This book offers a broad introduction to food policies in the United States. Real-world controversies and debates motivate the book's attention to economic principles, policy analysis, nutrition science and contemporary data sources. It assumes that the reader's concern is not just the economic interests of farmers, but also includes nutrition, sustainable agriculture, the environment and food security. The book's goal is to make US food policy more comprehensible to those inside and outside the agri-food sector whose interests and aspirations have been ignored. The chapters cover US agriculture, food production and the environment, international agricultural trade, food and beverage manufacturing, food retail and restaurants, food safety, dietary guidance, food labeling, advertising and federal food assistance programs for the poor. The author is an agricultural economist with many years of experience in the non-profit advocacy sector, the US Department of Agriculture and as a professor at Tufts University. The author's well-known blog on US food policy provides a forum for discussion and debate of the issues set out in the book.

This new edition offers a timely update to the leading textbook dedicated to all aspects of U.S. food policy. The update accounts for experience with policy changes in the 2014 Farm Bill and prospects for the next Farm Bill, the publication of the 2015–2020 Dietary Guidelines for Americans, the removal of Generally Recognized as Safe (GRAS) status for trans fats, the collapse of the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) treaty, stalled child nutrition reauthorization legislation, reforms in food-labeling policy, the consequences of the 2016 presidential election and many other developments. The second edition offers greater attention both to food justice issues and to economic methods, including extensive economics appendices in a new online Companion Website. As with the first edition, real-world controversies and debates motivate the book’s attention to economic principles, policy analysis, nutrition science and contemporary data sources. The book assumes that the reader's concern is not just the economic interests of farmers and food producers but also includes nutrition, sustainable agriculture, food justice, the environment and food security. The goal is to make U.S. food policy more comprehensible to those inside and outside the agri-food sector whose interests and aspirations have been ignored. The chapters cover U.S. agriculture, food production and the environment, international agricultural trade, food and beverage manufacturing, food retail and restaurants, food safety, dietary guidance, food labeling, advertising and federal food assistance programs for the poor. The author is an agricultural economist with many years of experience in the nonprofit advocacy sector, the U.S. Department of Agriculture and as a professor at Tufts University. The author's blog on U.S. food policy provides a forum for discussion and debate of the issues set out in the book.

Policy analysis is a dynamic process of discovery rather than a passive exercise of memorizing facts and conclusions. This text provides opportunities to "practice the craft" of policy analysis by engaging the reader in realistic case studies and problem-solving scenarios that require the selection and use of applicable investigative techniques. US Agricultural and Food Policies will assist undergraduate students to learn how policy choices impact the overall performance of agricultural and food markets. It encourages students to systematically investigate scenarios with appropriate positive and normative tools. The book emphasizes the importance of employing critical thinking skills to address the complexities associated with the design and implementation of twenty-first-century agricultural and food policies. Students are asked to suspend their personal opinions and emotions, and instead apply research methods that require the careful consideration of both facts and values. The opportunities to build these investigative skills are abundant when we consider the diversity of modern agricultural and food policy concerns. Featuring case studies and critical thinking exercises throughout and supported by a Companion Website with slides, a test bank, glossary, and web/video links, this is the ideal textbook for any agricultural policy class.

Despite technological advances in agriculture, nearly a billion people around the world still suffer from hunger and poor nutrition while a billion are overweight or obese. This imbalance highlights the need not only to focus on food production but also to implement successful food policies. In this new textbook intended to be used with the three volumes of Case Studies in Food Policy for Developing Countries (also from Cornell), the 2001 World Food Prize laureate Per Pinstrup-Andersen and his colleague Derrill D. Watson II analyze international food policies and discuss how such policies can and must address the many complex challenges that lie ahead in view of continued poverty, globalization, climate change, food price volatility, natural resource degradation, demographic and dietary transitions, and increasing interests in local and organic food production. Food Policy for Developing Countries offers a "social entrepreneurship" approach to food policy analysis. Calling on a wide variety of disciplines including economics, nutrition, sociology, anthropology, environmental science, medicine, and geography, the authors show how all elements in the food system function together.

The United States is viewed by the world as a country with plenty of food, yet not all households in America are food secure, meaning access at all times to enough food for an active, healthy life. A proportion of the population experiences food insecurity at some time in a given year because of food deprivation and lack of access to food due to economic resource constraints. Still, food insecurity in the United States is not of the same intensity as in some developing countries. Since 1995 the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has annually published statistics on the extent of food insecurity and food insecurity with hunger in U.S. households. These estimates are based on a survey measure developed by the U.S. Food Security Measurement Project, an ongoing collaboration among federal agencies, academic researchers, and private organizations. USDA requested the Committee on National Statistics of the National Academies to convene a panel of experts to undertake a two-year study in two phases to review at this 10-year mark the concepts and methodology for measuring food insecurity and hunger and the uses of the measure. In Phase 2 of the study the panel was to consider in more depth the issues raised in Phase 1 relating to the concepts and methods used to measure food security and make recommendations as appropriate. The Committee on National Statistics appointed a panel of 10 experts to examine the above issues. In order to provide timely guidance to USDA, the panel issued an interim Phase 1 report, Measuring Food Insecurity and Hunger: Phase 1 Report. That report presented the panel's preliminary assessments of the food security concepts and definitions; the appropriateness of identifying hunger as a severe range of food insecurity in such a survey-based measurement method; questions for measuring these concepts; and the appropriateness of a household survey for regularly monitoring food security in the U.S. population. It provided interim guidance for the continued production of the food security estimates. This final report primarily focuses on the Phase 2 charge. The major findings and conclusions based on the panel's review and deliberations are summarized.

This book serves as a foundational reference of U.S. land settlement and early agricultural policy, a comprehensive journey through the evolution of 20th century agricultural policy, and a detailed guide to the key agricultural policy issues of the early 21st century. This book integrates the legal, economic and political concepts and ideas that guided U.S. agricultural policy from colonial settlement to the 21st century, and it applies those concepts to the policy issues agriculture will face over the next generation. The book is organized into three sections. Section one introduces the main themes of the book, explores the pre-Columbian period and early European settlement, and traces the first 150 years of U.S. agricultural policy starting with the post revolution period and ending with the “golden age” of agriculture in the early 20th century. Section two outlines that grand bargain of the 1930s that initiated the modern era of government intervention into agricultural markets and traces this policy evolution to the early days of the 21st century. The third section provides an in-depth examination of six policy issues that dominate current policy discussions and will impact policy decisions for the next generation: trade, environment/conservation, commodity checkoff programs, crop insurance, biofuels, and domestic nutrition programs.

We all witness, in advertising and on supermarket shelves, the fierce competition for our food dollars. In this engrossing exposé, Marion Nestle goes behind the scenes to reveal how the competition really works and how it affects our health. The abundance of food in the United States--enough calories to meet the needs of every man, woman, and child twice over--has a downside. Our over-efficient food industry must do everything possible to persuade people to eat more--more food, more often, and in larger portions--no matter what it does to waistlines or well-being. Like manufacturing cigarettes or building weapons, making food is big business. Food companies in 2000 generated nearly $900 billion in sales. They have stakeholders to please, shareholders to satisfy, and government regulations to deal with. It is nevertheless shocking to learn precisely how food companies lobby officials, co-opt experts, and expand sales by marketing to children, members of minority groups, and people in developing countries. We learn that the food industry plays politics as well as or better than other industries, not least because so much of its activity takes place outside the public view. Editor of the 1988 Surgeon General's Report on Nutrition and Health, Nestle is uniquely qualified to lead us through the maze of food industry interests and influences. She vividly illustrates food politics in action: watered-down government dietary advice, schools pushing soft drinks, diet supplements promoted as if they were First Amendment rights. When it comes to the mass production and consumption of food, strategic decisions are driven by economics--not science, not common sense, and certainly not health. No wonder most of us are thoroughly confused about what to eat to stay healthy. An accessible and balanced account, Food Politics will forever change the way we respond to food industry marketing practices. By explaining how much the food industry influences government nutrition policies and how cleverly it links its interests to those of nutrition experts, this path-breaking book helps us understand more clearly than ever before what we eat and why.