Subject: Farm AId News 7-4-94
From: [email-masked] (IATP)
Date: 1 Jul 1994 16:18:02 -0400
Newsgroups: alt.sustainable.agriculture

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FARM AID NEWS
Volume 2, Number 14
Monday, July 4, 1994
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Headlines:
-TOWARD A NEW VISION OF ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
-COMMUNITY GROUPS ARE KEY LINK TO RURAL REVITALIZATION
-PURSUING NEW MODELS OF RURAL DEVELOPMENT
-WHAT RURAL AMERICA DOESN'T NEED
-ADMINISTRATION ANNOUNCES RURAL DEVELOPMENT PROPOSAL 
-RESOURCES, EVENTS
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TOWARD A NEW VISION OF ECONOMIC 
DEVELOPMENT

While the nation has continued to focus on urban unemployment 
rates over the past few years, rural communities have silently 
suffered slow economic decline over the past two decades.   As 
covered in the last edition of FARM AID NEWS, the need for 
comprehensive rural development is clear.  

The Clinton administration is making attempts to address this need 
as are hundreds of community-based organizations throughout the 
country.  

Groups are working one-on-one with rural communities to develop 
strategies that combat economic stagnation and consequent 
outmigration from rural towns.   These strategies include setting up 
research facilities and implementing new technologies, lobbying for 
policy reforms and working on long-term economic plans to 
revitalize existing rural businesses.  
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COMMUNITY GROUPS ARE KEY LINK TO RURAL REVITALIZATION

Community organizations have been working "in the fields" with 
people for years to develop programs that address rural America's 
most urgent economic, social and environmental development needs.  

The need for these groups to continue their work will grow as the 
Clinton Administration begins "streamlining" the U.S. Department of 
Agriculture and other agencies.   Ralph Paige of the Federation of 
Southern Cooperatives  worries that the downsizing process will 
place an even greater burden on rural community groups.  

"I understand the downsizing, but it's going to create some problems 
because it will force local community groups to provide most of the 
technical, hands-on support for farmers and farmworkers applying 
for USDA program benefits and for other rural business owners  who 
will lose access to federal support."  

For example, Paige says the FmHA restructuring will remove field 
offices and consequently leave community groups in charge of  
working with farmers to fill out Farmers Home applications or other 
program paperwork.  "Community groups will need to help farmers 
and other residents through group business training classes or one-
on-one sessions," Paige notes.  

However most of these community organizations lack the funding or 
technical support to implement comprehensive training and 
assistance programs. 

Federal and state governments must look beyond funding rural 
infrastructure improvements that provide economic incentive 
programs to lure a single manufacturer to towns.   Instead, 
governments must  support the efforts of community groups that 
work directly with rural residents to implement programs specific to 
towns' individual needs and to compensate for the removal of federal 
staff support.
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PURSUING NEW MODELS OF RURAL DEVELOPMENT
  
Community-based organizations have been working directly  with 
rural residents and business owners, including family farmers, 
farmworkers and minority groups, to generate viable economic and 
social development programs.  These programs are an important role 
in overcoming federal and state gaps in job training, research, 
infrastructure investments and economic policies. 

Job Training, Research and Education 
"We are losing jobs, property and communities to outmigration from 
rural to urban areas, people have become trapped in a cycle of 
poverty because rural communities are losing their trained 
resources," warns Ralph Paige, director of the Federation of Southern 
Cooperatives.  

The Federation of Southern Cooperatives, a resource and advocacy 
association for over 25,000 low income families, has worked with 
minority farmers and rural residents since 1967 to overcome 
financial and technical barriers to sustainable development.  
The Federation has helped communities in the Southeast to organize 
agricultural consumer stores and buying clubs, credit unions, 
handicraft production and housing and health care improvements.  

In addition, the Federation operates a 1,325 acre Rural Training and 
Research Center in Alabama to provide training in cooperative and 
credit union organization, management, accounting, agriculture, 
marketing and other skills.  

Technology Investment
Whether a community is agriculture-dependent or manufacturing-
dependent, a critical factor affecting sustainable development is rural 
America's ability to communicate with urban and other rural 
communities.  

More than 350 people attended a recent conference in Minnesota 
that focused on the need to extend electronic information networks, 
such as the Internet, to rural areas.  

Adam Golodner, of the USDA's Rural Electrification Administration, 
says by linking rural communities up to electronic networks "people 
don't have to leave their communities to have economic 
opportunities, people don't have to leave their communities to get a 
decent education, people don't have to leave their communities to 
have access to good health care."  

The Rural Coalition, a national alliance of agriculture and rural 
organizations, has made the linking of rural communities through 
telecommunication a development priority.  

The Coalition  is working to implement a two-step program that will 
enhance rural communities' communication links.   First, the Coalition 
plans to acquire telecommunications equipment either through 
federal or independent contributions.  Second, the Coalition will 
create an  internship program to train youth in telecommunications.  
Trained youth will work one-on-one with communities to train and 
educate those interested in learning and using electronic information 
services.
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WHAT RURAL AMERICA DOESN'T NEED
  
Traditional state development strategies, or "old wave" approaches, 
center on creating immediate employment opportunities at all costs.  
This approach has, time after time, realized short-term jobs at the 
expense of long-term, stable economic growth in rural communities.

Many state officials, in their zeal to create immediate economic 
opportunities for rural residents, often spend their resources on 
attracting a single, large employer.  

Prairie Fire Rural Action has been conducting research to determine 
the economic and social impact of state-subsidized meat packing 
plants, for example, on rural communities in Iowa and Kansas.  
Prairie Fire found that in communities where tax abatements, utility 
subsidies and other infrastructure incentives were offered to attract 
large meatpacking and processing plants, communities suffered 
economic and social costs in the long term. 

In Holcomb, Kansas, for example, county officials gave the IBP 
packing plant, which employs about 2,600 workers, a $3.5 million 
reprieve from property taxes for 10 years.  The county also assisted 
in the construction of the plant with industrial revenue bonds 
totaling almost $100 million.  

"Ironically, because of the 'economic development' aid packages and 
subsidies extended to the packers, and because of the low level of 
wages that they pay, there are few places from which the town can 
raise additional revenue to pay for [school and housing] 
expenditures,"  Prairie Fire found after preliminary research.

Many more examples like this one exist for counties throughout the 
nation.  Unfortunately, according to Dave Baldwin of the Missouri 
Swine Growers Association, "Once communities are tied into this type 
of 'development' plan, they will be forced to come up with 
permanent tax-draining incentives or face losing the plants 
altogether ... I know it as sure as the sun comes up."
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ADMINISTRATION ANNOUNCES RURAL 
DEVELOPMENT PROPOSAL 

Earlier this year, the Clinton administration promised rural residents 
that it would "elevate to a high level our goals for rural America" 
through improved farm income, rural infrastructure, housing and 
rural business.  

On June 10 Agriculture Secretary Mike Espy  established a USDA 
working group to focus on Rural Development and Protection (RDP) 
under the 1995 Farm Bill.  Espy outlined the administration's RDP 
goals in a report titled New Visions of USDA's Rural Development 
Programs:

"The new vision of the Federal role in rural development should be 
to assist communities, based on inclusive development initiatives and 
to become more competitive in a world marketplace through creating 
sustainable economic opportunities for all residents."   

Lorette Picciano-Hansen with the Rural Coalition praises the 
administration for its efforts to establish a "responsibility to the 
community" through new development proposals.  But she warns 
that failure to devote enough resources toward the strengthening of 
community-based organizations could undermine rural America's 
long-term development success.  

"If the administration wants to address rural poverty, it  needs to 
follow through on recent promises by assisting groups that are 
willing to work directly with the people to develop economic 
programs for a particular area," Picciano-Hansen cautions.    
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Sources: "USDA Sustainable Rural Development Issue Group," Rural 
Sociology Discussion List On-Line, June 28, 1994; Peter Leyden, 
"Rural America Risks Missing Info Revolution," MINNEAPOLIS STAR 
& TRIBUNE, May 25, 1994; Andy Bernat, "USDA Sustainable Rural 
Development Issue Group," June 28, 1994; Harlan Hughes, "As 
Agribusiness Specializes, So Will Education Suppliers," FEEDSTUFFS, 
January 17, 1994; "Committee Approves USDA Reorganization Bill," 
KIKA DE LA GARZA NEWS RELEASE, June 17, 1994; "House Panel 
Approves USDA Streamlining," AGRI NEWS, June 23, 1994.  
Telephone interviews with: Barb Grabner, Prairie Fire, June 28, 1994; 
Ralph Paige, Federation of Southern Cooperatives, June 21, 1994; 
Dave Baldwin, Missouri Swine Growers Association, June 28, 1994; 
Lorette Picciano-Hansen, Rural Coalition, June 17, 1994.
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RESOURCES
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"Rural Development, Biorefineries and the Carbohydrate Economy," 
David Morris, Irshad Ahmed, Institute for Local Self-Reliance, 
September, 1993.   12 pages.  1313 5th St. SE, Suite 306, Minneapolis, 
MN 55414-1546.  (612) 379-3815.  Fax: (612) 379-3920.  $5.00.
"Rural development strategies must build on the existing strengths of 
rural America. They must strengthen the interconnections among 
rural sectors, minimize the disruption of natural systems and above 
all, extract the maximum value from their human, capital and 
scientific resources.  The carbohydrate economy represents one 
strategy of achieving these goals."

Capsules.  Southern Rural Development Center, Box 9656, Mississippi 
State, MS 39762-9656.  (601) 325-3207.  Fax: (601) 325-8915. Free. 
"Published periodically by the Southern Rural Development Center 
for educators, researchers, practitioners, local officials and private 
citizens interested in improving the quality of life in small 
communities and rural areas of the South."
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EVENTS
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"Helping Small Towns Survive," The Heartland Center for Leadership 
Development, October 27-31, Jackson Hole, WY.  Contact the 
Heartland Center, (800) 927-1115.  
"The Institute is designed especially for community development 
specialists working with small towns and rural communities." 
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We welcome comments and suggestions: contact Harry Smith at 
FARM AID, (617) 354-2922.  We encourage the reproduction of 
FARM AID NEWS.  Produced by The Institute for Agriculture and 
Trade Policy (IATP) for FARM AID.   Editors: Gigi DiGiacomo and  
Harry Smith.  For information on other agriculture bulletins, contact 
IATP: (612) 379-5980.
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