Search results: food policy action

As I noted earlier, Congress passed the 2018 Farm Bill without gutting SNAP but President Trump exacted a price for signing it—making it harder for States to exempt participants from work requirements.

The USDA released its new work-requirement rules just as Congress was passing the bill (here is the USDA’s quick Infographic summary).

As Politico put it, “USDA unveils crackdown on SNAP waivers.”

In his Orwellian press release, USDA Secretary Purdue said the new rules are:

intended to move more able-bodied recipients of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits to self-sufficiency through the dignity of work. The rule is meant to restore the system to what it was meant to be: assistance through difficult times, not lifelong dependency…Long-term reliance on government assistance has never been part of the American dream.

In an even more Orwellian op-ed, Purdue said:

This restores the dignity of work to a sizeable segment of our population, while it is also respectful of the taxpayers who fund the program.

Americans are generous people who believe it is their responsibility to help their fellow citizens when they encounter a difficult stretch. That is the commitment behind SNAP. But like other Federal welfare programs, it was never intended to be a way of life. A central theme of the Trump administration has been to expand prosperity for all Americans, which includes helping people lift themselves out of pervasive poverty.

Trump’s statement outdoes anything Orwell could have imagined:

Today’s action will help Americans transition from welfare to gainful employment, strengthening families and uplifting communities…That was a difficult thing to get done, but the farmers wanted it done. We all wanted it done. I think, in the end, it’s going to make a lot of people very happy.

Why Orwellian?

Farmers?  Strengthening families?  Uplifting communities?  Making people happy?  Trump has to be kidding.

The true purpose of the new requirements is to reduce SNAP enrollment, never mind that most people who participate in SNAP really need it.  The USDA says the new policy will 755,000 people out of the current 39 million.

Under current SNAP rules, adults who can work (able-bodied adults without dependents— ABAWDs) must work or be in training at least 80 hours per month.  Otherwise they are only allowed to get SNAP benefits for up to three months in a three-year period.

But states can apply for waivers of this time limit, and 36 states have done so.

One reality check: Because the USDA does not keep data on food stamp recipients who participate in state employment and training programs, or on whether such programs do anything useful to help SNAP recipients achieve self-sufficiency, there is no way to know whether the new requirements will do any good.

I’m not the only one saying so.  The Government Accountability Office has just issued a report making precisely this point.

As the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities explains:

Taking essential benefits like food benefits away from those who are unemployed wouldn’t address the inequities in the labor market or the challenges that so many workers face. Instead of punishing struggling workers, policymakers should support them through ideas with bipartisan support, such as a higher minimum wage, a stronger Earned Income Tax Credit, and paid family leave.

Maybe someday.

Because our dysfunctional Congress did not pass the farm bill by midnight on Sunday, the 2014 bill has expired.

What does this mean?  Basically, the USDA hasn’t decided anything yet but a lot depends on the authorization status of each program (recall: the farm bill covers hundreds of programs).

• Programs with permanent budget authorization—SNAP and Crop Insurance, for example—keep going.
• Programs without authorization—the 40 or so “orphans”—terminate.
• Programs authorized by the farm bills of 1938 and 1949 that have been updated and modernized revert back to the rules for those those years—certain dairy programs are especially affected.

The Congressional Research Service has a quick summary of the implications of the non-passage of the farm bill.

As for why Congress couldn’t get this bill passed, the big barriers are SNAP and conservation.

Recall that SNAP, formerly food stamps, is in the farm bill as a result of classic logrolling in the Johnson era.  Johnson got legislators from farm states to vote for food stamps in return for votes from urban legislators for farm supports.  At the time, the food stamp program was piloted in 40 counties and 3 cities with a total of under 400,000 participants.  Its cost was a fraction of the total farm bill cost.

In 2017, SNAP had more than 42 million participants at a total cost in benefits and administration of $68 billion—nearly 80% of the total cost of the bill.

SNAP looks like a honey pot to legislators looking for funds to make up for the tax cuts.  They have proposed additional work requirements.

These are sure to reduce enrollments.  Mathematica Policy Research says the House farm bill (HR 2 (115)) would cause 2 million households to lose SNAP eligibility.

Conservation is another issue.  Senators write that they cannot support a farm bill that does not promote conservation.

New to the farm bill?  Want to find out more?

• Knowable Magazine’s Rachel Ehrenberg explains the farm bill’s role in health (I’m quoted).
• Ehrenberg’s article comes with a wonderfully illustrated timeline.
• The Sustainable Food Center tells you five things you need to know.
• The National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition’s website is the place to go for deep information and analysis.

I listened in yesterday to the webinar on USDA’s proposed relocation and reorganization of the Economic Research Service.  Participants included Scott Swinton (Michigan State University), Cathie Woteki (former undersecretary for research at USDA), Susan Offutt (former ERS head), Gale Buchanan (another former undersecretary for research, USDA), and Stephen Censky (current USDA deputy secretary). The former officials were unanimous in arguing that the proposal to relocate the agency outside of Washington DC and reorganize it into the USDA Secretary’s office was “ill-conceived,” made no sense, was done without appropriate consultation, was potentially illegal, would politicize the agency, and would damage, if not destroy, an agency that is the jewel of USDA. The USDA says the reasons for doing this are easier recruitment, cheaper rent, closer alignment with the Secretary’s policy initiatives, and getting the agency closer to stakeholders.  None of these bears up under even the most casual scrutiny. So what is this really about? I’m guess that this is about getting political control over—silencing—an agency that conducts independent, unbiased, nonpartisan research that risks leading to inconvenient truths. Here, for example, are some recent publications [with my comments].

• Participation in USDA’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP): Effect of Local Labor Market Conditions in Oregon: Local labor market conditions were strongly linked to the probability of leaving SNAP… When labor market conditions were measured at the local level, researchers estimated a greater responsiveness by SNAP recipients to labor market conditions, as opposed to what other researchers have measured at the State or national levels [if there aren’t jobs available, people will need to stay on SNAP].
• Household Food Security in the United States in 2017: An estimated 11.8 percent of American households were food insecure at least some time during the year in 2017, lacking access to enough food for an active, healthy life for all their members. That is down from 12.3 percent in 2016 [but still high].
• High-Poverty Schools Are More Likely To Adopt the Community Eligibility Provision of the USDA School Meal Programs: The Community Eligibility Provision (CEP) allows eligible schools to offer USDA school meals to all students at no charge. During the 2016-17 school year, 47 percent of U.S. school districts eligible to use CEP used the provision in at least one school [less than half are giving kids free meals].

ERS is not broke and does not need fixing.  The proposal must be understood as an attempt to destroy the ERS.  Participants called for:

• Congressional hearings
• An independent cost-benefit analysis
• Delay further action until then or, better yet, a full stop

I am a big user of ERS data and a great admirer of the work of ERS economists. Other views on the webinar and this issue

• Agri-Pulse
• Center for Progressive Reform
• Politico (behind paywall, alas)

Additions, September 24

The groups that did the WEbinar have forwarded links:

• USDA Research Relocation and Reorganization: Perspectives from Former USDA Chief Scientists and Administrators (464 people registered).
• The recording is online .
• The slides are online.
• The webinar webpage is online.
• The sign-on letter—organizations only—to Congress is at www.tinyurl.com/ERS-Strong
• Another sign-on letter for former administration officials and heads of statistical agencies is at www.tinyurl.com/StrongERS4USDA.

These ask Congress to:

• retain the ERS in the national Capitol region;
• maintain and strengthen the integrity and independence of the ERS as a statistical agency; and
• keep the budget and personnel for the USDA Economic Research Service at least at FY 2018 levels.

Additions, September 25 (thanks to the Hagstrom Report

▪ USDA — Secretary Perdue response to Roberts and Stabenow
▪ American Statistical Association — Count on Stats
▪ — Fact Sheet
▪ — Friends of Agricultural Statistics and Analysis Sign-On Letter Opposing USDA re-organization and re-alignment of the Economic Research Service
▪ — USDA Economic Research Service Sign-On Letter – Former administration officials and statistical agency leaders
▪ — NIFA Relocation Letter to Congress
▪ Center for Progressive Reform — Draining Washington of Science and Talent

 

The basic agreement does not say much about agriculture, but the Trade Representative has produced a separate fact sheet for agriculture.

The White House says:

The agreement specifically addresses agricultural biotechnology to keep up with 21st Century innovations. And we mutually pledge to work together with Mexico to reduce trade-distorting policies, increase transparency, and ensure non-discriminatory treatment in grading of agricultural products.  This is nothing short of a great victory for farmers and ranchers because…Mexico has historically been a great customer and partner.

And then comes the kicker:

We now hope that Canada will see the need to settle all of the outstanding issues between our two nations as well, and restore us to a true North American Free Trade Agreement.

According to Politico,

Trump warned that efforts to revamp the 24-year-old pact could result in two different agreements, and threatened Canada with tariffs on automobiles if Ottawa didn’t agree to negotiate “fairly.”

Mexico’s president must be worried about Canada.  In a phone call with Trump, he said:

It is our wish, Mr. President, that now Canada will also be able to be incorporated in all this.  And I assume that they going to carry out negotiations of the sensitive bilateral issues between Mexico — rather, between Canada and the United States.

According to the New York Times, Canada is scrambling to get in on the deal.  Why?  Three-quarters of its exports go to the U.S., and automobile supply chains are at issue.

Also according to the New York Times, Congress calmed things down a bit and the White House is giving Canada more time to figure out how to handle all this.

According to Vox, here’s how that happened.

Trump argues that NAFTA has been bad for the United States.  That is unlikely.  It’s been much worse for Mexico (see, for example, Alyshia Gálvez’s Eating NAFTA: Trade, Food Policies, and the Destruction of Mexico, out next month).

Thanks to The Hagstrom Report for providing these documents:

• Office of the US Trade Representative: United States-Mexico Fact SheetModernizing NAFTA to be a 21st Century Trade Agreement
• Office of the US Trade Representative: United States-Mexico Fact Sheet: Strengthening NAFTA for Agriculture
• White House — Remarks by President Trump in Phone Call with President Peña Nieto of Mexico on the United States-Mexico Trade Agreement
• White House — What They Are Saying: Support for President Donald J. Trump’s Trade Announcement with Mexico
• The Washington Post — Trump announces separate U.S.-Mexico trade agreement, says Canada may join later
• Informa Agribusiness Intelligence— Economic Impact of Retaliatory Tariffs from Mexico and China on the US Dairy Sector

GRAIN and the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP) have issued a devastating report on the effects of meat and dairy production on climate change.

 

The report’s principal finding:

At issue are demands for growth in the meat and dairy industries.

The report explains:

Current industrial levels of production cannot be sustained, nor can growth models for meat and dairy remain unchanged. The paradox of the corporate business model based on high rates of annual growth versus the urgent climate imperative to scale back meat and dairy production and consumption in affluent countries and populations is untenable.

Its inevitable conclusion:

cheap meat and dairy comes at a high cost due to social, environmental and animal welfare problems that continue to be under-regulated. In addition, this production is only made possible because the corporations receive an indirect subsidy from taxpayers in the form of government-funded price supports that keep grain cheap.  

It is past time to regulate the industry and redirect the massive subsidies and other public expenditures that currently support the big meat and dairy conglomerates towards local food and farming systems capable of looking after people and the planet.

That’s the challenge.  The need to address it is urgent.  Let’s get to work.

Also see:

Meat consumption, health, and the environment.  Science July 20, 2018.  Authors: H. Charles J. Godfray, Paul Aveyard, Tara Garnett, Jim W. Hall, Timothy J. Key, Jamie Lorimer, Ray T. Pierrehumbert, Peter Scarborough, Marco Springmann, Susan A. Jebb.

This lengthy, extensively illustrated and referenced article covers much of the same territory but with greater emphasis on the health impact of meat consumption, and the amounts of water used in meat production, primarily from feed.

By this time, you have no doubt heard about the Trump Administration’s attempts to stop the World Health Organization from promoting breastfeeding.  Incredible but true.

Here is a brief timeline of how this story got out.

May 25   Lucy Sullivan, executive director o 1000 Days (the first 1000 days of life are critical to an infant’s survival) sent out a tweet warning of a battle brewing over breastfeeding at WHO’s World Health Assembly, where countries are negotiating a resolution on infant and young child feeding.

June 7   Amruta Byatnal writes about “A Moment of Reckoning for Nutrition Advocates at the WHA” [World Health Assembly: “Nutrition advocates have accused the U.S. of siding with private sector interests, sparking a controversy over what they assumed would be a routine effort to provide advice on breastfeeding and the use of breast milk substitutes.”

July 8  The New York Times takes the story national: “Opposition to Breast-Feeding Resolution by U.S. Stuns World Health Officials.”  The Guardian also publishes an account.   These make it clear that the Trump Administration threatened Ecuador to drop its support of breastfeeding.  As the Times put it,

The Americans were blunt: If Ecuador refused to drop the resolution, Washington would unleash punishing trade measures and withdraw crucial military aid. The Ecuadorean government quickly acquiesced….The confrontation was the latest example of the Trump administration siding with corporate interests on numerous public health and environmental issues.

Ironically, Russia stepped in and introduced the measure, which passed despite US attempts to block it.

July 9  President Trump sends out a tweet:

July 9  Alex Azar, Secretary of Health and Human Services, also sends out a tweet, supporting the President: “America has a long history of supporting mothers and breastfeeding around the world and is the largest bilateral donor of such foreign assistance programs. Those unable to breastfeed shouldn’t be stigmatized; they should be equally supported with info and access to alternatives.”

July 9  The New York Times publishes an editorial: “Why Breast-Feeding Scares Donald Trump.”  Its answer: “It comes down to public health abroad could hurt American companies’ profits.”

What this is about

Infant formula works for babies, but breastfeeding is demonstrably better.  This is especially true for women who cannot afford formula, do not have clean water to dilute the powder properly, or lack refrigeration to store formula properly.

But breastfeeding has a serious political problem: it does not make money for formula companies.  As I explained in Waht to Eat:

Infant formulas cause controversy and are endlessly contentious for three important reasons.  Formulas are (1) largely unnecessary (most mothers can breast feed their infants), (2) not as perfect as breast milk for feeding babies, and (3) more expensive than breast feeding.  Breast milk is nutritionally superior to formula, but from a marketing standpoint it has one serious disadvantage: it is free.   Beyond one-time purchases of breast pumps, storage bottles, or special clothing, nobody makes money from it.

Formula companies are happy to pay lip service to “breast is best,” as long as policies do not promote breastfeeding over formula.

This is not the first time the US has taken this position.  In 1981, when the United Nations developed the International Code of Marketing of Breast-Milk Substitutes, all of its member countries agreed to abide by the Code except for the United States and South Africa.  Eventually, South Africa signed on.  The U.S. was the last hold out and did not agree to abide by the Code until 1994.  Why not?  Because the Code could set a precedent that might adversely affect U.S. corporations.

The Washington Post (“US efforts”) and The Atlantic (“epic battle”) review this history.

The formula industry’s problem

As I also explained in What to Eat, only about 4 million babies are born in the US each year, meaning that the formula market is limited and static.  That is why formula companies work so hard to convince mothers that breastfeeding is too difficult, unsanitary, inefficient, and ineffective to continue, and that they would be better off switching to formulas and staying on formulas long past the time when babies should be eating solid foods.

The reactions

My favorites are from

• Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association (in an interview with Food Chemical News).

• From the American Public Health Association
• From medical experts interviewed in the New York Times
• From Vox

Add this to the growing list of ways the Trump Administration favors corporate interests over public health. Alas.

Additions

Maplight reports:

Three of the largest infant formula companies — U.S.-based Abbott Laboratories, Swiss-based Nestle, and U.K.-based Reckitt Benckiser — have spent $60.7 million lobbying U.S. lawmakers and officials during the last decade….While the New York Times reported that the formula manufacturers didn’t play a visible role in the debate over the WHO resolution, lobbying records show they have a significant Capitol Hill presence that often extends beyond infant nutrition.

Stephen Colbert’s take

 

The Bipartisan Policy Center, a Washington-based think tank whose slogan is “Working to find actionable solutions to the nation’s key challenges,” did a study on SNAP: “Leading with Nutrition: Leveraging Federal Programs for Better Health.”

The report extends and updates the SNAP to Health report I was involved with in 2012.

Like that report, this one recommends making nutrition a priority.

• Make diet quality a core SNAP objective.
• Eliminate sugar-sweetened beverages from the list of items that can be purchased with SNAP benefits.
• Support healthy purchases by continuing and strengthening incentives for purchasing fruits and vegetables.
• Authorize funds for the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) to conduct a range of evidence-based pilots to improve SNAP participants’ diets.
• Consolidate USDA authority over the agency’s nutrition standards and nutrition-education efforts.
• Authorize the USDA to collect and share store-level data on all products purchased with SNAP funds. 7. Strengthen SNAP retailer standards to improve the food environment for all shoppers.

Two of these recommendations jump right into SNAP politics: collecting data and eliminating sugary drinks.

A recent article analyzes issues related to the quality of diets purchased by SNAP participants.  Consistent with previous studies, it finds that the diets consumed by SNAP participants are nutritionally worse than those of people of equivalent low income who are not enrolled in SNAP.   Some evidence suggests that SNAP encourages participants to buy junk food.  It would be good to have better data.

Another recent article explains the politics in no uncertain terms.  Making any change in what SNAP participants can buy with their benefits is blocked by:

• America’s culture of personal (not social) responsibility
• Corporate lobbying by the beverage and food retail industries
• Liberal attitudes defending SNAP as income support for the poor
• Institutional inertia within USDA and Congress.

These last three constitute what these authors call the “iron triangle” of resistance to changing SNAP for the healthier.  Their advice: try different approaches.

If the Bipartisan Policy Center wants its recommendations followed, it has a lot of work to do.

Last week, FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb spoke at the National Food Policy Conference in Washington, DC where he announced FDA’s Nutrition Innovation Strategy.

His speech, Reducing the Burden of Chronic Disease, specifies five areas that FDA intends to consider (meaning, at best, proposing suggestions for public comment and going through FDA’s interminable rulemaking process):

• Modernizing health claims
• Modernizing ingredient labels
• Modernizing standards of identity
• Implementing the Nutrition Facts Label and Menu Labeling
• Reducing sodium

The documents:

• Commissioner Speech: https://www.fda.gov/NewsEvents/Speeches/ucm603057.htm
• FDA Nutrition Innovation Strategy: https://www.fda.gov/Food/LabelingNutrition/ucm602651.htm

My immediate reactions: sounds good, but short on commitment.

I was impressed that Gottlieb focused on public health and prevention:

We can’t lose site of the public health basics – better diet, more exercise, and smoking prevention and cessation…The public health gains of such efforts would almost certainly dwarf any single medical innovation or intervention we could discover.

Yes!

I was particularly interested in two initiatives under consideration:

Front-of-package icon for “healthy”

This is to be based on a food-based definition that focuses on the healthful attributes of a food product—not, apparently, on its content of sugar, salt, or saturated fat.  Only healthful attributes?

This sounds like a highly pro-industry position, since research on front-of-package labeling is pretty clear that warning labels about unhealthful attributes (salt, sugar, saturated fat) are most effective in discouraging purchases of “ultraprocessed” foods.  The warning labels used in Chile, for example, are proving to be highly effective.

Gottlieb did not mention the the FDA-sponsored reports on front-of-package labeling performed by the Institute of Medicine early on in the Obama administration.  Those were serious attempts to develop an effective front-of-package labeling system that identified nutrients to be avoided.  The FDA seems to have forgotten about those reports.

Reduce sodium

This is the item that got the most attention.  Gottlieb said: “There remains no single more effective public health action related to nutrition than the reduction of sodium in the diet.”

OK, but if that’s true, how about ensuring that food companies gradually reduce sodium in their products, as was done in the UK.  No such luck.  Instead: “I’m committed to advancing the short‐term voluntary sodium targets” (my emphasis).

I suppose “voluntary” could work, but if sodium reduction isn’t across the board, companies will have little incentive to risk changing their formulas.

In short, Gottlieb’s words reflect modern public health thinking the good news) and it’s great that FDA is considering taking these actions (also good news).  Now, let’s see what the agency actually does.