Any revisions to U.S. food-aid programs must be discussed with the agricultural community, said House Agriculture Committee chairman Michael Conaway in a statement. The 2014 farm law allowed greater use of locally purchased food and cash assistance in hunger relief, but kept donation of U.S.-grown food as the major source of aid; many other nations donate cash rather than commodities. The United States is the world’s largest food aid donor, with $1.4 billion proposed for the Food for Peace program for fiscal 2016.
“Though there are continued calls for reforms to these programs, any additional reforms should be debated in an open and transparent manner and should fully involve the agricultural community,” said Conaway. The Agriculture Committee opened a review of the 2014 reforms to food-aid programs on June 24.
“The Agriculture Committee will continue to monitor implementation of those changes as part of its review of international food aid programs in advance of the next farm bill,” said Conaway. A second hearing by the House Agriculture subcommittee on foreign agriculture is scheduled for today.
Food for Peace was created during the Cold War and served the dual purposes of sharing America’s largess with hungry nations and drawing down U.S. farm surpluses. It is a point of pride in rural America to play a role in international relief. Maritime unions and the shipping industry are sound supporters of the program, which now requires that at least half of U.S. food aid travel on U.S. vessels.
Early this year, the Obama administration proposed further reforms that would allow up to 25 percent of Food for Peace funds to be used for local and regional food purchases, food vouchers and cash transfers. The additional flexibility would speed up delivery of aid during emergencies and save enough money on shipping to feed an additional 2 million people a year, says USAID. “Agricultural commodities shipped from the United States will still make up a significant majority” of food aid, it said.
Conaway and a subcommittee chairman, David Rouzer of North Carolina, pointed to a published report that said federal agencies were discussing with shipping lines a potential increase in payments for maintaining a U.S. cargo fleet. The larger payment would be “in exchange for allowing U.S. Agency for International Development to spend 45 percent of its food aid budget on local and regional purchases rather than buying food in the United States,” said Conaway and Rouzer. “This appears to be another attempt on the part of USAID to shift from U.S. in-kind commodity-based aid food aid to cash vouchers.”
The two lawmakers said cash assistance “is highly vulnerable to fraud, waste and abuse.” Farm-bill negotiators said in 2014 that in most cases local purchase of food aid were cheaper and delivered sooner than food purchased in the United States and shipped to hunger spots. They also noted losses from the practice of monetization – hauling goods to a target country, selling them and using the proceeds to fund aid programs.