farm bill

As usual, I’d like to offer my thoughts as to what may be in store for farmers market organizers and producers in the coming year (as I did in past years: 2018, 2017…)

With the end of year passage of the Farm Bill (coming as a welcome surprise after watching the summer-long legislative shenanigans in the House), the organizing for direct marketing for 2019 is now slightly altered -as soon as the government opens up again that is! The inclusion of LAMP in the farm bill offers markets some stability for grant funding over the next 5 years and also means a better-to-great chance of FMLFPP funding being included in future farm bills. Two other changes may be significant for farmers markets: the requirement of a 25% match for FMPP proposals (it had only been required for LFPP proposals previously), and the language to “support partnerships to plan or develop regional food systems” which is funded at 5 million per year. The FMPP match requirement seems to indicate that the grants will be prioritized for those who build deep partnerships into their proposals, and seems to be born out by the added 5 million for partnership work. Getting this funding could put market organizations in leadership roles in regional policy work, especially in terms of vendor needs (more in a minute on this), disaster response planning, and climate change initiatives with municipalities- that is if the grant language (when written by AMS) directs this funding to individual markets. If it turns out that the funding is really directed more to your state and network associations, I would expect them to use it to build capacity for their markets, especially in the area of increased data collection capabilities and dynamic data-driven analysis. That would align with my 2017 mantras for markets:

Don’t Hide the Hard Work
Function like a Network Whenever Possible

Two other areas that I expect to be active among markets in the coming year and beyond is in verification of local claims and in product development initiatives. The first has been climbing the ladder of priorities since the explosion of meal kit box programs, grocery store fragmentation, and the use of “local” in marketing language by every kind of player in intermediate channels (i.e. specialty stores, restaurants.) Farmers Market Coalition has even begun to discuss this regularly in house and included this topic in the farmers market track of 2018’s inaugural Direct Marketing Ag Summit. It was ably covered in a presentation by Washington State Farmers Market Association’s Colleen Donovan whose work on market integrity is well known, and by Boulder County Farmers Market CEO Brian Coppom who is fast becoming a great national spokesperson for farmers markets on the subject. FMC also added to the conversation around brand integrity in 2018 by taking over the management of the Buy Fresh Buy Local brand.

There is much to do on local verification and protection of the brand, but my sense is the best way for markets and other local food authorities like BFBL leaders to own it is (1) going through a process to find out the community definition of local/regional that works best there, and (2) transparent verification systems that explain/illustrate geographic proximity and proper stewardship of land and water. Once those are accomplished, state legislative language protecting it may be helpful.

The product development work is a little less visible, but is happening among some innovators. I’ve had recent conversations about this work with Grow NYC and a few others and expect to hear more, especially with the increased use of Metrics by markets to collect data. That data collection has been a game changer for market organizations as the necessity of collecting data from their vendors has sometimes turned out to be a point of contention. That tension is usually because those markets have never systematically collected market day data or used longitudinal data as the basis for market day decisions, relying entirely on management levels or outside funding priorities to decide when to add vendors or market days or even when doing event planning!

In the past few years of pilots with markets, the Metrics team (which includes me of course!) has advocated that the best way to make the need for collection understandable to ones vendors is to openly and simply share market level data which can then be compared privately with their own business and product- level data, allowing for more complete business intelligence for those entrepreneurs. Building this type of partnership with vendors also levels the field, as data becomes the lingua franca of market day decision-making rather than those decisions being (or seeming to be) made willy-nilly or behind closed doors without vendors input. The more market leaders think about, research, and support development and marketing of biodiverse items at their markets, the more they will understand their vendors businesses and consumer preferences and will be able to build partnerships and find funding to add products that data shows will do well at that market. All of that will quell much of the pushback on data collection-over time.

Throughout this post, the one word I have used again and again is the one that I hope sticks with markets: partnerships. These need to be more foundational (meaning include those partners in how the market itself is managed not just about the shared program), more dynamic (check in regularly to see if they are working and why), and be more diverse (hopefully self-explanatory). These partnerships, if designed well, will absolutely reduce the wear and tear on market staff and minimize turnover and burnout.

If every market reading this post set a goal to add two more (*non-traditional) partners to their program development planning, and started to consider their vendors as partners, I think 2019 would be a banner year in farmers market development.

*non-traditional: meaning partnerships beyond those who have shared outcomes in terms of direct marketing agriculture or increasing use of federal benefit programs for healthy food (although the latter were non-traditional partners not so long ago). This could include immigration services agencies who could help with vendor and shopper development, agencies working on public transportation amenities who could help with adding walking, biking, bus-riding people to markets, social justice organizations working on civic engagement, real-estate professionals who are in contact with new residents and could direct them to their local market, and so on.

I was able to hear an update from FMC’s Policy Director Ben Feldman today and would like to give a quick overview and call to action for all of my readers:

Hidden in all of the activity on Capitol Hill this month is Congress’ inability to pass a new farm bill. As many of you hopefully know, a new farm bill is passed every five years. The House and the Senate had each worked on their own version, but were unable to get anything out of shared committee to vote on. (One main difference between the two bills was work requirements for SNAP recipients, and the inclusion of LAMP* in the Senate version which would help the Tiny but Mighty programs, but the story now is that there are many other stumbling blocks to a final bill coming out of committee.)

What that means is that in a few days (September 30th) the current Farm Bill expires. The session is likely to end without an extension of 2014’s Farm Bill either. This leaves it to the lame duck session in 2019 to either get a new bill passed or an extension of the 2014 bill, and since that short session means some members are on their way home, and others may be waiting for new jobs on committees there is little hope a new Farm Bill will come from that session. However, it is quite possible that the lame duck session will pass an extension to the 2014 Farm Bill.

The biggest problem with only getting an extension of 2014’s FB as the achievement of the lame duck session will be the lack of funding included for what is called the “Tiny and Mighty” programs which do not have baseline funding. Baseline funding is essentially a funding threshold where programs are assumed to continue either in a new Farm Bill or in an extension of an old one. Without baseline funding, the Tiny but Mighty programs need to be named and inserted in any extension which is unlikely without pressure.

These are programs that have large impacts but small funding. Here is NSAC’s list of programs that will sunset on the 30th:

Beginning Farmer and Rancher Development Program
Conservation Reserve Program – Transition Incentives Program
Farmers Market and Local Food Promotion Program (FMLFPP)
Food Insecurity Nutrition Incentives Program (FINI)
National Organic Certification Cost Share Program (NOCCP)
Organic Agriculture Research and Extension Initiative (OREI)
Organic Production and Market Data Initiative *
Outreach and Assistance to Socially Disadvantaged and Veteran Farmers and Ranchers *
Rural Micro entrepreneur Assistance Program (RMAP)
Value-Added Producer Grants Program (VAPG)

This does not mean that grants funded by these programs before September 30 are in danger; if your project received funding in 2017 or 2018 with these programs, that money is already appropriated and will be available to you for the life of your grant.

From NSAC:

The ten tiny but mighty programs of this series have made a nearly half billion-dollar investment in American food and farm systems over the course of the current farm bill cycle. These programs have represented 100 percent of the farm bill funding for beginning and socially disadvantaged farmer programs, organic programs, and rural economic development spending.

Needless to say, spending for these critical programs is minuscule relative to the cost of the full farm bill, weighing in at just a fraction of one percent of total farm bill funding. Under a three-month extension scenario, for example, Congress would need to invest only $35 million to keep these critical programs active at their current 2014 Farm Bill funding levels.

So the message here is: write to your reps and senators and remind them of the work and impact that your farmers markets, CSAs, food hubs, farmer training programs and so on have in your community, and how these funds have helped your work in the past. Ask them to get an extension passed in the short term with the 10 Tiny but Mighty programs included. And then to get busy on the new Farm Bill.

They need to hear from you. Again and again. And as Hoosier Farmers Market Association pointed out on today’s call, those of you who work at the state level or on policy councils can help by amassing data on what DTC outlets and farmers in your state or area of work have received from those 10 programs and the impacts of those awards to send along to your elected officials.

*The Senate’s 2018 Farm Bill includes language to establish the Local Agriculture Market Program (LAMP), which would provide permanent funding for local food by consolidating existing programs into a single program.

LAMP would:

Consolidate Value Added Producer Grants, Farmers Market/Local Food Promotion Program, Value Chain Coordinators, and planning partnerships into a new program administered by the Agricultural Marketing Service in coordination with Rural Business-Cooperative Service;
Maintain purpose and eligible entities for each program;
Identify Cooperative Extension Service as the lead for outreach and technical assistance;
Provide $60 million in mandatory funding and $20 million in appropriated funding;
Reserve 35% of funding for farmer or rancher grants; and
Reserve 10% of funding for projects supporting beginning, veteran, and socially disadvantaged farmers or ranchers.

Helping Public Markets Grow

2019 for farmers markets

Help the “Tiny but Mighty” Ten

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