Food assistance

Uprooted Episode 35: SNAP

Josh talks with Katie Costello about the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. The nutrition title of the Farm Bill makes up nearly 80% of its total cost, helping to feed over 46 million people.

Comment on the draft paper 'Climate Smart Agriculture in Feed the Future Programs'

Comment on the draft paper on ‘Climate Smart Agriculture in Feed the Future Programs’ developed with feedback from across USAID and other U.S. government agencies.

Fair is fair: Raise the minimum wage

Last week, Republicans in the Senate blocked a vote on whether to enact a modest raise of the minimum wage from $7.25 to $10.10 an hour, and the tipped minimum wage from $2.13 an hour to 70 percent of the minimum wage. Senator Majority Leader Harry Reid has vowed to bring it up for a vote again. He should. And it should pass.

We deserve more than this bad Farm Bill

Was it just exhaustion from two-plus years of negotiations that finally produced the Farm Bill that is expected to be signed by the President this week? Or, was it the sense that “it could have been a lot worse” when compared with a mean-spirited, destructive Farm Bill passed by the House of Representatives last year.

It’s not just the price of food, stupid

Eric Holt-Giménez, director of the amazing food policy think tank FoodFirst, recently wrote in the Huffington Post that if healthy, organic food is unaffordable, this is a problem of wages and rights, not inherently a problem with healthy, organic foods.

No food stamps, no farm program

This piece is a guest feature from Rod Leonard, former IATP board member and special assistant to U.S. Department of Agriculture Secretary Orville Freeman.

Searching for the Farm Bill

Farmfest is the largest farm show in Minnesota, bringing farmers together to talk about and see the latest in tractors, seeds, and other farm-related equipment.

Change in the wind on food aid?

Washington D.C. is a gloomy place these days, with grey skies and a weirdly warm winter, the sour prospect of failure around the sequestration debate, and more cuts on the horizon. It’s possible, however, that on international food aid there just might be a silver lining to all that gloom.

Groups welcome the release of administration proposal for international food aid reform

Washington, D.C., February 26, 2013 – The below groups welcome reports that the Administration may propose helpful reforms to the U.S. food assistance program in its FY2014 budget submission to Congress. We urge the Obama Administration to include a bold reform proposal that builds upon the United States’ historic leadership as the world’s most generous donor of food aid.

Amendment craziness and the Farm Bill

An article in Politico yesterday suggested that the introduction of more than 200 amendments to the Farm Bill on the Senate floor was part of a conservative strategy to