This week, Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (WA-03), member of the House Agriculture Committee, introduced the Helping Optimize Markets and Encourage Generational Resilience through Ownership, Workmanship, and Nurturing (HOMEGROWN) Soil Health Act. The legislation will support small, generational farm ownership, long-term soil health, and the production of specialty crops here at home, at a time when 40 percent of the fresh fruits and vegetables Americans consume are imported from foreign countries.
The HOMEGROWN Soil Health Act will establish a USDA Farm Service Agency regional pilot program which offers 90-year, zero-interest loans for farmers to purchase up to 160 acres of land to grow specialty crops – including fruits and vegetables, tree nuts, horticulture, and nursery crops. This would help address losses of small, generational specialty crop farms, decreases in farmland, deterioration of soil quality, and increases in the share of imported fruits and vegetables.
“Across Southwest Washington, we have an incredible diversity of small, hardworking family growers – and they farm because it’s their way of life and their work is important to their communities, not because it’s easy. Owner-operator farmers are central to our national security and health, not only because they have literal and figurative roots in their communities, but also because they want to pass down a healthy farm over multiple generations. While farmers make up the backbone of our local food supply chains, they are three-and-a-half times more likely to die by suicide, in part due to financial stress,” said Rep. Gluesenkamp Perez. “At a time when 40 percent of our fresh fruits and vegetables are imported, small farms face economic pressures due to consolidation and extreme weather, and we face an associated loss of place-based culture, we need to reinvest in our ag communities more than ever. I’m introducing the HOMEGROWN Soil Health Act to help small specialty crop farms rebound, support long-term soil resiliency, and build up the national security that comes with owning our own food supply chains.”
Rep. Gluesenkamp Perez introduced the bipartisan Farmland Security Act to increase oversight of foreign ownership of American farmland, the PACA Act to help producers improve soil health and build extreme weather resilience, and the Agricultural Right to Repair Act to ensure farmers can repair their equipment where, how, and when they want.
The Congresswoman has also introduced bipartisan legislation to research the impact of microplastics on biosolids used on agricultural lands, and she has made it a priority to hear from farmers across Southwest Washington.
Full text of the bill is available here.