Dear Willy: I'm particularly worried about this form of misinformation,
especially when our friends in the funding and policy making world fall prey.
At least one major foundation staffer who gives significant funding to the
sustainable ag community seems convinced that the trend toward industrial
agriculture is all but a fait accompli. This person is nudging proposers to
direct their work on farm pollution toward policies that will work with
corporate ag. The implication is that all the work with family farms on
environmental issues is maybe a quaint nod to a dying breed, but that real
effective work will be focused on huge industrial farms. I sense this attitude
more and more among the policy crowd. Living here in the Midwest where medium
sized commercial family farms are still the norm, I find it alarming when
sustainable ag is marginalized by the misimpression that it addresses only a
tiny minority of farms.