Black farmers are being targeted by a misguided federal policy. That’s nothing new

If there’s one thing Washington, D.C. is good at, it’s making policies in the Belt and Road bubble that ultimately hurt Americans in rural areas, like mine here in Virginia. It means becoming.

I am a 4th generation farmer from Baskerville. I have been growing cured tobacco for over 30 years. My ancestors, John Boyd Sr. and my grandfather, Thomas Boyd, grew tobacco.

And while I spend most of my time managing my 1,600-acre farm, the rest of my time is spent being a voice for Black farmers.

The National Black Farmers Association, of which I am proud founder and president, has more than 116,000 members in 47 states. We know all too well that the federal government’s misguided policies have put the nail in the coffin of shrinking small communities and rural towns across the country, time and time again.

Few workers have been hit harder in recent years than black farmers. At the beginning of the 20th century, black farmers in this country owned more than 20 million acres of land, but today they own less than 5 million acres of land in this country.Our company previously represented 1 million farmers The number of black farmers in this country is now down to 50,000.

Unfortunately, Washington, D.C. has passed another order that will put even more black farmers out of business and deprive these small towns of vital revenue: a federal criminal injunction against the use of certain tobacco products by adults. I’m about to go down. Specifically, the types of tobacco products black farmers prefer to grow.

What all Washington’s leaders may not know is that tobacco remains a major crop in states like Virginia, Kentucky and North Carolina. In other words, Prohibition of menthol and other flavored tobacco under federal prohibition law Too many black farmers will be sunk, many already living near the margins of work.

Worse, banning these tobacco products would give way to an unregulated drug market that is inherently dangerous. When individuals do not know or cannot know what is in the substances they are ingesting, they are at risk of serious health harm.

And perhaps most alarming is the impact on black tobacco users across the country. The FDA’s proposed ban would criminalize the sale, distribution, and possession of menthol cigarettes under federal, state, and local laws. If the ban goes into effect, all 50 states will criminalize possession. This criminalization can lead to mandatory minimum sentences, revocation of parole, fines, loss of voting rights, and even deportation, among other criminal legal consequences.

because The majority of people who smoke menthol cigarettes are black., which would further criminalize an already overly criminalized population. Black people and other people of color have historically borne the brunt of disproportionate outcomes in the criminal legal system.

Washington has a better way to promote public health. Increasing investment in education, especially education, is the right thing to do.

For decades, black people in this country have been constantly told what they can and cannot do.For many years, the federal government, through the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Discrimination against thousands of black farmerswhich led to the loss of land and black farmers in this country.

Although the federal agency has changed hands, in this case the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), which pursues the ban on flavored tobacco, a criminal ban on menthol would leave yet another black farmer in this country vulnerable. Bankruptcy cannot be tolerated.

Instead, we should be allowed to continue growing tobacco in this country and contributing to American agricultural policy.

John Boyd Jr. is the founder and president of the National Black Farmers Association.