Community groups in the Midwest worry that a change in California's carbon emissions policy could hurt the quality of life in the nation's heartland.
Later this month, the California Air Resources Board will consider an amendment to the Low carbon fuel standard. Oil and gas companies will be able to offset their emissions by buying credits from producers of “greener” fuels across the country, specifically, methane captured from cow and pig manure.
Tim Gibbons, director of communications for the Missouri Agricultural Crisis Center, said it could spur large dairy farms to expand.
“If Californians knew that their state policy was creating, incentivizing, fueling more corporate factory farms in the Midwest, I'd like to think they would be opposed to it,” Gibbons argued.
Supporters of the amendment said their goal is to reduce carbon emissions on a national scale.
Many large dairy farms, known as Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations, use anaerobic digesters to capture natural gas from manure and then market it as a clean fuel. But a 2020 report Food and Water Watch found that, unlike human sewage, pig and cattle waste is not treated, so it can contaminate groundwater and blanket upwind communities with a terrible smell.
Brenda Brink, a member of Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement, said California's emissions credit system would allow factory farms to “greenwash” their carbon footprint and disadvantage renewable energy sources such as solar and wind. energy.
“Because it's such a sweet deal, it pushes more and more production through factory farms,” Brink argued. “State governments see the sweet deal which is, 'Well, look, it's clean energy.' And so, this huge PR thing is not true.”
The public hearing will take place on March 21 in Sacramento and will be streamed live so users can watch it online.
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An agricultural group is helping Iowa agricultural producers find ways to reduce the amount of nitrogen they use on their crops.
Excess nitrates can accumulate in groundwater and surface water and cause health problems.
Practical Farmers of Iowa encourages farmers to find just the right amount of nitrogen they need for their crops – avoiding over-application, which the team says is common.
PFI's Field Crops Viability Coordinator – Chelsea Ferrie – said thanks to federal grants and private funding, the group would pay farmers up to $35 for each acre that performed below normal if they didn't use enough nitrogen.
“No cost to the farmer,” Ferrie said. “We're trying to help incentivize them. That's something that farmers want to do — I mean, they want to be good stewards of the land — but also that they have to have a profitable farm.”
The application period for the program is open until the end of April.
To help them get the nitrogen balance right, Ferrie said PFI will also help farmers at the front end of the process – so they're not left guessing how much to apply.
“Discuss what your typical fertilizer plan is and what your reduction plan will be,” Ferrie said. “Then you would apply this year, going into the spring and the season.”
Farmers have relied on nitrogen-based fertilizers for generations – but when applied in excess, nitrates leach into soil and surface water, causing animal and human health concerns.
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Pesticides are still common in agriculture. Organic producers who avoid them have seen ups and downs in the push for stronger regulations and point to a South Dakota example of the harm associated with widespread use among neighboring farms.
At the heart of the regulatory fight is the application of the weed-killing pesticide dicamba and how it can move from one farm to another. Last month, a federal court blocked the spraying of dicamba products, but the EPA followed with an order to allow spraying of existing supplies.
Glenn Pulse, co-owner of an organic farm in Vermillion, said a drift incident in 2017 had a big impact on his operation.
“Our whole farm was covered. We lost many animals and thousands of bees were killed,” he explained.
This also resulted in health concerns for his family, the need to regain his organic farmer certification, and a legal battle for reinstatement. Groups like the National Family Farm Coalition are fighting what they call deregulation of these chemicals, arguing that drift and runoff have harmed millions of crops.
Dicamba manufacturers deny responsibility, accusing farmers who apply it of not following directions.
The EPA he said there were already millions of gallons of dicamba in circulation before the court decision, causing the agency to order. Pulse believes there are farmers who are wary of spraying chemicals, but wants stronger enforcement against what it describes as “loose cannons”.
“Guys not following the labels and spraying in unfavorable weather conditions, that's where I'd say 90% of the problems happen with drift incidents,” Pulse said.
His calls for better responses to these incidents coincided with policy demands to severely restrict dicamba products. Meanwhile, Rep. Dusty Johnson, D-South Dakota, is the lead sponsor of one bill Supporters say it would ensure uniformity in national pesticide labeling under federal law. But opponents argue it would curtail longstanding state and local pesticide safety rules.
Disclosure: The National Family Farm Coalition contributes to our Environmental, Agriculture/Agricultural, Social Justice, Sustainable Agriculture reporting fund. If you want to help support public interest news, click here.
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Montana farmers have testified before a panel of state lawmakers asking them to protect agricultural data collected by precision agriculture technology — and stored electronically, “in the cloud.”
They are looking for changes in how they access this information.
In recent condition Meeting of the Economic Affairs CommitteeMontana Farmers Union President Walter Schweitzer said with the increased use of precision ag tools and the vast increase in data being collected and stored remotely, Farmers' information needs more protection.
“We read every day that there is data being breached,” Schweitzer said. “The military has been hacked. Banks have been hacked. Hospitals have been hacked.”
Schweitzer argued that hackers could use the information to influence prices or market products directly to farmers based on information they collect about crops and farming operations.
He said based on farmers' input, the Economic Affairs Committee will work with lawmakers to consider changes during next year's legislative session.
Instead of increasing access, Schweitzer said he believes ag data should be made more transparent and publicly available.
He explained that this would help avoid the possibility of market manipulation by commodity brokers or large countries, such as China, that buy the crops.
“Let's say the wheat crop, at harvest time, looks like it's going to have lower than average or expected yields,” Schweitzer said. “So then, China would come in, buy all the wheat it needed before the USDA announced it, and the price would go up.”
Schweitzer said 10 percent of a farmer's data, uploaded in real time during harvest and stored in the cloud, is all it takes for hackers to know a grower's entire harvest.
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