What's for dinner? The farm bill has a big impact

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What's for dinner? The farm bill has a big impact
By MARY CLARE JALONICK
Associated Press
Feb 8, 8:21 AM EST

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Look no further than your dinner plate to understand how the new farm bill affects you.

About 15 percent of the money in the legislation signed into law Friday by President Barack Obama will go to farmers to help them grow the food you eat. Most of the rest of the money in the almost $100 billion-a-year law will go to food stamps that help people buy groceries.

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WHERE YOU SHOP: The law includes incentives for farmers markets and makes it easier for food stamp recipients to shop there. A new program would award grants to some farmers markets and grocery stores that match food stamp dollars if recipients buy fruits and vegetables. It has a bit of money to help finance the building of grocery stores in low-income areas that don't have many retail outlets.

THE MAIN COURSE: Most of the subsidy money benefits producers of the main row crops - corn, soybeans, wheat, cotton and rice. Most corn and soybeans in the U.S. are grown for animal feed, so those subsidies keep costs down for the farmers and the livestock producers who buy feed for their beef cattle, hogs and chickens. Corn is an ingredient in hundreds if not thousands of processed foods you buy in the grocery store.