Safe Fields and Food

We're advocating for a Farm Bill that reduces pesticide use, protects farmworker, and builds food sovereignty. In 2023, we wrote letters to both Agriculture Committees that were endorsed by 50 organizations; and sent members to D.C. where they held 23 in-person meetings with members of Congress that we complemented with another five virtual meetings.  We continue our farm bill work this year, with a focus on supporting CFAC member organizations, including Alianza Nacional de Campesinas. Learn about the marker bills we support, and the status of the farm bill in this update blog. 

Today members of Coming Clean’s Farmworker Health and Justice Team submitted a comment urging the Council on Economic Quality (CEQ) to improve its Environmental Justice (EJ) Scorecard to ensure that federal agencies are providing Justice40 benefits to farmworkers. Phase One of the EJ Scorecard was launched in 2023, as mandated by President Biden’s Executive Order 14008 on Tackling the Climate Crisis at Home and Abroad. It is intended to track the progress of federal agencies in ensuring that 40% of climate, housing, energy, pollution remediation, and related federal benefits flow to “disadvantaged communities that are marginalized, underserved, and overburdened by pollution,” as part of the implementation of the Justice40 Initiative. Farmworkers are “a particularly important EJ community,” states the comment, because they often live in remote, rural areas, are disproportionately exposed to toxic pesticides, intense heat and high humidity, and wildfire smoke and pollution, and experience other health stressors such as substandard housing, harsh working conditions, and lack of access to affordable healthcare. 

Since 2019, the Local Food Solutions project has been asking Dollar General to offer healthy, local food options in its stores, starting with four stores in Albuquerque, New Mexico. The South Valley of Albuquerque is the base of operations for the Agri-Cultura Network, a community-based and farmer-led cooperative that works to provide access to local and sustainably grown produce and spur local economic development. Agri-Cultura Network and its network of more than 70 farms and ranches use traditional and innovative agricultural practices to improve environmental and community stewardship and strengthen the agrarian and cultural heritage of their land and its residents. Local Food Solutions is offering a path forward for Dollar General to provide highly desirable, local food to its customers, and in doing so, reinvest in the communities where its stores operate.

This year, the environmental health and justice organizations, small-scale farmers and farmworker advocates that make up Coming Clean’s Climate, Food Agriculture and Climate (CFAC) team have been educating lawmakers on the need for a transformative 2023 Farm Bill. In a letter to the House and Senate Agriculture Committees and through in-person office visits, we’ve called for a Farm Bill that prioritizes community food sovereignty and equity, protects workers against exploitation, violence, and health harm, and incentivizes farmers to employ safer, regenerative, climate resilient practices that avoid the use of pesticides. Right now, the House Agriculture Committee members are submitting new language that will inform the contents of the 2023 Farm Bill, with a June 16th deadline. We are urging legislators to support the the following marker bills. Leer en español. 

Some environmental advocates are pushing for more support for small farms that practice regenerative agriculture, said Jessica Swan, the community outreach organizer for the Agri-Cultura Network, a farmer cooperative in Albuquerque, New Mexico. She and her colleagues want the new Farm Bill to include new rules that not only cut chemically intensive farming practices nationwide and protect workers from pesticide-related illnesses, but also make farmer conservation programs more accessible to people who own small or urban farms. They also want to see crop insurance and commodity programs reward more farmers for organic and regenerative practices. In a letter to House Agriculture Committee Chairman David Scott, Agri-Cultura and 49 other food and agriculture organizations called for these measures and also called on Congress to block funds that support large, polluting animal agriculture operations.

Today, Coming Clean hosted a lobby day for members to meet with Congressional leaders to urge them to prioritize community food sovereignty and farmworker protections in the upcoming farm bill reauthorization, while incentivizing reductions in pesticide use. Members from across the country, including small farmers and farmworkers, scheduled visits throughout the day with lawmakers from their districts to highlight reforms that are most important to them and their communities.

Today, 50 organizations sent a public letter to the House Agriculture Committee and the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry, calling for a transformative 2023 Farm Bill. They urged the legislators to incentivize reductions in pesticide use, include provisions to protect farmworker health, and increase funding and research for organic and regenerative farming, representing fenceline communities, food system workers and farmworkers, family farmers, businesses, scientists, and environmental health and justice organizations.The Environmental Protection Agency estimates that global agriculture contributes 34% of the greenhouse gas emissions responsible for climate change, but the Farm Bill has not explicitly addressed climate change since 1990. An estimated 1 billion pounds of pesticides, manufactured from fossil fuel feedstocks, are used on United States farms each year. The next Farm Bill could decrease agricultural carbon emissions by incentivizing farmers to reduce reliance on pesticides, in favor of regenerative, climate-resilient practices such as certified organic farming, the letter states.