Not a an expert in this area at all, but I suspect there's an aspect here if maintaining productive capacity to replace imported food, if that became unavailable. Cursory searching suggests US food exports are similar in scale to food imports. Roughly speaking, with some adaptation that export capacity could be redirected for domestic nutrition.
If, in contrast, you let those farms and skill dry up it would be difficult to rebuild quickly.
If, in contrast, you let those farms and skill dry up it would be difficult to rebuild quickly.