The bill was passed with the
backing of the powerful farm lobby, with little resistance: it gained an
overwhelming majority in Congress. The US began its
now outdated subsidy scheme system during the depression to help poor farmers
get on their feet, but it has become a tool of the rich.

US subsidies wreak havoc on the
food markets—and farmers—of the developing world. The Mexican corn industry
for instance, a longstanding integral part of Mexico’s
economy, has suffered severely from heavy US
corn subsidies since Mexico
opened its markets to the US
under NAFTA in 1994. Since that time
cheap US corn (kept
artificially cheap at the expense of US taxpayers) has flooded into Mexico, driving
down the real prices for corn received by Mexican farmers: from 1994 to 2003,
prices dropped by some 70%. This is
unsurprising considering the fact that in the year 2000, US subsidies equaled
ten times Mexico’s
entire agricultural budget. These
statistics were taken from Oxfam International, which claims bluntly
that “there is a direct link between government agricultural policy in the US and rural
misery in Mexico.” The decline of Mexico’s corn industry has caused
many families to seek work elsewhere: the Maquiladoras, corporate sweatshops
where workers’ rights are systematically abused. Since Mexico became vulnerable to US
subsidies, the real minimum wage has declined by 20 percent; half of Mexico’s
population now lives in poverty.

Enshrined in the farm bill is a
continuation of the subsidies that have led to the ruin of farmers in Mexico and
around the world.

Perhaps the most underhanded part
of the bill is the continuation of a mandate that all US government-funded
foreign food aid be bought in America and transported using
American ships. This goes directly
against the WFP’s request that all food aid be bought locally, which
stimulates local economies and provides a livelihood for poor farmers. In other words, the US has chosen
to benefit its own industry at the expense of developing world workers even in
its aid.

While the farm bill is a scandal
that poor farmers and laborers will get the blunt end of, there is one positive
gain for workers that has been made. Thanks to the efforts of the ILRF and others committed to workers’
rights, the farm bill included a provision that may help end child and forced
labor in the global agricultural sector. The provision calls for the establishment of a voluntary certification
program that will certify that US importers of agricultural products have taken
the necessary steps to ensure that their products are not produced with forced
or child labor.

Small gains are being made for
laborers worldwide, but systematic causes of exploitation continue to prevail.