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Plus, an essay on how Illinois can lead on scaling up local food economies
Bosky Setting for a Lovely Neighborhood Market
I can’t think of a Chicago farmers market that made a more delightful location shift last year than Uptown Farmers Market.
Created in 2021 by the developing Chicago Market co-op grocery store project, the market spent its first two years in the shadows just outside the building that will house the co-op — right underneath the elevated train tracks of the CTA’s Red Line. Last year, though, the market moved to a polar opposite experience, occupying a lovely, tree-shaded four-block-wide pedestrian mall on Sunnyside Avenue.
It quickly became one of my favorite markets, and I was already looking forward to Wednesday’s season opener when the day broke with what could only be described as near-perfect weather, dazzling sunshine complemented with mild temperatures.
There’s more about an afternoon at the Uptown — plus an important contributed essay about financing growth in Illinois’s local food ecosystem — but first, this shameless plug.
Our next webinar, on Monday, May 13 at 7 p.m. central, is on topics of major importance to the future of a better food system: food education and improving the quality of food served to children in our nation’s schools.
Co-host Chef Sarah Stegner of Prairie Grass Cafe fame and I will discuss these topics with executive directors of leading Chicago non-profits in the food education space — Alexandra DeSorbo-Quinn of Pilot Light and Sebastian White of The Evolved Network — and Spence Medford and Christy Sherding of The Henry Ford Museum outside Detroit, which is asserting a national leadership role on getting more locally produced, farm-fresh food into schools.
Click the button below to read all the details and to register. Trust us, you do not want to miss this.
Uptown Wednesday Afternoon
Speaking of Local Food Forum webinars, here’s main man Matthew Ruffi, fresh off his star turn on Monday’s episode about why farmers markets are so important and why you should go. Matthew organizes the Uptown Farmers Market as part of his role as president of the Chicago Market project, even as he heads up the Link Up Illinois non-profit that advances the cause of better food access for underserved individuals and communities.
Great market you have there, Matthew.
The market is a tree-shaded stroll that can make you forget that you’re in the middle of a residential neighborhood.
Vendors range from longtime standards, such as River Valley Ranch Mushrooms…
… Los Rodriguez Farm, a prolific produce grower from western Michigan that has emerged in recent years as a rising-star vendor on the farmers market scene…
… and newer businesses such as Spicy Grrrls hot sauces and spice blends.
One of the best things about the just-under-way expansion of the outdoor market season is that I don’t have to buy everything I need for the week at one market visit. My smallish haul from the Uptown market included (from left) a Tuscan garlic-infused avocado oil from Made with Love Vinegar; spring onions, asparagus, and radishes with those beautiful greens from Los Rodriguez Farms; and in the middle, cremini mushrooms from River Valley Ranch.
Please read on for the following informative essay.
Scaling Local Food Economies: How Illinois Can Lead the Way
The following essay on a very important issue was contributed by Bob Heuer, director at HNA Networks. The opinions shared are those of the author.
——————————Illinois Stewardship Alliance and Chicago Food Policy Action Council are ramping up joint efforts to increase local food system funding in the next federal Farm Bill. At a recent lobby day in Washington, the two groups joined forces to take their message to all 19 members of the Illinois congressional delegation. Then this April 22 Earth Day webinar featured a presentation by a Farm Bill legislative expert at National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition, their D.C.-based partner NSAC’s alliance of 150+ grass-roots organizations advocates for small and mid-sized farmers in the Farm Bill and annual federal appropriations battles. NSAC members seek funding through Farm Bill proposals such as the Justice for Black Farmers Act, Agriculture Resilience Act, and the Local Farms and Food Act. They also are pressing Congress to oppose cuts to conservation programs that received major funding upgrades as part of the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act.
Illinois voters can help by reaching out to seven Illinois members of Congress with a direct hand in Farm Bill policymaking and advocating for NSAC’s Farm Bill platform, published in 2023. Illinois has five representatives on the 54-member U.S. House Agriculture Committee — Reps. Michael Bost, Nikki Budzinski, Jonathan Jackson, Mary Miller and Erik Sorensen. The 15-member U.S. House Appropriations Agriculture Subcommittee includes Rep. Lauren Underwood. Sen. Richard Durbin serves on the 23-member U.S. Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition & Forestry.
Importantly, NSAC’s Farm Bill platform includes support for a reform that could bring billions of new non-federal dollars into local and regional food systems. The reform would modernize the Farm Credit System, a century-old creature of Congress with a questionable history of fulfilling its obligations to the American people.
Farm Credit System Predates “First” FDR-Era Farm Bill
Established as an outgrowth of the Federal Farm Loan Act of 1916, the Farm Credit System is today the largest agricultural lender in the United States. It took root as the first Government Sponsored Enterprise, or GSE.
GSEs are quasi-governmental entities created through acts of Congress to enhance the flow of credit to specific sectors of the U.S. economy. GSEs regularly enjoy hefty tax breaks and benefit from an implicit guarantee of the U.S. government, because investors assume that Congress will bail out the GSEs if and when necessary. The housing GSEs known as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are the best known.
That GSE status and the implicit government guarantee enable Farm Credit System to borrow funds at very low rates. That message is embedded in the very name of Farm Credit’s agent on Wall Street: Federal Farm Credit Banks Funding Corporation.
Agriculture’s GSE Rings Up Huge Profits
In 2023, Farm Credit System booked loans totaling $398 billion with a net profit of $7.445 billion. Meanwhile, the System paid $180 million in federal taxes. (In 2023, the effective federal corporate tax rate was 21 percent. Farm Credit’s was 2.41 percent.)
Farm Credit System excels at providing financial capital to “qualified borrowers.” Yet the Farm Credit System has done far too little over the past 40 years to achieve its congressional mandate to serve the little guys. Congress initiated these requirements in the 1980s around the one time (thus far) that Farm Credit System turned to the federal government for a bailout.
Congress authorized up to $4 billion in federally guaranteed bonds for the “debt-plagued Farm Credit System,” the Washington Post reported December 20, 1987. “Lawmakers painted the measure... as aid to the Farm Belt, where some areas are still suffering from a financial crisis that began six years ago. But the measure will also be a substantial boon for those who hold bonds in the nation's largest farm lender, as well as for banks and securities dealers.”
The specific directive requires Farm Credit System to provide “credit and related services to Young, Beginning and Small farmers and ranchers.” That’s YBS for short. Never mind that producers can be Young, Beginning and Small. The Farm Credit System regulator’s annual report to Congress features big numbers for YBS loans and a tiny footnote about triple counting.
Inside the Belly of the Beast
Starting during the run-up to the 2008 Farm Bill, I spent a few years consulting for Farm Credit Council, the System’s Washington, D.C.-based national trade group. I helped familiarize Farm Credit Council staff and board with the people and trends shaping the local food marketplace.
I made the case that the “related services” aspect of the congressional mandate didn’t just have to mean things like selling insurance to borrowers. “Related services” could also mean creating pathways for innovation such as helping more people develop the skills to qualify for loans.
In 2009, Farm Credit Council commissioned me to edit the final draft of the Illinois Local and Organic Food and Farm Task Force report to the Illinois General Assembly. (The continued relevance of the report’s funding recommendations — cited below —reflects an organizational financial savvy that merits much wider reach.)
Internal local food reports that I co-authored caught the attention of the federal Farm Credit Administration. FCA is the System’s “independent safety, soundness, and mission regulator.”
Federal Regulator Highlights Local Food
In 2012, FCA produced this “bookletter” — or policy statement — providing guidance for Farm Credit System lending associations to meet local food farmers’ “credit and related services needs.” FCA encouraged System institutions to produce more inclusive marketing plans, noting, “A successful program to lend to eligible and creditworthy local food farmers begins with a commitment by the association’s board of directors to lend to these farmers.”
Also in 2012, the FCA issued a rule requiring Farm Credit System to “commit to embracing diversity and inclusion in lending, employment and governance” or “risk losing…relevance in the marketplace.” Farm Credit System responded through continued consolidation and insulation.
Since the 1987 federal bailout, Farm Credit System has shrunk from over 400 independent entities to only four banks and 50 lending associations. (Northern Illinois is served by Wisconsin-based Compeer Financial. Farm Credit Illinois serves the southern half of the state.)
No wonder this indispensable agricultural industry asset remains an enigma in the ever-widening circle of agri-food, nutrition and conservation groups. In 2017, the U.S. Department of Agriculture partnered with the Federal Reserve Bank on a book titled “HARVESTING OPPORTUNITY: The Power of Regional Food System Investments to Transform Communities.”
In 2023, FCA issued a regulation essentially begging Farm Credit System to market its services to “all…eligible” YBS populations. The regulation’s preamble states: “Underserved communities and groups can be overlooked or excluded from marketing efforts and education outreach, leaving out a potential borrowing base.”
Farm Credit Reform Proposal
A proposal to require Farm Credit System to invest 15 percent of annual profits to serve next-generation farming is included in NSAC’s Farm Bill platform. In this 2023 report, the Congressional General Accounting Office showed Farm Credit System is unique among GSEs. Unlike the housing GSEs, Farm Credit is not required by law to grant out a portion of profits to support its public purpose.
In contrast, the Federal Home Loan Bank’s congressionally mandated Affordable Housing Program has provided homebuyers with more than $9 billion in downpayment assistance over the past 35 years. A Farm Credit-funded Affordable Farming Program could be even more impactful. Based on 2023 earnings, a 15 percent set-aside mandate would have resulted in an investment of $1,445,000,000 in next-generation agriculture.
How an Affordable Farming Program could work is an open question. Suppose those funds were providing downpayment assistance for beginning farmers buying farmland? In year one alone, Farm Credit grant funds could provide $22,335 each for 50,000 new farmers nationwide.
Farm Credit System calls itself a “network of cooperatives owned by its borrowers.” In 2023, its patronage payments provided 605,000 “owner borrowers” with dividends totaling $3.1 billion. Officials are dismissive of the idea of an Affordable Farming Program, and of congressional proponents being too eager to spend “other people’s money.”
Land of Lincoln’s Leadership Opportunity
NSAC’s Farm Credit grant mandate might begin to gain traction if members of Illinois’ congressional delegation invite Farm Credit System officials to a public hearing. Perhaps the appropriate venue is a joint session of the Illinois House and Senate Agriculture committees to explore how best to implement Farm Credit System’s own local food funding plan.
In 2009, Farm Credit representatives responded to a request from a task force authorized through a 2007 state law to “…develop a plan containing policy and funding recommendations for expanding and supporting a State local and organic food system.” Farm Credit officials described the problem impeding local food systems as “limited knowledge” of local farm and food entrepreneurs “about how to finance their enterprises.”
Four solutions were presented:
• Establish positive working relationships with financial institutions
• Maximize capital access through participation in state-sponsored farm financing programs
• Develop creative financing approaches in concert with private & public lending institutions
• Tap all available federal financing resources
Those recommendations were included in a report that led to passage of the Illinois Local Food, Farms and Jobs Act of 2009. That now 15-year-old law became a blueprint enabling state policymakers to enact other laws supporting the overall goal to make locally produced, nutritious food more widely available.
Unfortunately, those policies and programs are being enacted without the benefit of financial leveraging mechanisms that would result from the implementation of Farm Credit System’s own local food funding plan.
As is true at the federal policy level, current and proposed state local food programs are too underfunded and/or fragmented to maximize the return on public investment. It’s high time we demand much more from the Farm Credit System. Ag’s GSE was created to adapt with the times. Today that means investing a portion of its profits to build well-resourced regional food supply networks that complement the global agri-food chain.
Farm Credit System’s dedicated investment in its own funding plan can help grow a statewide network of local food economies from Cairo to Waukegan. And from the state of Washington to Florida.
Bob Heuer is director of Evanston, IL-based HNA public policy and marketing consultancy. He can be reached at bob@hnanetworks.net.
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