The 2012 Hunger Report recommends ways for the federal government to better respond to the agriculture and nutrition challenges of today and tomorrow.
With one in four Americans participating in a federal nutrition program, the nation’s nutrition and farm policies absolutely need to be aligned. Farm policy should significantly increase production of healthy foods. But farm policies alone can’t automatically improve nutrition among low-income families. Nutrition programs need to do more than provide food for hungry people; they must ensure that healthy food is available to all.
Policymaking is always a question of balance: balancing interests near and far, in the present and future, in the world as it is and the world as it should be. Soon Congress will begin writing the next farm bill, which must rebalance U.S. food and farm policies in ways that link agriculture with nutrition and health and promote viable, sustainable livelihoods for farmers—both in the United States and in developing countries. The 2012 Hunger Report aims to show how U.S. food and farm policies can achieve these objectives.
As Congress and the White House debate over which programs to cut, we might take a moment to consider why it is necessary to use government resources to meet challenges like those just mentioned. Let’s assume most of us agree that government resources should be used for public goods (things that are in the public interest), especially when the private sector has no inherent reason to provide these. Food security is a public good: people may disagree about what items in the federal budget are necessary for the public good, but we take for granted that it’s in everyone’s interest for the government to fight hunger. In fact, there should be zero tolerance for hunger—no matter what the size, ideology, or other responsibilities of the government may be, it must do what is necessary to keep people from going hungry.
Some U.S. policymakers are convinced that rising federal deficits outweigh the value of U.S. investments in overseas development assistance. But evidence would suggest otherwise. In the long run, the U.S. economy benefits more by helping developing countries to reduce poverty, so that these countries become trading partners with us.
Global hunger and U.S. hunger rarely converge as closely as they do in the farm bill. As the 2012 farm bill reauthorization approaches, Congress confronts an environment dramatically different from the lead-up to the 2008 farm bill. The world has experienced many changes that bear directly on issues members of Congress will be deciding.
