How should Congress amend the Farm Bill so that payments have a greater positive ecological impact?
The U.S Department of Agriculture spends roughly $20 billion per year on payments to farmers, with about $5 billion of that delivered through the conservation title. It offers the single greatest opportunity for the public to assist private landowners in providing ecosystem services, like clean water, biodiversity and climate regulation. However, the funds are not invested according to any coherent strategy and the ecological outcomes are largely unknown.
One proposal is to eliminate the subsidy for corn ethanol. Adding corn ethanol to gasoline does not contribute to a meaningful reduction to greenhouse gases, causes the price of food to increase, and encourages continued degradation of the Midwestern landscape with heavy applications of fertilizers and pesticides.
Another proposal is to restructure the payments in the conservation title to be more strategic and more focused on ecological outcomes rather than practices. The potential advantages would be to demonstrate to the public what tangible benefits are gained from the investments and possibly to simplify the delivery. Some potential unintended consequences could be a disproportionate focus on ecological outcomes that can be easily measured, like water quality improvements, and lack of attention to biodiversity and other services that are difficult to quantify. Another potential downside might be spending too much money on the perfecting of measurement tools relative to the conservation benefits.
What do you think Congress should do to improve the ecological effectiveness of the Farm Bill?
Comments
Perhaps they could widen the
Perhaps they could widen the corn ethanol subsidy to a biofuels subsidy, with a time limit of ten or twenty years during which the scientific and economic communities could study the outcomes to see if these processes are ecologically and financially feasible. For example, there are studies going on to use switchgrass, Panicum virgatum, native to much of the US, as an alternative to corn. Here's an article from Scientific American about switchgrass as a biofuel: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=grass-makes-better-etha...
Even though there are many studies showing that corn is not a sustainable biofuel, I'd hesitate to eliminate the subsidy without a grace period or some program to help corn ethanol producers switch to a more viable alternative.
Conservation Tenders
Conservation Tenders -conservation leases sold at auction and linked to performance outcomes- have been used in Australia as a mechanism to create the market needed to develop supply & demand curves that allow efficiency analysis. See Dr. Jon Rolfe's work at Central Queensland University for details. http://cem.cqu.edu.au/FCWViewer/staff.do?Sid=ROLFEJ
Resource-Driven - The
Resource-Driven - The National Assocation of State Conservation Agencies received funding and support from the USDA to evaluate the nation's conservation delivery system. In its 2007 report, it recommended that the conservation delivery system reverse its current trend of a program-driven system back to a resource-driven process. I think this recommendation would be aligned with your mentioned proposal to focus on ecological outcomes. I think your concerns (unintended consequences) are valid, particularly in the early years, but they could be tempered with some foresight and guidelines. One consequence of this may be the shift of debate toward the measurements and outcomes rather than programs and dollars that naturally creates silos in politics, administration, legislation, process and implementation. In the longer term, the ecological outcome approach is really the only viable option if there is a desire to integrate corporate, industry, retail and government ecoservice policy. Under the government program system, all the responsibilty falls on the agency and farmer, and other stakeholders have a real hard time participating in a meaningful manner.
Sara, I'm with you on the
Sara, I'm with you on the ethanol issue - the pesticides from roundup ready seeds are starting to show up in tribs to the Mississippi - all inputs and expanded cropping may well be impacting the Gulf in addition to all other issues - oil spill, etc. The seed monopolies subsidized in grain pricing and grain finished beef controlling the mainstream beef market - that entire cycle needs to be broken - chemical companies controlling our food production and we pay for it - outrageous. Oilseed based cropping and algal fuel production need to be encouraged for many reasons - water quality is not the least of these. More attention needs to be paid to infusing "currencies" for ecosystem services, as well. I had Mr. Geiseke's EcoCommerce101 in mind when I was signing in - performance and outcome based "resource driven" policies that optimize soil and water health should be the focus.
Best regards, K. Love
Practice towards Ecological I
Practice towards Ecological
I certainly agree with removing the subsidy for corn ethanol. It has gone on for too long past the point where science proved it is a no win for the environment. In addition to being a determent to the world's poor.
I also like the idea of focusing on ecological outcomes, but share your concerns about measurement of the outcomes. It might be a bit too early. Long range planning could make that the future solution. In the mean time, there needs to be some standardization of measurements. Practice based payments seem to be do-able now. It would be nice if the history and outcomes of these practices became available in a database allowing for adjustments to be made and for others to learn from mistakes and successes. Landscape solutions should be the ideal rather than focusing on one particular ecosystem service.
If you are looking for a
If you are looking for a stronger focus on ecological outcomes, why not look at expanding the conservation stewardship program (CSP) to become a true green box payment that pays producers based on how they farm (environmental protection) instead on what they farm and what the price is? Also, we need USDA NRCS to have a in stream monitoring program that partners with state conservation agencies to quantify what works or doesn't work as far as land treatment and improved waterquality. The monitoring should be in stream and continuse unlike the current program that is only edge of field.
Richard Wineberg •
Richard Wineberg • Disclosure- I currently receive payments under the Conservation Reserve Program .
It seems that with so many of its users taking their land out of it to take advantage of high grain prices, that there would be a lot of funding available for enhanced programs. Maybe they could phase in a carbon component to the existing program array. Using google earth,vcs methodologies, and existing soil maps, it wouldnt really be that hard to estimate carbon accumulations in many situations...it could start as an experimental program adding a per ton of C payment to the ongoing payments structure. And yes, take a look at Australia's and other countries programs for ideas.
Roger Harris • One idea
Roger Harris • One idea would be to reward farmers for returning to the use of rotation and fallow years as a means to boost production and protect from pests. Before the advent of modern agrochemicals, these techniques were capable of feeding large populations. Rotation and fallow years will result in higher biodiversity than repetitive monoculture until the soil is exhausted and we have created super-resistant pests.
Bob Bloomfield • Top line
Bob Bloomfield • Top line issues:
To get farmers to think that they are actually providing ecosystem services - not just crops. e.g how can they be rewarded for providing secure water catchment, preventing erossion; ensuring water is not contaminated with fertilisers and pesticides; helping mitigate against flood and drought; that they are providing refuge for biodiversity etc.
That they seek to protect biodiverity as part of their function - using schemes such as Conservation Grade farming certification for example. In addition looking at the benefits to farming in these mechanisms - particularly in boosting preditior and micro-parasitiod species such as wasps etc. as well as pollinator species - which can impact posititively on productivity and the bottom-line.