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Congressional Testimony
October 8, 2002 Tuesday
SECTION: CAPITOL HILL HEARING TESTIMONY
LENGTH: 1745 words
COMMITTEE:
SENATE ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS
HEADLINE: CLEAN WATER ACT
TESTIMONY-BY: THOMAS A. WEBER, ASSOCIATE CHIEF, NATURAL
RESOURCES CONSERVATION SERVICE
AFFILIATION: UNITED
STATES DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE
BODY: Statement of
Thomas A. Weber Associate Chief, Natural Resources Conservation Service United
States Department of Agriculture
Before the Senate Environment and
Public Works Committee
October 8, 2002
Mr. Chairman and Members
of the Committee, I am pleased to appear before you today to present the
Department of Agriculture's perspective on the Clean Water Act and the
celebration of the 30th Anniversary of this historic Act. I thank the Members of
the Committee for the opportunity to appear, and I would like to express
gratitude to the Chairman and members of this body for your interest in USDA's
roles in improving water quality.
The 30th Anniversary of the Clean
Water Act is cause for celebration about the improvements that have been made in
the quality of our Nation's waters. At USDA, we are celebrating this event along
with our many partners at the Federal, State, Tribal, and local levels --
including our non-governmental partners, farmers, ranchers, and woodlot owners.
And as we celebrate the past 30 years, we are also reflecting on USDA's natural
resource conservation heritage, and upon the significant work ahead of us as we
enter this new century. A Historical Perspective --
The People's
Department, as Abraham Lincoln referred to USDA, has played a key role in the
management of nonpoint sources of pollution for nearly a century, long before
the word nonpoint was part of our vocabulary. In 1905, President Theodore
Roosevelt named Gifford Pinchot the Chief Forester of the redefined U.S. Forest
Service and signed the Act transferring the Nation's Forest Reserves from the
Department of the Interior to the Department of Agriculture. This Act gave USDA
its first authority to protect forestlands and the water resources they produce.
Pinchot, Roosevelt, and their contemporaries believed in the wise use and
management of all the Earth's natural resources, and began a nationwide
Conservation Movement.
In the early 1900's, the Department was
conducting soil surveys, identifying "rough gullied land" and the resulting
sediment that made its way to nearby creeks, streams, and rivers. In the 1920's,
Hugh Hammond Bennett, a USDA soil scientist who later became the first Chief of
my agency, drew upon his observations about soil erosion's impacts on
agriculture. He was evangelistic in delivering his message on natural resource
conservation and his writings and speeches were sprinkled with admonitions about
the "evil of erosion", how "rainwater running wild" would result from poor land
management, and other interesting phrases. Concerning water pollution from
sediment and nutrients, Bennett made note of "the waste material marching down
to the Gulf of Mexico." In the 1920's and 1930's, Congress responded to natural
resource degradation in many ways. Congress authorized the formation of soil
conservation experiment stations; it created the Civilian Conservation Corps and
the Federal Emergency Relief Administration, marking the beginning of
public-sector erosion control assistance on private agricultural land; it formed
the Soil Erosion Service, later named the Soil Conservation Service; and it
established controls for livestock on public lands that began to prevent
overgrazing and soil deterioration. Many of these new initiatives were responses
to the devastation caused by poor land management during a period of terrible
droughts -- commonly called the "Dust Bowl." Other water resource protection
authorities were established for USDA in the 1950's and 1960's.
Clean
Water Act Brings New Emphasis --
When the Clean Water Act was passed in
1972, it triggered a new national emphasis on the problems created by poor land
and water management practices. Congress appropriately recognized the
differences between point and nonpoint sources of pollution, and it established
differing approaches to solving these distinct problems. New emphasis on water
quality concerns also occurred at USDA and it has been of critical importance to
our natural resource conservation work ever since. USDA's agencies that work on
natural resource issues -- including the Natural Resources Conservation Service,
Forest Service, Farm Service Agency, Agricultural Research Service, the
Cooperative State Research, Education, and Extension Service, and Economic
Research Service - - have emphasized water quality issues related to
agricultural and forest land management in their program delivery, research,
education, and extension efforts.
These efforts, performed in
partnership with local soil and water conservation districts, State and Federal
conservation and natural resource agencies, and owners and operators of the
land, have been instrumental in protecting our soil and water resources. For
instance, we are presently experiencing another major drought -- the most
significant drought since the Dust Bowl days. While the drought has resulted in
decreased crop and forage production and imposed financial losses on farmers and
ranchers, there is little threat of widespread natural resource degradation as
experienced during the Dust Bowl. The poor land management practices of the
1930's have been replaced by and large with sound soil erosion reduction
practices of today, such as conservation tillage, crop residue management,
terraces, and conservation buffers. On working cropland and Conservation Reserve
Program land, soil erosion caused by wind and water has been cut by 38 percent
since 1982. Less erosion means cleaner water, improved fish and wildlife
habitat, and more fertile soils. On the subject of conservation buffers, since
1997, over 1.2 million miles of conservation buffers (about 4 million acres)
have been established nationally on farms and ranches to protect water resources
and establish wildlife habitat. Locally in the Chesapeake Bay watershed, the
goal of establishing 2,010 miles of conservation buffers by the year 2010 will
be completed this year -- eight years ahead of the target!
21st Century
Opportunities --
Last September, Secretary Veneman released Food and
Agriculture Policy: Taking Stock for the New Century. This document provided
guidance on future agriculture policy, and identified emerging challenges facing
farmers and ranchers across the Nation. A key component dealt with the
environment and natural resources, and highlighted policy options for meeting a
breadth of conservation challenges including water quality and quantity. A
central aspect of the conservation portion of that document was the proposition
that market-based solutions should be developed and implemented as a means to
achieve conservation goals. The document also pointed out that farmers and
ranchers need voluntary conservation opportunities commensurate with the
regulatory challenges they face.
Congress responded this year with the
2002
Farm Bill that provides for significant program
authorities and funding levels to sustain past environmental gains, accommodate
new and emerging environmental concerns, and to adopt a portfolio approach to
conservation policies and programs. Secretary Veneman, in recent testimony
before the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry, stated that
"We are pleased with the strong conservation programs contained in the
Farm Bill. The changes in the conservation policy support this
Administration's commitment to a voluntary approach and provide the Nation's
producers with a comprehensive portfolio of conservation options including cost-
share, incentive, land retirement, and easement programs."
For example,
two provisions of the
Farm Bill will substantially strengthen
conservation efforts which complement Clean Water Act goals and objectives.
Under the 2002
Farm Bill, funding for the Environmental Quality
Incentives Program (EQIP) is increased to more than six times previously
authorized levels. As a result, USDA will be able to implement a greater number
of important conservation projects such as nutrient management and sediment
control on an accelerated basis. In the area of wetlands, the popular Wetlands
Reserve Program (WRP) was authorized by the 2002
Farm Bill for
restoration and protection of an additional 1.25 million acres. This is a total
land area roughly the size of the state of Delaware. Without question, the
opportunities presented in the
Farm Bill will lend greatly
toward reduction of nutrients and sediments in water bodies as well as reversing
wetland conversion on a national scale. The increased conservation funding may
address natural resource priorities, such as impaired waterways or critical
watersheds, allowing USDA to help advance many of the Clean Water Act's
objectives.
Year of Clean Water Activities --
In this Year of
Clean Water, America's Clean Water Foundation has coordinated a series of
national events to focus public attention on the importance of clean water. USDA
has participated in the planning of these events along with many other
co-sponsors. USDA's agencies have also conducted their own activities throughout
the year to help publicize and inform the public of clean water benefits. We
want to publicly applaud the efforts of America's Clean Water Foundation and its
President, Roberta Savage, for her tremendous job of conceiving and coordinating
these many activities. We are pleased to have been a part of this celebration
and we look forward to our involvement in this month's events.
Closing
--
In closing, allow me to provide you with an observation by Aldo
Leopold, the internationally respected scientist and conservationist who served
for 19 years in the U.S. Forest Service (1909-1928) and later served on the
faculty of the Department of Agricultural Economics at the University of
Wisconsin. As you may know, Leopold espoused the notion of a land ethic and he
said this:
"We shall never achieve harmony with land, any more than we
shall achieve absolute justice or liberty for people. In these higher
aspirations the important thing is not to achieve, but to strive."
Regarding the Clean Water Act and its 30th Anniversary Celebration, I
believe Aldo Leopold would suggest that we must continue striving to achieve the
higher aspiration of our clean water goals and to continue to help the public
adopt a sound land ethic.
Thank you again, Mr. Chairman and Members of
the Committee, for inviting USDA to participate in today's hearing. I would be
pleased to respond to your questions.
LOAD-DATE:
October 9, 2002