Originally published in the Fargo Forum, 12.13.16
by Marie Hoff, Bismarck, ND
I wonder if the North Dakota Farm Bureau is really a friend of North Dakota? I wonder if the Farm Bureau really supports the people of North Dakota and our preferred way of life here? Over 75 percent of us voted FOR our law which supports family farms and rejects corporate-owned “agribusiness.”
Yet, the Farm Bureau has filed a lawsuit against the State (that’s us, citizens). This means taxpayers’ precious funds are used to defend a law that has been in place since 1932 and which we overwhelmingly reaffirmed on the June ballot.
Do people who buy NoDak Mutual Insurance realize it is affiliated with the Farm Bureau? Consider that your purchase may be helping fund a lawsuit against a law that the vast majority of North Dakotans support.
If our family farm law were overturned, anyone — even foreign governments or other corporations, including multinational agri-business—could buy up our precious land and use it for whatever short-term economic advantage they’d want. Corporations come like colonial masters to drain resources and run. Family farms are the lifeblood of our rural communities and our rural communities hold up the economic well-being of North Dakota.
Rural North Dakota people want neighbors who help build lively communities where children thrive and the land is passed on intact.
Hoff lives in Bismarck.