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Revitalize Conservation Programs and Farm
Communities in the Next Farm Bill
Americans have a great deal at stake in the next Farm Bill.
No activity is as important to the nation’s landscape and
environment as agriculture. Private crop, pasture, and rangelands
account for 50% of the land, and private forests another 20%, of the
lower 48 states. Farms account for 80% of our consumptive water use.
Farmers can provide not only food and fiber, but also clean water,
habitat for native wildlife, and other conservation benefits.
Farmers can also help reduce the threat of climate change and serve
as the frontline against sprawling development.
Widely dispersed family farms and ranches promote related
businesses and provide the economic and social backbone of many
rural economies. If helped to thrive, farms and ranches can help
secure the health and vitality of rural communities.
Farming practices can also help improve public health. Many
practices can greatly reduce human exposure to bacteria and
pesticides.
The next Farm bill, scheduled for 2002, can provide the funds to
help farmers achieve these goals for the environment, farm
communities, and public health.
As much as $100 billion could be at stake.
Annual direct payments to farmers have skyrocketed from less than
$10 billion in the early 1990s to a record $32 billion in 2000.
Through this period, annual conservation spending held constant at
less than $2 billion, a decline from 20% to 6% of spending. Without
fundamental changes, the next Farm Bill will likely average $20
billion a year for traditional farm commodity programs over the next
five or more years. But traditional agriculture programs at best
modestly advance, and to a significant extent undermine, efforts to
help family farmers, the environment, and public health.
Some members of Congress want to enact a new Farm Bill this year
that includes only “commodity” crop programs. That would leave out
conservation, forestry, research, and rural economic development
programs, as well as the full range of other traditional farm bill
programs including food stamps and nutrition.
A new Farm Bill should move comprehensively. Without a new,
broader approach, farm spending will not help most farmers,
consumers and the environment. A new Farm Bill should focus $11.8
billion per year on conservation programs and stewardship
incentives, as well as programs for research, marketing, and rural
economic development programs that support independent and
resource-conserving farms.
Challenges and Opportunities for Public Health and
the Environment:
Farmers, ranchers, and private foresters can and want to take
practical steps to enhance water supplies, wildlife habitat, and
long-term soil productivity. However, according to USDA, roughly
three out of four who seek assistance for most conservation programs
are turned away because of lack of funds. A reoriented Farm Bill can
help meet a broad array of challenges:
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Water Quality: According to the Environmental Protection
Agency, about 40% of the nation’s assessed rivers and lakes are
too polluted to allow fishing, drinking, or swimming, and
agriculture is one of the leading sources of polluted runoff. But
with sufficient incentives and support for expenses, farmers can
significantly improve water quality by changing how and when they
plow and apply fertilizer, by planting winter cover crops, by
diversifying rotations, and by restoring wetlands and streamside
buffers.
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Sprawl: Farmers and ranchers serve as the frontline
against sprawling development, but according to the USDA, more
than 2 million acres of rural land continue to be converted to
urban uses every year. Federal funds to purchase easements can
insure these lands remain in agriculture.
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Safe Food: Although America’s food supply is considered
one of the safest in the world, large numbers of Americans still
become sick each year from contaminated food, in part from
bacteria found in animals. Excessive or misused pesticides still
threaten worker and consumer health, and heavy use of antibiotics
in large feedlots for purposes other than treating animal disease
contributes to the development of drug-resistant bacteria. With
adequate support, federal programs can promote safer livestock
practices and help farmers adopt systems that use fewer
antibiotics. Programs can greatly reduce pesticide use by
encouraging such practices as crop rotations, delayed spraying
until pests are observed, and, for some farmers, transition to
organic farming.
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Native Wildlife and Endangered Species: Most imperiled
species rely heavily on private lands. According to the best
scientific estimates, the survival of one-third of the nation’s
imperiled species depends on efforts by farmers and ranchers to
preserve and enhance private woodlands, grasslands, and other
habitats, conserve water, reduce farm chemicals, and shade and
stabilize streams – efforts that need public support.
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Enhanced Pasture, Range and Private Forest Lands: Help
for farmers to preserve and enhance rangelands and private forests
and increase rotational grazing of dairy cows and other livestock
can improve water quality and preserve and improve habitat for
wildlife.
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Reduce Flood Damages: Support for farmers to restore
wetlands on frequently flooded fields can reduce flood damages
downstream as well as the need for federal disaster aid. According
to USDA estimates, its wetland conservation program
(“Swampbuster”) prevents the loss of another 6 to 13 million acres
of wetlands otherwise at risk.
- Climate Change: Many of the practices that reduce
polluted runoff or enhance wildlife habitat also help sequester
carbon, turn methane into energy, reduce nitrous oxide, and
otherwise reduce gasses that contribute to global warming. In
addition, many of the country’s best wind and solar energy
resources are located on farmlands, providing farmers an
opportunity to reduce greenhouse gases and generate income.
Challenges and Opportunities for Farmers and Farm
Communities:
Family farmers and ranchers also face serious economic problems.
When federal farm programs began, there were more than six million
farms, and today there are fewer than 2 million. While the rate of
decline in total farms has slowed in the last decade, the number of
farmers able to make a living off their farm continues to decline
sharply. Today’s farmers face increasingly concentrated and
diminished marketing alternatives, and record low prices. Farm
policies have exacerbated these declines because they primarily
support farmers only to the extent they grow large volumes of a
small number of “program crops.” Such limited policies have let
farmers down in several ways.
- They provide no direct support to two-thirds of all farmers.
- They fail to reward farmers and ranchers who meet
environmental challenges through diversified farming systems that
can be more sustainable and lighter on the land – including farms
that rely on grass for dairy or livestock, farms that produce a
diverse array of products, and farm business models that focus on
qualities other than volume.
- They encourage increased production of a few “program” crops,
which shifts lands from pasture to crops that provide less habitat
and use more fertilizer and pesticides.
- They increase the likelihood of crop surpluses, which drives
down prices for all grain and cotton farmers.
- They direct the bulk of funds to a small number of large
farms, encouraging consolidation of land into fewer hands and
failing to help many family farmers and agricultural communities.
- They provide little to help a new generation get started in
agriculture.
- They invest little in research, food production, and marketing
systems for “sustainable” farming and fail to address increasing
concentration and market access problems.
Farm programs can do more to help farmers and farm
communities.
Stewardship incentives can be shaped to support income, not just
defray some of the costs of environmental measures, and can be
offered to all kinds of farmers. Programs can help farmers make the
transition to new promising markets that reward environmental
stewardship, to diversify their production, and to find new
marketing opportunities to increase their share of the food dollar.
There is an alternative. Farm Policy Can Work Better for
Farmers, Ranchers, Private Foresters, Rural Communities, Public
Health, and the Environment.
Congress should:
- Provide stewardship payments to farmers and ranchers who
reduce fertilizer and pesticide use, prevent soil erosion, rotate
crops, adopt resource-friendly grazing systems, and manage manure
more effectively as a resource. Such programs should be structured
both to achieve environmental benefits and to support income.
- Purchase easements to preserve farmland, rangelands, and
forests threatened by sprawl.
- Create incentives for farmers to enhance and preserve native
grasslands, restore wetlands, stream buffers, and other sensitive
lands and enhance habitat for native species.
- Target farm payments more toward medium-sized and smaller
farms and support new farmer programs.
- Provide grants to help family farmers and ranchers develop
markets and add value for resource-conserving farm techniques and
diverse farm products, to retain that value in farming
communities, and to take steps to restore competition to the
marketplace.
- Increase funding for research programs to develop and test new
environmentally oriented farming techniques and systems and
marketing policies to assist family farmers to meet resource
conservation and farm income goals.
- Increase the technical assistance needed to deliver programs
and respond to farmer needs.
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