FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE November 9, 2017 Contact: Hannah Packman, 202-554-1600 hpackman@nfudc.org WASHINGTON – U.S. Senate leadership today released its plan for comprehensive tax reform. The legislation differs in many ways from its counterpart released by the U.S. House of Representatives a week ago. The plan would comprise a greater number of individual tax brackets, limit … Read More
Farm Groups Urge President Trump to Implement Farmer Fair Practices Rules
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE November 7, 2017 Contact: Andrew Jerome, 202-314-3106 ajerome@nfudc.org WASHINGTON – National Farmers Union joined a coalition of 82 farm, rural and consumers groups today in sending a letter to President Donald Trump urging him to implement the Farmer Fair Practices Rules via executive order. The rules would provide the most basic of … Read More
Access To Markets: Business & Industry Loan Guarantees
By Tom Driscoll, Director of NFU Foundation and Conservation Policy As we’ve discussed here on the Beginning Farmer Forum, access to markets is among the greatest challenges for new producers. Oftentimes, beginning farmers face fewer obstacles in emerging markets than in well-established ones. For example, beginning farmers may be able to grow products appropriate for local and … Read More
What Do Farmers Need to Know About Climate Change? Credit Stacking and Water Quality Trading
By Tom Driscoll, Director of Conservation Policy and NFU Foundation Environmental markets, in addition to being science based, quantifiable, innovative, and permanent, will have to offer farmers adequate incentives to adopt new conservation practices. Cases in which a single practice achieves more than one quantifiable environmental benefit, verifiably reducing more than one pollutant, payments for credits … Read More
Shift to More Regressive Taxation Would Increase Burden on Family Farmers and Ranchers
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE November 2, 2017 Contact: Andrew Jerome, 202-314-3106 ajerome@nfudc.or WASHINGTON – U.S. House of Representatives leadership today released its blueprint for sweeping tax reform, including significant cuts to individual and corporate tax rates and eventual repeal of the estate tax. The plan is estimated to cost $1.51 trillion over the next decade. In … Read More
Access to Markets: Homegrown by Heroes
By Natalie Grote, NFU Intern Many veterans, upon returning home from serving our country, discover a newfound passion for farming or ranching. After putting in hours of hard work to start their operations, farmer veterans are often determined to both make a living as well as bolster their local economies by selling their homemade products, … Read More
Cooperatives Build A Better World
By Cathy Statz, Wisconsin Farmers Union Education Director A mobile home park resident. A dairy farmer. A college student. A produce grower. A home care worker. A hardware store owner. What do these people all have in common? Each is the owner of a business called a cooperative. Many of us in rural America are familiar … Read More
What Do Farmers Need to Know About Climate Change? COMET-Farm
By Tom Driscoll, Director of Conservation Policy and NFU Foundation Farmers are a key participant in mitigating climate change. Agriculture is one of a few sectors that can sink existing atmospheric greenhouse gasses (GHGs) as well as reduce emissions moving forward. Environmental markets could compensate farmers for natural resource conservation benefits achieved on their land. A … Read More
Farmers Union Celebrates National Cooperative Month
October is National Cooperative Month, a time when more than 29,000 cooperatives across the country advocate for the cooperative business model and its myriad benefits for co-op members, consumers, and local communities. Cooperatives are of particular importance in rural America, where they have offered both political and economic sovereignty for over a century. Farmers Union’s roots … Read More
Access to Markets: Farm to School
By Tom Driscoll, Director of NFU Foundation and Conservation Policy A growing interest in local and regional food offers lucrative opportunities for beginning farmers, and growing farm products for these markets often require a less significant investment in land and equipment than other production methods would. However, direct-to-consumer sales do require that farmers spend a … Read More