therefore, if welfare reform legislation results in greater numbers of poor people, it will also likley result in more food insecure people.

The draft report acknowledges that facilitating access to food and maintaining a food security safety net are vital components of food security policy implementation. The final U.S. position paper prepared for the Summit (July 1996) summarizes the contributions of federal food assistance programs (III-3) to food security. However, it does not comment on in the likely effects of food assistance program budget cuts then under debate in Congress. The following mini-summary of non-governmental and governmental assessments of the extent of U.S. food insecurity is offered as background to the Consultation's defining of issues.

According to a U.S. Department of Agriculture study, more than 45 million people, about one-sixth of the U.S. population received food assistance during all or part of Fiscal Year 1995. Several studies indicate that more people are eligible for food assistance and in need of it, but do not get it either because of inadequate funding or inadequate access to information about eligibility requirements for those programs. Fifty-two percent of officials responding to a 1995 U.S. Conference of Mayor's survey said that emergency food assistance facilities in their cities could not keep up with the demand for food assistance. The purchasing power of cash and food stamp assistance benefits for a family of three fell by 27 percent between 1972 and 1993.

Most of the U.S. government position paper and intervention at the Summit was directed at improving food security in other countries through "free" trade, in the expectation that declining tax revenues, particularly from transnational corporations in the expanding global economy, together with U.S. policy priorities, will constitute a grim "budget reality" (5) for aid to alleviate food security. The U.S. government tends to represent food security as primarily a problem of developing countries, many of whom, according to the Ohio consultation, export food very cheaply to the United States at declining terms of trade that exacerbate developing country food insecurity. Towards complementing the official U.S. position, the following selection of issues discussed and proposals for action from the National Consultations is oriented primarily towards the U.S. situation.

Issues: Several reports from the May 21 consultations, as well as subsequent submissions from consultation groups, such as "Arkansas' Plan of Action" (6/2/97), called for an expansion of food assistance programs, such as WIC, School Food Service and Food Stamps. The Georgia consultation agreed with the need for such an expansion, but with the additional comment that local surveys of food security needs would better able "small farmers to plan their production for local use." (3) The Colorado, Georgia, Minneapolis, and Washington, D.C. consultations called for a national and local monitoring of food security in order to evaluate food assistance programs, use remaining food assistance effectively and educate Congress about the issue. Several consultations strongly urged public education about the extent of food insecurity and hunger in the U.S. and education to correct misperceptions that the U.S. was increasing food assistance abroad. The Georgia and Ohio consultations identified racism in the implementation of government food assistance and farm programs as an impediment to food security. The Everett, WA consultation called for a national commission to educate Congress and the U.S. Administration about food security issues.

Several consultations commented that U.S. government decisions to reduce commodity reserves and food assistance programs at home and abroad are major impediments to improving food security. The Everett, WA and Minneapolis consultations called for greater democratization and transparency in trade policy formulation and implementation concerned with agriculture and food security, particularly insofar as U.S. agriculture, food safety, and food security laws are often elaborated in the name of fulfilling WTO or other trade policy commitments in which the public has little, if any, say.

While it is difficult to synthesize the various disagreements about the role of for-profit enterprise in creating food security, a question posed in Iowa City, Iowa consultation captures part of the terms of disagreement: "Should agriculture be viewed primarily as a profit-making enterprise or primarily as a means to meet the population's food needs?" In contrast to U.S. government facilitation of the industrialization of agriculture, there was also a great deal of disagreement about whether the industrialization of agriculture promoted was "sustainable" and an equal amount of disagreement over the meaning of "sustainability." The Kansas consultation debated whether the "U.S. agribusiness model is valid for developing countries" as a way towards improved food security.

Actions:

• Establish municipal and/or county food security departments on par with departments of housing, health, transportation etc. These departments would be charged with administering and/or facilitating food security monitoring, urban garden, community sustained agriculture, public-private partnership and gleaning programs etc. (Pro: food insecurity is most evident at the local level and local programs are most likely to provide immediate relief; department programs can be funded by readily explained revenues, e.g. restaurant taxes. Con: results of local food security monitoring will probably not persuade Congress to institute a national monitoring program.)
• Insofar as national agriculture and food security laws are required to conform to trade rules, NGO access to multilateral trade studies groups, discussions and negotiations should be formalized on par with the access presently granted to businesses and industry groups. NGOs should have broader participation on both the President's Agricultural Policy Advisory Committee for Trade and on the Technical Agricultural Advisory Committees for Trade. On both these committees the impact of trade policy formulation, negotiation and implementation on food security should be a standing agenda topic. (Pro: Properly formalized NGO access would increase democratic consultation in trade policy formulation and implementation, and gain greater popular acceptance for such policies. The granting of such access would encourage greater NGO accountability to their constituencies, and establish a basis for improved policy interchange among government, business and NGO representatives. Con: Formalized access will likely be opposed by some governments who fear democratized policy-making, and such opposition could be used by U.S. officials to deny access. Greater NGO participation, at the outset, would likely be regarded as a hindrance by those in search of short-term market development.)
• Using the September 15^th USDA study of food insecurity in the U.S. as a benchmark, the USDA and Health and Human Services should establish an interagency group to monitor and report annually the effects of Welfare Reform legislation on food security in the United States. This interagency group should consult formally and regularly with NGOs groups with competency in food security policy and the provision of food assistance. The interagency group would also be mandated to propose changes in the definition of poverty and the availability of all forms of federal food assistance. If the interagency group determines that greater food insecurity has resulted from the Welfare Reform legislation, it will propose to Congress a priorization list for the full funding of food assistance programs, beginning with WIC and school breakfast programs, since such programs have a greater impact on school performance than lunch programs. (Pro: Monitoring of the impacts of "Welfare Reform" on food security will better allow Congress to measure the cost-benefits of food assistance programs and to justifying full or fuller funding for these programs. Con: It will be difficult to get Congress to refinance a program whose budget reductions were counted among the budget "savings" towards a balanced budget.)
• In order to facilitate accountability, the U.S. Plan of Action should assign tasks to various classes of stakeholders in food security and prioritize actions for short term and long term food security improvement. (Pro: everybody knows what is expected of them and by when. Con: inadequate funding for some tasks may delay or make impossible their fulfillment.)
• The U.S. Plan of Action should recommend expanded ability to use WIC and food stamp vouchers at farmers' markets, including addressing infrastructural problems of electronic benefits transfer systems for recipients who want to shop at farmers' markets. (Pro: Local farmers may develop more predictable markets for their goods, while supplying food assistance beneficiaries with good quality food at lower prices. Con: It may be necessary for Congress to authorize funds to help mutually local farmers and food stamp beneficiaries.)
• The U.S. Plan of Action should outline a timetable for establishing a permanent interagency office on food security. The design of this agency should include equal and formalized access to the information and decision-making process of this agency for NGOs, on par with the access and influence that agribusiness presently enjoys at the U.S.D.A. (Pro: a minimal cost to the federal budget. Con: some initial confusion and delay in establishing adequate NGO representation and reporting, i.e. the price of democratic consultation.)
• The U.S. Plan of Action should set the goal of achieving a 50 percent reduction in food insecurity by the year 2000, not by 2015, as presently stated.