Today (and maybe tomorrow) the Senate will be voting on amendments to the Farm Bill, which includes subsidies to American farmers both large and small.

The problem with these subsidies is that when big-business farmers receive millions of dollars in subsidies they end up driving down prices of these crops around the world. As a result, small farmers around the world can’t compete. For small farmers in the developing world, this means they stay trapped in poverty, unable to compete because their government can’t afford to underwrite their production.

The Farm Bill only comes up for renewal every 5 years, so if we don’t change it now, we won’t get another shot until 2012. The status quo is a promise of 4 more years of extreme poverty to millions of people, so we are asking our Senators to vote YES on two amendments that put a limit on the cash handouts given to big-agribusiness.

As I’ve written recently here on the ONE blog, the Farm Bill working its way through Congress contains subsidies directed to big business farms that stifle competition from smaller farms. Some members of Congress would like the public to believe that these subsidies are designed to help American farmers. In reality, the vast majority of farmers are hurt by these subsidies. These subsidies allow the biggest 8% of farms to lower prices on their goods, leaving small American farmers – not to mention impoverished farmers in the developing world – struggling to compete. Take some time to read about the Farm Bill and why it needs to be reformed.

As our astute ONE members may already know, the Farm Bill is making its way through Congress. The bill only shows up once every five years, and is in major need of reform.

The agricultural subsidies contained within the bill use taxpayer money to allow large farms to out compete small farmers by driving down prices. Only the largest 8% of farmers receive these subsidies, leaving small farmers the world over unable to compete.

This legislation has a particularly strong impact on poor farmers living in extreme poverty, who rely on farming as their sole source of income. However, its negative effects don’t stop there. The other 92% of American farmers also struggle to compete with large subsidized farms.

The Farm Bill has been around for many years, and to reform such a deeply rooted piece of legislation, we will need to get the attention of Congress, the media, and the American public.

It seems that US farm policy gives the short end of the stick to poor and disenfranchised people in both the U.S. and the world. Today, Oxfam  released a study that shows that if the U.S. cut the billions it gives in cotton subsidies to a handful of farmers, millions of poor farmers in the cotton-producing regions of West Africa would see a boost to their incomes.