Today, Farm Action and Farm Action Fund released A Healthy Food System Begins with Farmers: Policy Recommendations to the MAHA Commission, outlining solutions to address food and agriculture-related issues identified in the MAHA Commission’s report.
“The MAHA Commission’s report marks a historic recognition of a crisis decades in the making: the American diet, shaped by a hyper-consolidated food system dominated by a handful of corporations, is fueling a chronic disease crisis,” said Farm Action President Angela Huffman. “If we want to reverse course, then we must center farmers, not corporate profits.”
Farm Action and Farm Action Fund’s policy recommendations call for a shift in U.S. government farm support programs and policies to align with the administration’s stated public health goals. These recommendations include prioritizing subsidies for healthy food crops, developing local and regional food systems, combating corporate consolidation with robust antitrust law enforcement, and supporting farmers to reduce pesticide use for greater profitability. These are just some of the more than two dozen recommendations provided, some of which the administration could enact immediately.
“The MAHA Commission report highlights how our current food and agriculture system is contributing to our chronic illness crisis in the U.S. In the past, addressing various issues of this system has been a focus of both sides of the aisle in Congress. Our recommendations set out many of their legislative priorities as solutions,” stated Farm Action Fund president Joe Maxwell. “We urge leaders of both parties to dedicate the necessary time and effort to identify common ground and deliver meaningful solutions for the American people.”
The industry-backed trade organizations casting doubt on the MAHA report’s food and agriculture findings represent the corporate interests currently dominating our food system, not America’s farmers. This report’s assessment of the U.S. food and agriculture system is pro-farmer and highlights many of the issues that Farm Action and Farm Action Fund have prioritized for years with support from both sides of the aisle.
The policy recommendations are divided into four focus areas that center farmers and improve public health:
- Reform government farm programs
- Combat food system consolidation
- Reduce chemical use in agriculture
- Confront corporate capture and the revolving door in D.C.
To read the full list of recommendations, click here.
