Civic Issue Blog 2

How can countries address food insecurities through redistribution?

Part 2: Current Policies that Address the Issue:

Through the part 1 of the blog, the issue of food waste and food insecurity was dived into with an analysis conducted on how they connect with one another. In the second part of the civic issue blog a dive into what the current policies are addressing the problem will be looked into and how they solve the issues that are being faced.

This problem of food insecurity and food waste is being dealt by three government agencies, EPA, USDA, and FDA, combined. On September 16, 2015, these agencies came together to announce their goal of trying to cut the national food waste by half by the year 2030.

To manage food waste, EPA conducts extensive research to have accurate figures on the amount of food that is wasted by different sectors of the food economy. It tracks the pathway of food starting from when it is growing in the crops to when it is served in the plates of the consumers. It then finds the root causes of food waste at each stage along the process. After the research is complete it updates it’s baseline goal of reducing food waste to best align with the U.N’s Sustainable Development Goal Target 12.3. This is done every year by the EPA.

To combat food insecurity, a combination of several factors is being considered by the USDA. USDA has opened several smaller programs that combat food insecurity by focusing on different sections of the population. There is the “Commodity Supplemental Food Program” that helps feed low income citizens of age 60 and above get monthly food packages. There is also “Food Security Program” that helps not only the U.S, but other countries as well improve their agricultural systems in order to boost crop production and supply the food to people in an affordable manner.

Much of these programs are newly formed or have been recently restructured to meet the modern day conditions by the Biden and Harris Administration. Almost all these programs follow 4 frame works:

1. “Building a more resilient food supply… while reducing carbon footprint” (USDA, 2022)
2.  “Create a fairer food system that combats market dominance” (USDA, 2022)
3. “Make nutritious food more accessible and affordable” (USDA, 2022)
4. “Emphasis equity” (USDA, 2022)

Although these 4 might sound quite similar to one another, by reading more about the individual frame works the difference can be understood better. However, due to the limitations of this blog and further topics that need to be discussed in order to derive a solid conclusion, these details can discusses through the blog.

While the EPA focuses on collecting data, USDA focuses on designing the specific policies according to the data collected. As mentioned earlier, EPA collects data of every stage of the food economy. This data helps USDA divide it’s policies in 4 distinct part: production, processing, aggregation/distribution, and markets/consumers.

The policies surrounding the production include a $300 million initiative to create a new organic transition and a $75 million support for promoting urban agriculture. Under the initiative of creating an organic transition, the government plans to provide farmers with technical assistance and mentoring to educate them on growing crops organically. There are two benefits to this. The first is that it allows farmers access to a more premium market of organic produce, and it also makes farms more environmentally friendly. Due to the expenses that a farmer needs to incur to go organic, the government also gives economic benefits like additional crop insurance, financial assistance, and support to develop projects in the targeted markets.

Under the support to promote urban agriculture, the goal is to help grow farms within city boundaries and community gardens with in the city. This will help connect producers and consumers while at the same time contribute to the local economy. The policy started originally in 2018, but due to under funding it was only able to fund 6% of the application who asked for support. In 2022 the money towards this policy got increased to make the percentage of accepted applications higher.

The policies surrounding food processing involve “The Food Supply Chain Loan Guarantee Program” and “Creation of a Robust Technical Assistance Network”. The goal of “the Food Supply Chain Loan Guarantee Program” is to help combat the shortage of essential infrastructure for storing, transporting, and processing food in the U.S by making “$1 billion in guaranteed loans available immediately” (USDA, 2022) for independent institutions. This can help curve the wastage increase of food with growing demand and supply by improving the treatment of food.

Under “Creation of a Robust Technical Assistance Network”, the goal is to help navigate and organize industries like meat and poultry which use complex technical systems. It gets difficult for start ups to fully comprehend the intricacies in these industries, making it difficult to create competition. Through the program, the government will provide the technical expertise and experience to these start ups that want to grow and expand in these fields.

The policies surrounding food distribution and aggregation involve an investment in regional food business centers and an investment for prevention of food loss and waste. The investment in creating regional food centers is of $400 million and it gives assistance to small and mis-size farmers on distribution and aggregation challenges. Through this assistance the government wants to create an environment where local and regional markets can flourish.

Through the investment in prevention of food loss and wastage the government plans on creating several community compost and food reduction programs that will support producers and consumers reduce their food wastage. This investment is of $90 million.

Lastly under the market and consumer sector the government plans on increasing the funds under “the Healthy Food Financing Initiative” and “the GusNIP Produce Prescriptions Program”.

“The Healthy Food Financing Initiative” is an important program of the government that gives access to affordable and healthy food to communities that are underserved. The program helps create new markets for farmers while also promoting local independent retailers in these communities that help create quality jobs. The funding for this program got increased by $155 million. “The GusNIP Produce Prescriptions Program” aims at showing the importance of fresh produce and it’s health benefits. It also highlights at showcasing the health conditions that stem from nutrient deficiencies.

These policies see food wastage and food insecurities as separate problems, which is a good thing, and show the 2 problem’s ties with the larger food supply model of the economy. The policies try to not generalize the solutions either by diving the food supply problem into different sectors, and divide different sectors to communities and smaller businesses that exist within them. There were many more policies under each sectors that were not covered in this blog, but the biggest ones were shown. The government now does seem more aware of the impact that the 2 problems, food insecurity and food wastage, have on the people. The results of the policies, however, will only be seen in 2030, by when the policies claim of bringing food waste down to half and also reduce food insecurity drastically.

As the world gets more and more educated and informed, policies like these will form more and get better. In the next blog, the part 3 of this series, we will discuss some possible policies that do not currently exist and how they can make an impact in this matter.

Works Cited