Farm Action Comments on the Executive Order on America’s Supply Chains

Yesterday, Family Farm Action Alliance submitted comments to the USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) on the Executive Order (EO) on America’s Supply Chains. The EO represents the Biden-Harris administration’s commitment to establishing “resilient, diverse, and secure supply chains to ensure our economic prosperity and national security.” 

With these comments, Family Farm Action Alliance seized an opportunity to inform the USDA’s policy priorities as they develop new programs, continue to implement existing ones, and determine what changes must be made to realize a more resilient future. 

Family Farm Action Alliance’s comments noted that supply chains are vulnerable due to high levels of corporate concentration, and provided concrete policy recommendations to democratize the U.S. food system while improving its resiliency. The comment was founded on six key points of intervention, which call for a restructuring of the power, policy, and financial structures that underpin the U.S. agriculture system, such as subsidies, property rights, and production arrangements. 

The comments emphasized that in order to improve the resilience of U.S. food supply chains, it will be necessary to:

1. Strengthen and fully enforce antitrust and fair market legislation.
2. Shift federal support to allow a just transition to crop production and practices that will strengthen national nutrition security, not undermine it.
3. Bolster support for independent farmers and ranchers to engage in local and regional food systems, thus increasing overall U.S. food supply chain resiliency.