We`ve Made A Hash Of Food

January 10, 1986|By Lauren Soth, who lives in West Des Moines, Ia. and has written extensively on food and agricultural policies. He is a former editorial page editor of the Des Moines Register.

The Space Age being upon us, we are drawn to global thinking about the human race as a whole. What would visitors from a distant galaxy think about human behavior on this insignificant planet? Earth`s policies concerning food, the stuff of life, surely would strike extraterrestrial visitors as wildly incongruous. Indeed, these policies seem crazy to many earthlings.

We see the rich, well-fed countries of the world, mostly in the Northern Hemisphere, fostering agricultural production as though they were running out of food. They subsidize farmers, support farm prices, finance agricultural research and education, promote manufacture of fertilizer and other farm supplies and develop sophisticated systems of food processing and delivery. Food is cheap, even when you count in the farm subsidies.

The poor countries, generally below the Tropic of Cancer, in contrast, try to keep food prices low for city dwellers, but food is scarce and high-priced. Governments put little effort into helping farmers through research and education. Farming is primitive and unproductive.

The rich countries have pushed food production so hard they are troubled with surpluses, which they try to export, using government subsidies, in angry competition with each other. Their policies of agricultural support have brought forth enlarged investment and increased capacity of farm supply and marketing businesses. These businesses are a political force for full farm production.

In large parts of the world, most pitiably in Africa, people go hungry, are poorly nourished and even starve--not just because of bad weather. Rich countries ship poor countries lots of grain and other foods, partly out of charity and partly out of political pressure to get rid of market gluts. This relief of hunger, spurred by rock concerts, songfests and theatrical performances, makes citizens feel noble and generous.

In the last year, the United States, the richest country and the one most heavily committed to agriculture`s support, led the world in giving food to Africa. Americans should feel proud of this. But they should realize that the government`s response to hunger in Africa is in part a byproduct of a domestic farm policy that creates food surpluses.

Where is the follow-up? Where are the gifts of local research stations, agricultural education, machinery, fertilizer, irrigation systems, etc.

? Admittedly, governments in Africa and other low-income countries often are authoritarian, corrupt and more concerned with military and police forces than with their farm populations. They are difficult to work with.

Nevertheless, shouldn`t the rich countries try harder by spending more to help these poverty-stricken countries grow more food and less on promoting excessive production at home? There is no good reason why farm families in America, for example, could not be provided income support without encouraging overproduction.

The new farm bill offers some possibility of reducing price incentives for greater output, while maintaining farm income through direct payments. But it is hardly the great turn to the free market the Reagan administration claims it to be.

Most important, it contains the possibility of removing from soil-depleting crop cultivation a large amount of land brought into production in the 1970s by unwise government policies, surging export demand and extremely shortsighted credit and financial policies in the farming sector. The land-retirement program is the best thing about the new farm legislation, but it will take wise management and generous funding to shrink farm production capacity and to have a measurable impact on the loss of topsoil. If done right, this program could convert farming areas into grazing land and forests. Meanwhile, much of the apparatus for stimulating farm output here should be converted toward doing the same in Africa. This would be a major shift in food-agriculture policy and in foreign policy. We should at the same time try to persuade the Europeans and people of other industrialized regions to tone down their farm subsidies and join us in an African food production plan.

All of us would be better off with better distribution of food production and consumption on Planet Earth. You don`t have to ride a space vehicle to see that.