What We've Done

Despite the growing power and consolidation of corporate agri-business, Iowa Citizens Community Improvement has been able to achieve extraordinary results for the independent family farmer.

• Campaigned to end the Mandatory Pork Checkoff
  We chalked up another big win in October 2003 when the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed an earlier ruling that the mandatory pork checkoff program is unconstitutional and should end. Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement and other Campaign for Family Farm members began a petition drive in 1998 to end the program which supports factory farms at the expense of independent family farmers.
  
  
• Won U.S. Senate support to ban packers from owning livestock
  As a member of the Campaign for Family Farms, we helped mobilize hog farmers in 45 states to win a ban on meat packers owning livestock in the U.S. Senate’s version of the 2002 farm bill. The ban was stripped from the farm bill during conference committee. Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement continues to meet with members of Congress to encourage them to co-sponsor legislation supporting a packer ban.
  
  
• Kept Tom Dorr from becoming USDA Undersecretary
  We worked with other members of the National Family Farm Coalition to stop Tom Dorr from becoming the Undersecretary for Rural Development at the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Our opposition to Dorr was based on the fact that he: 1) championed the corporate take over of agriculture; 2) supported North Carolina’s model of factory farm hog production; 3) made comments suggesting that ethnic and religious diversity hinders economic development in rural areas; and 4) knowingly applied for and received $34,000 in farm subsidy payments that he was not eligible for. As a result of our two-year campaign, the U.S. Senate rejected Dorr’s nomination in November 2003.