Governor Walz Needs To Answer For Failed Progressive Food Policies

The US presidential election is shaping up to be one of the most “heartland” themed campaigns in recent history. Donald Trump’s VP selection of Ohio Senator JD Vance checked the Rust Belt box for Republicans, and Democrat Kamala Harris countered with her new running mate, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz.

With camo hat always on hand, Walz’s political brand is tied to his first job working on the family farm in Nebraska. Farmers across Minnesota are abuzz about Walz’s agriculture record both as a congressman and as governor, and it’s mixed. Walz speaks the language of Minnesota farmers but shares the sentiments of California and European progressives when it comes to food and environmental policy.

Environmentalist groups like Greenpeace and Pesticide Action Network have never had potential allies in the White House quite as aligned as Kamala Harris and Tim Walz. Walz’s record indicates he would entertain the kind of utopian visions that have guided the European Union on policies such as gas taxes on farm equipment and sweeping pesticide bans. The same policies which sparked massive farmer protests across Europe and Canada.

As recently as July, Walz announced $200 million from the EPA to flow into Minnesota for the advancement of “Climate-Smart Food Systems”, meaning the replacement of gas-powered farm vehicles, new standards around refrigerators, and soil practices. Several years back, Governor Walz visited organic farms in Minnesota to give voice to their concerns about pesticides, saying “There’s still more we can do to make things easier for organic farmers.”

What did those organic farmers want? Nothing related specifically to their operations, but instead a total ban on aerial pesticides used by conventional farms statewide, which they claim travels by air and impacts all farms. Walz’s position was, “We need to build coalitions with the public and fellow politicians and get them on board with this stuff.”

Americans have been fortunate, as these progressive experiments in rolling back high-yield farming have not hit the political mainstream. That could soon change. 

The European Union abandoned its own attempts to boost organic farming after the farmer protests, learning over many years that its rules and regulations led to a less productive and more expensive food system for consumers.

But you’ll find that no EU member state has endured a famine, and that’s the result of Europe’s trademark caution and incrementalism. Nations that have been inspired by Europe’s failed policies but lack their bureaucratic restraint have seen actual starvation when modern farming systems were upended.

The case of Sri Lanka, a small island off the coast of India, is only the most recent example. Until 2019, Sri Lanka had been the planet’s top tourism spot for a decade, but regulatory change in agriculture threw it back into the ‘dark ages’.

All it took was seriously implementing the ideas of progressive environmentalists and food production critics.

In Sri Lanka’s 2019 election, now former-president Gotabaya Rajapaksa promised a 10-year transition away from conventional farming practices to “organic agriculture”. It was on the advice of an Indian environmentalist, Vandana Shiva, that Rajapaska believed chemical fertilizers and pesticides needed to be outlawed. Shiva cared little for the steady gains in agricultural productivity in Sri Lanka in the 21st century.

During COVID, President Rajapaska banned all imports of chemical fertilizer and pesticides, effectively forcing two million farmers to go organic. The plans have since been abandoned but still created a devastating ripple that has yet to be undone.

Sri Lanka’s domestic rice production has dropped by 20% due to the lower agricultural output of organic farming compared to conventional methods, despite political promises. Food prices rose by a third. Tea production, a crucial domestic and export commodity, decreased by 50%, as foreign consumers were unwilling to pay premiums. Nine out of every 10 Sri Lankan families were reported to have skipped meals and waited for days at a time in lines for fuel.

Rubber and coconut producers faced similar challenges, as obtaining imports on short notice proved nearly impossible despite the lifting of the ban on synthetic fertilizers and pesticides.

Half a million individuals fell back into poverty after decades of real progress. Sri Lanka has been left to rely on foreign food assistance from neighboring India. On top of all that, protestors in 2022 stormed the Prime Minister’s office and the President’s residence, forcing the government to resign in disgrace.

Sri Lanka still grapples with grinding inflation due to the devaluation of its currency. As of March, inflation sat at 5.9%, down from a peak of 70% in 2022. The island country has seen an exodus of doctors as well as parents being forced to pick which of their children can attend school. All ripple effects of a deep economic crisis that has hobbled the country, stemming from the all-in pursuit of progressive’s food production agenda.

None of this is to say that Tim Walz and Kamala Harris are going to bring famine and pestilence to the United States, but should emphasize that the food systems Americans take for granted are indeed fragile. Ideological reformers have persuaded many of America’s trade partners to pursue the kinds of policies that have broken nations, starved families, and produced massive political blowback from hardworking farmers.

Food systems are fragile, and both Kamala Harris and Governor Walz should be asked tough questions about these global farming trends, as well as their records while in office. Walz has more farming knowledge than any presidential or vice presidential candidate since Jimmy Carter, but Americans need to know where he really stands on these debates. It can be a matter of life and death.

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Bill Wirtz is senior policy analyst at the Consumer Choice Center, where he focuses on agriculture and trade. He has published “No Copy-paste: What Not to Emulate From Europe’s Agriculture Regulation.”

The views expressed in this piece are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.