EquivalentCommon5 t1_jabn47x wrote on February 28, 2023 at 6:54 AM

Reply to comment by TheRealSmallBean in ELI5: Why is it that when fertilizers make their way into waterways, all the oxygen disappears, killing the fish? by Psychological-Dog994

This is why it’s a great thing to have buffers for waterways, tiered gardens that funnel water runoff to be used again and not get into waterways. Other things that can help keep runoff out of waterways! But if the US can manage that, we still have animal fecal runoff (which can be mitigated but isn’t as much as should be), company pollution- which they can pay for off sets. Off sets aren’t available to farmers iirc, could be wrong! We need to supplement farmers not so many companies!!! Farmers feed us, companies- ugh, some ‘feed’ us but big corporations get major breaks that local farmers don’t! Wish people started to really look at what makes the US great. Unfortunately, they won’t! Liberals don’t see where their food comes from, conservatives don’t see how great diversity helps us, neither side on the outskirts seem to realize that politicians are about themselves. Politicians get away with bribes, stock fraud (buying knowing more than the public, pretty much corruption though there are other terms, insider trading comes to mind), oh not paying back loans that were for small business to stay afloat during the pandemic, or they get different health care, salaries and pensions that don’t make sense… they retire as millionaires. Sorry went off on a tangent I shouldn’t have. Summary from this- politicians on every side have a 70% chance of being corrupt in someway!

sweetpotatokumquat t1_jaby1pl wrote on February 28, 2023 at 9:24 AM

One thing that annoys me about the rise of agrocorp is how the deck is stacked against existing farmers.

We know that tiered taxation systems are generally a good thing, where individuals who earn more pay progressively higher percentages in tax. They still take home more money overall by earning more, but it shifts the burden of income tax away from those who have the least.

This doesn't happen for corporations. The mom and pop farm managing 2 hectares is paying the same tax rate as HappyValleyAgroCorp which manages 100000 hectares spread across the country.

But it gets worse. Mom and pop either have old inefficient equipment they've inherited, or have to rent in equipment when needed, cause they can't afford to drop $500k on a new tractor that will get used for 50 days a year. So they're paying more for their equipment than HappyValleyAgroCorp which has their own fleet of gear that's in constant use.

Mom and pop are stuck paying whatever price the local farmer supply store charges for feed and fertiliser. HappyValleyAgroCorp is buying so much that they can negotiate heavily with suppliers and ship stuff in from across the country.

Mom and pop will struggle to access any subsidies that might be available, either having to jump through hoops or simply not knowing about them. HappyValleyAgroCorp's got a lawyer on retainer who goes golfing with the subsidy administrator.

Mom and pop are stuck taking whatever price HappyValleyGroceryCorp offers them for their produce. HappyValleyAgroCorp is pumping out so much produce for cheaper costs that they can undercut mom and pop into the ground, and negotiate higher wholesale rates by threatening to disrupt HappyValleyGroceryCorp's supply chains. But they hash it out over their weekly golf round, and the only ones that get hurt are mom and pop and us buying groceries.

And so mom and pop are stuck working for very little their entire lives, until they die, and their kids are left with a tiny farm that brings in very little, and forced to choose between slaving away like mom and pop did, or sell off the land to HappyValleyAgroCorp who's willing to step in with "quite a reasonable offer really for this tiny plot, in cash, cause we know in this difficult time you don't want to be wasting time dealing with this. It's what mom and pop would have wanted, that the land continues to be farmed."

And 40 years later, we still think of farmers as mom and pop but really it's 3 or 4 mega corps owning the entire thing.