This chapter investigates the extent to which agricultural policies contribute to childhood
obesity. It starts by exploring the policies that directly affect production, such as agricultural
subsidies (ie, price supports, production subsidies, and farmland subsidies), acreage
controls, tariffs on imported commodities, and agricultural extension research. The chapter
then evaluates the policies aimed at stimulating the demand for food, such as commodity-
distribution programs and commodity-promotion programs, and proposes the reforms that …

For thirty-five years, US agriculture has operated under a “cheap food” policy that spurred
production of a few commodity crops, not fruit or vegetables, and thus of the calories from
them. A key driver of childhood obesity is the consumption of excess calories, many from
inexpensive, nutrient-poor snacks, sweets, and sweetened beverages made with fats and
sugars derived from these policy-supported crops. Limiting or eliminating farm subsidies to
commodity farmers is wrongly perceived as a quick fix to a complex agricultural system …