Economic Linkages Between the WIC Program and the Farm Sector

In fiscal 2008, the $4.6 billion of food purchased with vouchers from the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) generated $1.3 billion in farm revenue. Because WIC participants would have purchased some of these foods with their own money in the absence of the program, the net addition to farm revenue from WIC is estimated at $331 million and the net increase in full-time-equivalent farm jobs at 2,640. The study uses an Input-Output Multiplier Model to derive these estimates and assumes that recent revisions in the WIC food packages were implemented in all States in fiscal 2008.