Opinion: U.S. farmers helped shape the nation's 'feed the world' programs

President Franklin D. Roosevelt, VP-elect Harry S. Truman and
VP Henry Wallace led the U.S. before, during and after WWII.
(Photo by Abbie Rowe, Truman Library via Barn Raiser)

As the United States ends many of its longstanding international food aid programs, reporter Joel Engleman provides a brief history of American farming as a backdrop for his discussion on the newly released book, Global Heartland: Cultivating the American Century on the Midwestern Farm, by historian Peter Simons. An edited version of Engelman's thoughts and Q&A with Simons are shared below.

The seeds of American "food for the world" were planted after World War I and continued growing through the start of the Cold War. "In that roughly 30-year span, American farmers faced a flu pandemic, a dust bowl, a two-decade-long farm depression and a second global war," Engleman writes. "It was also a time when the federal government took a more active role in rural communities."

U.S supply chains that were created during WWII to provide Europe with machinery and weapons helped "set the stage for larger-scale food processing after the war," Engleman explains. "Technological developments in mass communication, as well as letters from relatives fighting overseas, broadened horizons at home." The shifts made U.S. farmers think about their role in the world.

After World War II, U.S. farmers "demanded a reluctant government act to prevent postwar starvation," Engleman writes. "Conservative Cold Warriors in the Truman administration slowly recognized that addressing global needs could help improve both U.S. national security interests and global opinion. A Cold War consensus to 'feed the world' emerged as farmers were enlisted to demonstrate the values of American exceptionalism through their commodity exports."

Simons offers a fresh view on how U.S. farmers began
"feeding the world." (Images via Barn Raiser)

Question (Engleman): Global Heartland charts this period when Americans in and around agriculture — farmers, farm interest groups like the Farm Bureau and Farmers Union, commodity trade groups and the USDA — are debating about whether to focus on domestic or international markets for their products. What was the nature of that debate?

Answer (Simons): "It’s only when the vast scope of [WWII] becomes clear, and the fact that the state is stepping in to guarantee farm profits, that farmers see an opportunity for trade overseas. After the war, humanitarianism is involved in the argument to stave off a famine in Europe, but there’s clearly a desire to prolong these markets.

"But you can’t just have changes in technology or the market. You also need people to reconceptualize a sense of national responsibility, or Christian responsibility, to the rest of the world. I see it as this complication sparked by World War II that ultimately creates the postwar world and reshapes the agricultural economy."

Q: You write about the international workers who came to work on U.S. farms during World War II. How did these migrant farm workers lay the groundwork for the agricultural system we have today?

A: "During World War II, [existing] networks become more formalized. The federal government sent trains down to Mexico City and, using the USDA and Department of Labor, got as many people as they could to work on farms.

"Ultimately, it's the Bracero program that formalizes predominantly Mexican immigrant work in American farm fields. That establishes a pattern for the way that agriculture works in the United States. It is a system that has lasted. . . until early 2025."