US bishops, other Catholic leaders call on Congress to increase funding for programs in new Farm Bill
April 27, 2023
In a letter to leaders of the House and Senate agriculture committees, two committee chairmen of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops called for increased funding for domestic and foreign anti-hunger programs—as well as for a slew of other programs—in the 2023 Farm Bill.
The Farm Bill, approved every five years, provides massive funding for an array of federal programs. In 2018, President Donald Trump signed into law a $867-billion bill—at an average cost of $2,600 to every man, woman, and child in the United States, before factoring in interest on the debt.
Ukrainian Catholic Archbishop Borys Gudziak of Philadelphia (the chairman of the bishops’ Committee on International Justice and Peace) and Bishop David Malloy of Rockford (the chairman of the bishops’ Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development) were joined in their appeal by the leaders of Catholic Relief Services, Catholic Charities USA, Catholic Rural Life, and the Society of St. Vincent de Paul.
“The cost of food has increased significantly due to inflation,” the Catholic leaders noted. “This puts particular stress on the poorest families to get enough to eat and be healthy. In this environment, nutrition programs that support the basic right to food should be strengthened, not weakened.”
They continued:
In this year’s Farm Bill, we encourage you to prioritize sufficient funding of programs that feed hungry families, both here and abroad, while opposing efforts to weaken the efficacy of or access to these programs. We ask you to provide a safety net for farmers and continue a reasonable amount of support for our commodity and dairy farmers, prioritizing vulnerable farmers and small and moderate-sized family farms. We urge you to help rural communities by encouraging rural development and promoting the culture and well-being of rural America. We also recommend that you promote sustainable stewardship of the land.
To that end, the Catholic leaders weighed in on over 20 federal programs:
- Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP)
- Emergency Food Assistance Program (TEFAP)
- Senior Farmers Market Nutrition Incentive Program (SFMNP)
- Gus Schumacher Nutrition Incentive Program (GusNIP)
- Food for Peace
- McGovern-Dole
- Food for Progress
- Farmer-to-Farmer programs
- Bill Emerson Humanitarian Trust.
- Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP)
- Regional Conservation Partnership Program (RCPP)
- Conservation Reserve Program (CRP)
- Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP)
- Agriculture Conservation Easement Program (ACEP)
- Commodity Title (agricultural subsidies)
- Appropriate Technology Transfer for Rural America (ATTRA)
- the USDA’s Research, Education, and Economics (REE) Mission Area.
- Beginning Farmer and Rancher Development Program (BFRDP)
- Organic Agriculture Research and Extension Initiative (OREI)
- Rural Microentrepreneur Assistance Program
- Appropriate Technology Transfer for Rural America (ATTRA)
In their discussion of agricultural subsidies, the Catholic leaders said that “subsidy levels should not lower the international market price of commodities to the detriment of local farmers in resource poor countries”—a puzzling (if laudable) goal, considering that agricultural subsidies by their nature allow producers to reduce the prices of the goods they sell, leading to artificially lower market prices.
“Now is a critical time to hear both the cry of the poor and the cry of the earth, to consider the needs of the hungry, of underserved farmers, and of rural communities,” the bishops and other Catholic leaders concluded. “We look forward to working with you as you shape the 2023 Farm Bill.”
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