farm bill

Understanding the Farm Bill: What's SNAP Got to Do With It?

A few weeks ago, I had the chance to help out at the Midtown Farmers Market in Minneapolis, one of the area markets that allows patrons to use Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, commonly called Food Stamps) benefits to purchase fresh produce. Seeing firsthand how Farm Bill legislation is put into practice was a great reminder of how something as seemingly arcane as the Farm Bill can actually affect our neighborhoods, and of the kind of improvements we can make in the 2012 Farm Bill.

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A Farm Bill Primer: Getting Ready for 2012

As a child of the Midwest, I’ve been surrounded by farms and farmers my whole life. Most of my immigrant forebears were farmers, and there’s a good chance that yours were, too. Although I’ve chosen a city lot instead of my grandfather’s alfalfa fields (at least for now), I’m quite interested in what will happen in the 2012 Farm Bill. The Farm Bill affects not just farmers, but everyone who eats -- and that’s all of us. The bill, with its grand scope and billions of dollars, will help define what we eat (and, thus, who we are) in thousands of subtle ways.

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