|
In eastern Tennessee, farmers are moving out of tobacco production and into fruits and vegetables.
Thanks to the Jubillee Project's Clinch Powell Community Kitchen, they are able to extend their
profitability by turning some of the produce into preserves, sauces, pickles and relishes. In New
York, hundreds of teenaged girls are helping to run "Juice Joints" through Lower East Side Girls
Club, and are learning about local food, good nutrition, and business skills. On the Tohono O'odham
reservation in Arizona, tribal members are growing and eating traditional foods again, and watching
their diabetes rate fall.
Since 1996, the USDA's Community Food Project (CFP) program has funded over 240 projects like these
in both rural and urban areas. Its projects help ensure that low income people have access to good,
fresh food, that communities are feeding their people well, and that family farmers are able to find
markets for their products.
These projects are good work done right. Whereas many funding sources are focused on a single issue,
the CFP recognizes the connections between hunger, access to farmland and markets, business training,
health, and nutrition. It looks for multifaceted approaches that address interrelated problems and
offer compounded benefits.
A systems approach such as this requires that many voices be heard. Thus, the program includes
rigorous requirements for coalition building. The resulting projects reflect the particular needs of
their locales. CFP grant recipients create powerful, elegant, local solutions to complex and often
entrenched social issues.
Understandably, this is a hugely popular program. Over 460 non-profit organizations approached the
USDA in the hopes of securing a CFP grant for 2008. A couple of dozen would have been selected, but
this year's application process has been suspended because of "uncertainty” about the program's funding.
For the last decade, the CFP has received mandatory funding through the Farm Bill, and this type
of support is included again in the Senate version of the bill. Unfortunately, the House bill went
with discretionary funding instead. If this version passes, the program's funding would rely on annual
appropriations, a much less stable scenario. No funding was appropriated for fiscal year 2008.
Everyone should have access to excellent, healthy food. That's a given, once you think about it. But
our political representatives need to hear it from us. So. About those calls. Please take three minutes
and call your House of Representatives member and both Senators and tell them two things:
-
Tell them that you are very concerned that continued CFP funding is in jeopardy in the Farm Bill.
-
For the Senators, please thank them for the Senate's support, and ask them to make sure the final
bill contains $10 million in mandatory funding.
-
Urge your Representatives to contact conference committee leaders to make sure that $10 million in mandatory funding is included in the final version of the bill. If your Representative is a Democrat, have him/her call Chairman Peterson; if your Representative is a Republican, have him contact Rep. Goodlatte.
Here's the number of the Congressional switchboard: 202-224-3121. Thanks so much for taking a few
minutes to help save the funding for this great program.
|
Photo by Long Hungry Creek Farm
|
view basket
