Sustaining sustainable agriculture: The rise and fall of the Fund for Rural America

Sustainable agriculture has lately madesignificant inroads into US agricultural policydiscourse. An examination of the ``life cycle' of theFund for Rural America, a component of the 1996 farmbill, provides an example of the complex and contestedways in which the goals of sustainable agriculture areadvocated, negotiated, and implemented at the level ofnational policy, in the context of the evolvingpolitical and institutional arrangements of Americanagricultural policy. The Fund, with its relativelylarge endowment of $100 million annually, and itsexplicit emphasis on alternative agriculture research,is emblematic of both the growing politicaleffectiveness of the alternative agriculture movementand the increasing institutionalization of alternativeagriculture representatives in Federal agencies. Theuntimely demise of the Fund in the appropriationsprocess, however, illustrates the extent to whichcertain key spaces within the state remain outsidesustainable agriculture's broadening sphere ofinfluence. This suggests that while some aspects ofthe movement's organizing strategy are indeedeffective, some may need to be rethought in light ofthe experience with the FRA.