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« Political turmoil, public health catastrophy | Main | Unilever takes a bite out of your face cream »
The science has spoken –- will policy makers listen?
New USGS study cites Farms in 9 States Causing the Dead Zone Problem
This week, the U.S. Geological Survey released a report showing that farms in just 9 states cause 75 % of the nitrogen and phosphorus pollution that creates a Dead Zone every Spring at the mouth of the Mississippi River.
Imagine, 9 states causing all the ruckus. After all, these nine states (IL, IA, IN, MO, AR, KY, TN, OH, and MI) make up just one-third of the Mississippi River Basin that encompasses 31 states!
How could this happen, you say? You thought that farmers were “the first environmentalists, ” that they were “good stewards of the land?” Many of them rightly regard themselves this way, but unfortunately the scientists conclude that there’s still a lot of fertilizer and manure that’s escaping their farms, getting into rivers, and causing a Dead Zone the size of New Jersey in the Gulf of Mexico.
Could it be that these 9 states take home 41 % of all federal commodity subsidy dollars that encourage production and thus, enable polluting practices?
Could it be the fact that even USDA’s Economic Research Service knows that 80 % of the farms in the country with high nitrogen run-off potential happen to also receive farm subsidies?
Is it possible that the Farm Bill conservation funds to help solve the problem are woefully underfunded? Over the last 5-year Farm Bill, thousands of farmers’ conservation applications were denied (USDA received $18 billion worth of conservation applications, but only $6 billion were funded).
The answers to all these questions, of course, are yes.
But there’s one more really important question: What are the policy makers going to do about this?
The 18-agency Gulf Hypoxia Task Force is meeting in February to decide just this. Will this policy-making body heed the USGS scientific findings? Will they heed the recommendations of the EPA’s Science Advisory Board to set a 45 % nitrogen and phosphorus reduction target to shrink the Dead Zone in half?
I’ll keep you posted.
Photo: Farm Scene by cindy47452
This seems like more than a matter of governmental supports; also about education. How can these subsidized farms be more effective at controlling nitrogen run-off? Are the gov't subsidies paying for nitrogen/phosphorus fertilizers? Is there a cost effective way for them to switch to organic or other environmentally sound and sustainable farming methodologies?
Your article contains more questions than answers.
Brian S - Thanks for your questions.
To be more effective at controlling N run-off, farmers can implement many "best management practices" (BMPs)
a) on their own (no or low cost behavior changes like NOT applying manure to fallow land in the winter, NOT using starter fertilizer on corn but taking a nitrogen test when the corn is knee-high to see if it needs more fertilizer during the growing stage)
or b) seek federal or state cost-share funding or private loans for other BMPS that have costs (e.g. planting cover crops to soak up excess nutrients, planting stream-side buffers to trap sediment, nutrients, and herbicides from reaching the stream, establishing treatment wetlands to filter the groundwater collected in tile drains under much of Iowa's corn fields, etc.)
No, government subsidies are not paying for N or P fertilizers. There are farm subsidies that pay farmers just because they own land that used to get subsidies (and they don't have to be farmers at all or grow anything at all). There are subsidies that pay farmers when market prices fall below a set threshold and there are subsidies that pay farmers the difference between U.S. set prices and international prices for commodities like cotton. Plus there are crop insurance and disaster aid subsidies too. All of these subsidies encourage crop production, most violate international trade rules, and they come with very few environmental requirements (control soil erosion on Highly Erodible Land - only).
There are organic transition programs that help farmers over a 3-year certification period phase out use of commercial fertilizers and herbicides but they are woefully underfunded. Organic farms tend to produce fruits and vegetables on small plots of land while commodity crop production (corn, soybeans, wheat, cotton, and rice) require huge swaths of land. There is a small but growing market for organic wheat and cotton, so there is hope.
Finally, your last comment inspires me to write follow-up blogs to answer the questions I appear to be raising.