Excerpt from Assisting America's Small Farmers and Ranchers in the 21st Century: Accomplishments Through October 2001 VII. Research and Extension Agricultural Research Service Cooperative State Research, Education, and Extension Service. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

In Feeding a Divided America, third-generation Montana rancher and international agriculture development specialist Gilles Stockton explores the causes of what he refers to as the "rural-urban divide" and how this widening chasm between rural America and urban centers threatens our democracy. He shows how it determines the very structure of our society and the physical as well as political landscapes in which we live, and he goes on to demonstrate how big banks, international food conglomerates, urban expectations, and US farm policy have all participated in the demise of small towns across rural America. In a series of polemical essays, Stockton paints a clear picture of national food issues surrounding market competition, US trade policy, country-of-origin labeling, wildlife controversies, climate change, supply-chain disruptions, the decline of pastoralism worldwide, and US farm policy, topics that impact all Americans and transcend local, regional, national, and global geopolitical boundaries. Stockton stands firm with American farmers and ranchers, offering potential remedies to these issues in the face of concerns over livelihood, the future of American food systems, and the future of our planet. Stockton's essays are timely, and they challenge American urbanites and rural folk alike to find ways for all of us to coexist in a changing environment.