Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
Second World War and in the years of the Marshall Plan, US agriculture was sub-
sidized through three mehanisms instituted around the Great Depression: the Grain
Futures Act (1922); the Agricultural Marketing Act (1929); and the major Agricultur-
al Adjustment Act (1933). A main focus of these Acts (reflected in subsequent legis-
lation) was to secure the production of major commodities through both direct price
support and export subsidies. Secondary subsidy mehanisms that were deployed in-
cluded periods of 'set-aside' and the creation of new demand for export commodities
through aid (although this was preigured in the National Shool Lunh Act of 1946).
While US agricultural policy is complex, and subject to constant subtle hanges
due to the power of agricultural lobbies and the pivotal nature of farming constitu-
encies, the general US model for securing the livelihoods of farmers has been to en-
courage the establishment and maintenance of major commodity platforms, with the
primary direction for those products being overseas markets. The ability of US farm-
ers to access continually expanding destination markets for their products was en-
abled not only by aggressive trade policy in formal markets, but also by the strategic
deployment of aid initiatives to gain access to consumers outside the reah of the
formal marketplace.
This formation was not only created as a result of policy initiatives. Post-Second
World War conditions were also highly advantageous for corporate investment into
agriculture - with guaranteed prices, massive international demand (particularly
during the Marshall Plan) and significant interventions to ensure the maximum pos-
sible extent of market scope and access (including through food aid). The result was
a massive movement of corporate investment into US agriculture at that time, with
major agri-corporations emerging around both agricultural input industries (like
Dow and Monsanto) and the processing and trading of the major grain commodities
(like ConAgra and ADM). These new agri-corporates became key contributors to the
expansion and elaboration of the wider Second Food Regime. Many consequences
flowed from this propitious alignment of policy and corporate interests. First, these
corporates (or their forebears) were vociferous supporters of the green revolution in
the 1960s and 70s, as they stood to be the immediate beneficiaries of the new markets
opening up for agricultural tehnologies in the Developing World, as well as having
the opportunity to trade in the resulting commodities on global markets. While the
green revolution was widely considered a failure in terms of solving the problem of
world hunger, it was, nevertheless, a significant success in ensuring the profitability
of the high-teh corporate model of agriculture - and its farmers. It has also been
