Commentary: Big Tent Ideas

The Answer To America’s Food Security Woes

(Photo via Aaron Burden / Unsplash)

Every parent knows the feeling. You walk into the grocery store expecting to pick up the same items you’ve purchased for years, only to discover the total somehow climbed again. A few dollars here. A few dollars there. Before long, feeding a family becomes noticeably more expensive than it was just a few years ago.

Americans deserve answers about why this keeps happening. What they don’t deserve are convenient political scapegoats.

As food prices continue to rise, some policymakers and activists are searching for someone to blame. Manufacturers, suppliers and producers often find themselves in the crosshairs. But blaming the businesses that help feed America is like blaming the thermometer for a heat wave. It may satisfy a political narrative, but it does nothing to address the actual problem.

The reality is that food security begins long before products reach grocery store shelves. It starts with the farmers who grow our crops, the manufacturers who produce critical agricultural inputs, and the complex supply chains that connect the world economy.

One of the most important links in that chain is fertilizer. Without fertilizer, crop yields decline. When crop yields decline, food production falls. When food production falls, prices rise. It’s a straightforward equation that affects every family in America.

Yet fertilizer production depends on raw materials such as sulfur, ammonia, and phosphate that move through a highly interconnected global marketplace. When geopolitical instability disrupts that marketplace, the effects ripple throughout the entire food supply chain. That is exactly what we are witnessing today.

Russia’s ongoing war against Ukraine continues to disrupt key commodity markets and transportation networks. Tensions throughout the Middle East have created uncertainty around critical shipping routes. Countries such as China have restricted exports of fertilizer and related inputs, tightening supplies even further. Together, these events have created significant pressure on the materials farmers need to grow the food that ultimately reaches American dinner tables.

None of these is the result of corporate greed. It is the predictable consequence of global instability colliding with economic reality. When supplies become constrained, prices rise. When supplies expand, prices stabilize. The laws of economics have not been suspended simply because the issue has become politically inconvenient.

Unfortunately, some leaders seem more interested in assigning blame than removing obstacles. If policymakers genuinely want to lower costs for families, they should focus on strengthening America’s ability to produce, manufacture, and compete. That means streamlining permitting processes, reducing unnecessary regulatory burdens, encouraging domestic energy production, and ensuring that American manufacturers can access the resources they need to meet demand. It also means recognizing an important truth that often gets lost in today’s political debates: businesses are not the enemy.

At the Christian Employers Alliance, we work with employers across the country who see business as a calling rather than merely a source of profit. They understand that every decision they make affects employees, families, customers, and communities.

That belief inspired the creation of the Biblical Business Index (BBI), which evaluates policies through the lens of five core biblical freedoms. This fertilizer and food security challenge highlights the critical importance of Economic Freedom, one of those five freedoms.

Biblical principles of stewardship call us to manage resources wisely, pursue honest commerce, and enable productive work that provides for families and communities. Excessive regulations, permitting delays, and policies that hinder domestic production directly undermine economic freedom. They make it harder for American farmers and manufacturers to respond to global disruptions, increase costs, and ultimately hurt the very families we aim to serve. Policies that expand economic freedom, by cutting red tape, promoting domestic energy and resource development, and strengthening supply chain resilience, align with Scripture’s emphasis on diligence, responsibility, and abundance.

Those same principles should guide our approach to economic policy.

A healthy society depends on healthy institutions. Strong families need stable jobs. Stable jobs require successful businesses. Successful businesses require an environment where innovation, production, and investment are encouraged rather than punished.

When employers can thrive, communities thrive alongside them.

The Biblical concept of stewardship teaches that resources should be managed wisely and responsibly. That lesson applies just as much to public policy as it does to individual conduct. Leaders have a responsibility to create conditions that allow people and businesses to be productive, solve problems, and meet human needs.

Food security is ultimately about more than fertilizer, trade policy, or commodity markets. It is about whether America remains capable of providing abundance for future generations. That goal will not be achieved by vilifying employers, manufacturers, or producers. It will not be achieved through political finger-pointing. And it certainly will not be achieved by ignoring the geopolitical realities driving today’s supply disruptions.

Instead, it will be achieved through policies that encourage production, strengthen supply chains, reward innovation, and empower responsible businesses to do what they do best: create value, provide opportunity, and serve their communities.

Americans don’t need another villain in the food security debate. They need leaders willing to address the real causes of the problem. And they need the courage to support the businesses helping provide the solution.

Margaret Iuculano is President of the Christian Employers Alliance, advocating for the rights of faith-based businesses to operate according to their convictions. She works at the intersection of law and policy and helps advance the Biblical Business Index (BBI), a Scripture-centered policy platform guiding Christian CEOs in aligning business decisions, investments, and public engagement with biblical truth.

The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller News Foundation.