While Michigan pantries are bare, farmers forced to dump bumper crops

Originally posted by fraterormus
Anyone with half a brain already knows that the USDA's Farm Subsidies program is beyond borked.

What is borked?

This practice has to stop...especially in an Economic Depression!

First, you have to get rid of the big agricultural lobby from the government.

That is absolutely crazy!! Yeah lets throw away pounds upon pounds of food when people all over are eating out of trash cans, But of course we are talking about rich dumb men who couldn't care less!!

The people running this country are so self rightious, and above the general public, but this is perfect example of the fact the ones running things are morons, and we are imbeciles for letting them.
We need to vote these people out, way out.

I believe Lincoln said, if the Government is broken, fix it, if you can't fix it, replace it.

[edit on 15-8-2009 by googolplex]

They could have turned any excess cherries over to those who make supplements such as vitamin C. I just bought a bottle that cost over $8.00. They are wasting money and resources. There are many things that can come out of those crops. They should have an auction for companies who will buy the excess instead of just letting it rot or throwing it away.

I'm guessing it has more to do with speculators in the commodities now. They went from real estate to commodities. I guess that's the next bubble and this time it might mean starvation for millions.

Originally posted by mrmonsoon
This may be a stupid question, but......

Why not give the food to food banks.

Don't sell it, mind you, just give it.

In this way it has no effect on market prices.

We can maintain the economy and feed the hungry and take care of our farmers.

Sure seems like win/win/win.

The purpose to destroy the crops is to save supply and demand. If there is a surplus, it would be pointless to pay the farmers not to put the product into the economy, just to turn around and push the crop into another sector of the economy. It would still effect supply and demand, and lower prices of that commodity..

It's a stupid process.. and it really doesn't benefit the small family farmer.. it protects the major Corporate Agriculture business. The farmers can still send the surplus to food banks and the poor... but they won't get paid for it.

Some very good, compassionate replies here. I have starred many of them.

This is not about socialism, capitalism, or any other kind of -ism I can think of.

It's about having hungry people on one side of the road and food being wasted on the other side of the road.

Except that there are lobbyists and gov't barriers in between them.

Feeding people insted of wasting food seems so basic, so commonsense, that I cannot entertain any idea that opposes it.

Just my .02

[edit on 15-8-2009 by jsobecky]

reply to post by jsobecky


Unfortunately .. if we didn't waste the crops, not just the cherries but many others, it would ruin whats left of the minor to small sized farming operations by reducing prices so low they will go bankrupt.

It's a loose loose for everyone.

reply to post by ClintK


... Why would they have to pay people not to pay crops during the Great Depression AFTER the soil has already dried up? Shouldn't there not have been any crops to prohibit the selling of anyways?

reply to post by Rockpuck


And the farmers stupid enough to not do their own crop rotation or the ones too poor (too unpofittable, aka too inefficient as judged by the market) gradually go out of business relative to the farms that don't over time... Free markets win again.

reply to post by Rockpuck


Yeah, you're right, but the economic situation seems to be manufactured. If they are going to destroy them to prop up prices, why not 'destroy' them in food pantries?

Another man-made boondoggle. If we can't plan our harvest for one year in advance, that's pretty bad.

reply to post by RedDragon


This problem has nothing to do with crop rotation.

Yeah, you're right, but the economic situation seems to be manufactured. If they are going to destroy them to prop up prices, why not 'destroy' them in food pantries?

The food pantries are filled with foods that are purchased. The Pantries themselves may not buy the food.. but the Churches that collect them from individuals do .. and the individuals that donate to them do.. and sometimes the cities that donate to them .. they all pay for the food, then donate to the pantries. If the farmers filled the pantries with raw goods, there would be no need to have donations.. with less donations, that much less is purchased by the consumer that donates, and thus supply and demand comes into play lowering prices.. May not be a "major" impact if it where just one city, or just one state even.. but across the entire union the effect could be significant and cut a few billion from agriculture sales.

I don't blame the farmers specifically.. the entire system is dysfunctional ..

The idea is to manufacture reasons for the government to step in and regulate and tax and to seem like the hero of the day.

Originally posted by fraterormus
Anyone with half a brain already knows that the USDA's Farm Subsidies program is beyond borked. To protect Farmers when there is a bumper or surplus crop from the market collapsing on that foodstuff, they are paid to destroy their crops to protect the price/value of that commodity.

Michigan farmers aren't taking this practice too well when all of their neighbors have empty pantries.

Cherry Farmer Dumps His Frustration

Ligon, and many other tart cherry growers in northwest Michigan who produced a bumper crop this summer, will leave millions of pounds of cherries on the ground to rot. A federal marketing order will divert 42 percent the estimated 300 million-plus pound tart cherry harvest from going to the primary domestic market this year.

Farmers in New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Utah, Washington and Wisconsin are also being affected by this USDA Subsidy of tart cherry crops.

Sure, this is good for the farmers. It protects them. But why must they DESTROY their crop when there are needy families, not just overseas, but here in the U.S. of A.! Why not allow these farmers to donate their subsidized crops to local community pantries or other non-profit charitable organizations that feed the hungry?

It's no wonder the farmers are mad!

Oat, Barley and Corn farmers have been having to do this for decades. So have Wheat farmers. The USDA orchestrates "controlled" shortages to increase demand and value, hurting consumers and starving many. There is another thread here on ATS www.abovetopsecret.com... about the US being entirely out of Wheat because of USDA Farm Subsidies.

This practice has to stop...especially in an Economic Depression!

This could be a Zimbabwean style manmade famine.

Think of Robert Mugabe, intentionally starving the Zimbabweans by seizing the white owned farms.

The catastrophic results could happen in the United States.

reply to post by ironfalcon


You propose the USDA ordered the destruction of a portion of the tart cherry harvest to take control from white farmers? And to starve civilians in general? .. This is hardly a new practice.. as far as I know, it's occurred since the Great Depression / Dustbowl..

One word...

Globalisation.

In a global market, the control of such essentials to stabilise the markets is required, and eventually, this will require the Global Government to enable the control of everything in an attempt to keep balance.

The truth is it will never work as it should.
We are already interdependant. Globalisation has reached a point where the balances are on such a huge scale that no government can control it.

The ONLY solution to all our ills is smaller government, local trade and industry, smaller communities supplying the required food for their people...
Basically, we need to move backwards, and it can still be done with the benefits of modern science and technology, if we wanted it to.

It will be a struggle, because every government needs to get bigger and bigger and control more, and this will eventually end up in the feared "NWO" scenario. The Federal Bank will also not want this to happen, so expect government to work as their slave to ensure the people don't get the communities and localisation they want.

Originally posted by MBF
One year, I left my entire squash crop in the field. The year before, it was sold for $1.76/box. The box cost me $.75, labor to harvest was $2.89/box, cooling cost $.50/box and commissions was $.18. See where this went in a hurry? This doesn't include seed, fertilizer, chemicals, irrigation, machinery, land, repairs or even my labor.

Some of what the green crowd and NWO folks say in their sustainability
papers have some merit, but they have some darker agendas hidden
amongst the good.

Local crops for local ppl, Permaculture, less beef and pork.

Soy is not really a good idea though, if you do a little research
it often causes problems for some ppl.

Fruits, veggies, grains, chicken, fish, and keep it local.

Right now Tomatoes from south america are transported to china to
be made into tomato paste and be canned and shipped to the US.

It is a huge waste of fuel.

You can see the huge benefits by watching the film reversing diabetes
in 30 days, and the film One man, One Cow, One Planet - how to
save the world.

Permaculture and Biodynamic agriculture.

Better to find a way to grow it here, not can it at all, and distribute it here.

Start an organic farm or garden, contact organic growers in your area,
and get away from chemical farming forever.

Coops need to make a huge comeback and ppl can trade one food
for another at a farmers market.

Big Agra, Big Pharma, and Big Chem can rot in hell.

Time to vote with your wallets.

The corporations only care for there profits.

The ppl burning crops sounds like some of the things done by stalin
to the ppl of the Ukraine, they are recycling tyranny again.

Originally posted by detachedindividual

The ONLY solution to all our ills is smaller government, local trade and industry, smaller communities supplying the required food for their people...
Basically, we need to move backwards, and it can still be done with the benefits of modern science and technology, if we wanted it to.

Well said, I totally agree.

I does not need to be thought of as backwards.

It is truly a step forward.

In India Gandhi would target a very profitable item of the Brits and
then would get the ppl to boycott to get something in return
in the way of freedoms, this worked for him.

The ppl of the US are mostly asleep though, so it will require a
grass roots movement to get the word out and to get ppl off
their couches and doing something.

The two movies I mention in my prior post are pretty good at
getting farmers to consider organic food, and use some of the
proof from those films to promote their foods.

Info about Codex Alimentarus might also help to get ppl to move
to local organic foods.

If we can get enough ppl to vote with their wallets it will start to
make a difference.

It has in the past.

Hmm, very interesting.

This is a reply to a lot of you. What I said was purely sarcastic. I think it's disgusting that there are people starving in our own country and we destroy food to keep prices high. GIVE IT TO THEM. I'm sure we'd be giving it to them for free if they were starving bankers and ceos.
I'm sorry if the sarcasm was lost in the text. I guaranty that if I said it in person, you all would have understood.

[edit on 15-8-2009 by really]

reply to post by fraterormus


I am always amazed in how the Government totally disregards the people! There are starving people all around the world, including in the U.S. - there seems to be no compassion for the people and they ignore their plight. They only seem to focus on the dollar bill - on money - what happened to humanity and helping out others?

It seems I will never cease to be disgusted by what is happening to everyday people (all of us) - in how the government shows they really couldn't give a S#%& about us!

S and F