Green Options

The US Secretary of Agriculture, Tom Vilsack, announced last month plans to use an additional $30 million dollars to purchase pork in 2009 for federal food and nutrition assistance programs.

This announcement comes as the USDA has already spent some $151 million of Recovery Act (widely known as the “stimulus”) money to purchase pork products.  To me there’s always a bit of irony when pork barrel money is spent to purchase actual pork, as is the case here.  You can read the USDA Press Release here.

There’s theoretically nothing wrong with using taxpayer money to support pork producers who are struggling with a glut of supply and lagging demand, as well as slower sales due to the economic conditions in the US.  But since a majority of pork producers in the US are huge CAFOs (Confined Animal Feeding Operations), essentially your tax money is being used to bail out pork producers who are having a slow year.

Lawmakers continue to raise a stink about the $1.7M earmark for hog odor research in Obama’s stimulus package, calling it “pork” in its finest form. Rural residents who live near hog farms, or worse, facilities where hogs are butchered, are calling it about time!

Obama has prided himself on removing government waste and not allowing pork to infiltrate his controversial $787B stimulus package, but was he successful? According to many outspoken opponents such as Senator John McCain, the answer is no.