Washington, D.C. (NAWG Newsletter) -Ag Groups: Bay Bill Could Impose Excessive Regulation
Organizations representing wheat and corn growers in the Chesapeake Bay region provided input this week to leaders of a Senate Environment and Public Works subcommittee considering a bill that could drastically expand Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) jurisdiction over agricultural operations in that area.
A letter sent Monday to correspond with a subcommittee hearing on the issue specifically addressed S. 1816, a bill to reauthorize the Chesapeake Bay program under the Clean Water Act (CWA). S. 1816 would codify a May 2009 executive order and give EPA and other federal agencies broad and undefined new authorities despite the fact that many reports and most milestones required by the executive order are still being drafted and are not yet public.
For instance, the bill would codify court-ordered Total Maximum Daily Loads (TMDLs) while shortening the process for TMDL completion, imposing burdensome regulations and penalties before procedures and practices are defined.
Bill language also significantly expands EPA authority to withhold state funds, withhold current and new permits and supersede state and local programs. The legislation carries strong penalties with short timeframes for correction, leaving no flexibility for agricultural practices like harvest or weather occurrences.
The groups told EPW leaders that, with respect to water quality, agriculture is the Chesapeake Bay watershed’s most effective and efficient land use, but the economic costs imposed by S. 1816 would likely mean many farms would be sold for less-desirable uses like housing developments.
The coalition – made up of NAWG, Maryland Grain Producers Association, New York Corn Growers Association, Virginia Grain Producers Association and National Corn Growers Association – wrote, in part:
“We ask that you carefully consider the broad implications of this legislation for production agriculture and the important role our industry will play in assuring water quality. This legislation subjugates state and local actions to the approval of federal authority through the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Our producers and members are concerned about the requirements established by this legislation with little or no consideration to economic impact or future growth.”
The groups argued the efforts to achieve Chesapeake Bay water quality should be cooperative rather than strictly regulatory and encouraged the Water and Wildlife Subcommittee to reauthorize the Chesapeake Bay Program without substantive changes.
The Chesapeake legislation is one of a number of efforts to clarify or amend the Clean Water Act, with the effect of broadly expanding EPA jurisdiction over agricultural activities.
In January, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals handed down the first U.S. court ruling that pesticide discharge is a point source of pollution subject to additional regulation and permitting under the CWA.
The pending Clean Water Restoration Act would remove the term “navigable” from the definition of the “waters of the United States” in the CWA, clarifying a concept questioned in court many times in recent years, but also dramatically expanding EPA’s regulatory jurisdiction.
A Web archive of Monday’s hearing on S. 1816 and other water legislation can be accessed http://www.epw.senate.gov under “Hearings”.
EPA Takes Next Step to Regulate Greenhouse Gases
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Lisa Jackson said this week that her Agency has submitted its greenhouse gas (GHG) endangerment finding to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), which will have 90 days to review it before EPA can move forward with setting GHG regulations.
A 2007 Supreme Court ruling gave the EPA authority to regulate six greenhouse gases if they contribute to air pollution that may endanger public health or welfare. In April, EPA issued a proposed endangerment finding, which is the first step to regulation under this ruling.
Assuming OMB approves the finding, new regulations applying to motor vehicle emissions could be in place as early as spring 2010. It is widely expected that regulations on emissions from stationary sources would soon follow.
Jackson told Reuters news service that EPA received more than 300,000 comments in response to its proposed endangerment finding.
The finding and regulation that will follow it are the major impetus for many of those in Congress, the Administration and industry working toward climate change legislation.
The Senate Finance Committee held a hearing this week about climate change legislation’s potential effects on jobs.
Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.), the lone vote against the Boxer/Kerry draft approved last week by the Senate’s Environment and Public Works Committee, said in his opening statement, “I am committed to passing meaningful, balanced climate?change legislation. I am committed to legislation that will protect our land and those whose livelihood depends on it,” presumably including wheat and other producers in his home state.
Also, this week, the 25x’25 coalition released a study done by the University of Tennessee looking at the effects of climate change legislation on agriculture. It contended that net returns for virtually all major crops are positive under a “properly constructed” cap-and-trade program, but if carbon emissions are regulated by EPA as prescribed under the 2007 ruling, net farm income is projected to fall below baseline projections.
Growers Urged to Contact Members on Cuba Legislation
NAWG, U.S. Wheat Associates and other agricultural organizations are urging growers to contact their Members of Congress about the importance of passing legislation to ease trade restrictions with Cuba.
Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin Peterson (D-Minn.) will be introducing legislation with Rep. Jerry Moran (R-Kan.), Agriculture Appropriations Chair Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.), and Rep. Jo Ann Emerson (R-Mo.) to expand agricultural trade to Cuba and are looking for original cosponsors.
Cuba relies on imports for most of its food needs and, between 2000 and 2006, Cuba’s food and agricultural imports nearly doubled. Agricultural producers in the United States are well positioned to benefit from additional trade in Cuba, but current U.S. policy hampers their ability to supply the Cuban market.
The Peterson/Moran legislation would:
• provide a direct payment provision for Cuban buyers, eliminating the need to go through banks in other countries to conduct agricultural trades.
• revise the current "payment of cash in advance" regulation by requiring agricultural exports to Cuba meet the same payment requirements as exports to other countries.
• allow U.S. citizens to travel to Cuba, reducing the bureaucratic red tape currently required for agricultural associations, agribusinesses and others to make agricultural sales in the country.
NAWG and U.S. Wheat have long supported any effort to ease trade restrictions with Cuba, which cost the U.S. wheat industry an estimated $40 million per year, and NAWG asks all interested wheat producers to contact their Members and urge them to sign on to the Peterson/Moran bill.
USDA Research Under Secretary Moves to USAID
The Obama Administration announced this week that current USDA Under Secretary for Research, Education and Economics (REE) Dr. Rajiv Shah would be nominated as the administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).
USAID, part of the State Department, is the principal U.S. agency that extends assistance to countries recovering from disaster, trying to escape poverty and engaging in democratic reforms. It has a number of agriculture-related functions, including administering food aid programs, acting on ag development programs and contributing to international research agencies, including the international research group working most heavily on wheat, CIMMYT.
In making the announcement, President Barack Obama said Shah “brings fresh ideas and the dedication and impressive background necessary to help guide USAID.”
Shah was just confirmed to the REE post this spring, though his short tenure has included the launch of the National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA), meant to be a new scientific institute that can elevate the status and funding of agricultural research to be more in line with other major scientific groups, like the National Institutes of Health.
Before going to USDA, Shah was director for agricultural development at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. He also worked on health care policy for the Gore 2000 presidential campaign, served as a member of Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell’s transition committee on health and served as a policy aide in the British Parliament and at the World Health Organization.
Shah earned his M.D. from the University of Pennsylvania Medical School and a master’s of science in health economics at the Wharton School of Business. He has attended the London School of Economics and is a graduate of the University of Michigan.
Coppock Travels to Scotland to Talk Wheat Yields, Biotech
NAWG CEO Daren Coppock traveled to Glasgow, Scotland, this week to participate in the British Crop Production Council (BCPC) Congress.
The importance of a continual flow of new technology in wheat production was emphasized at the meeting, at which Coppock presented twice on behalf of U.S. producers.
In a plenary session on Monday, Coppock showed the production and yield trends on a global basis for wheat and made the point that current trajectories will fall far short of the oft-cited need to double production by 2050.
This level of need was projected by the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization in 2008, when global wheat production was about 700 million metric tons. Doubling that number by 2050 would require production of 1.4 billion MT in 2050, but current growth in wheat production globally will lead only to a production number of just over 1.0 billion MT. Without some sort of changed paradigm – most likely from new technology – global wheat production will fall 380 million MT below the anticipated need in 2050.
Coppock went into detail on declining production and acreage trends and relatively flat yield curve in United States wheat production, pointing out that these trends will make hitting the target even more difficult from a U.S. perspective.
“Improvements in productivity have always come from new technology,” he said. NAWG’s strategic goal of a 20 percent improvement in yields in the decade leading up to 2018 “will not be achieved by any single technology, but by a combination of technologies that will certainly include biotechnology.”
Coppock was joined on the general session panel by Dominic Dyer, chief executive of the United Kingdom’s Crop Protection Association; Dr. Mark Avery, director of conservation with the United Kingdom’s Royal Society for the Protection of Birds; and Dr. Julian Little, chairman of the UK Agricultural Biotechnology Council.
The general question posed to the panel was whether agricultural science and technology is the only solution for long term food supply sustainability. Julian Little’s response summed up a majority of the afternoon’s discussion: “Will new technology be the only answer? Probably not. But without it we don’t stand a chance.”
Growers Talk to Broadcasters; Audio and Photos Online
NAWG President Karl Scronce and NAWG Immediate Past President David Cleavinger, talked biotechnology, trade, climate change and the process for hiring a new NAWG CEO at Thursday’s Trade Talk, the National Association of Farm Broadcasting’s annual interview fair.
Trade Talk allows farm organization leadership to meet with dozens of reporters in just a few hours at a one-day trade show.
NAWG and U.S. Wheat share booths at Trade Talk and other farm media conventions. U.S. Wheat Associates Vice Chairman Don Schieber represented U.S. Wheat at this year’s event, focusing his comments on the value international buyers can achieve from U.S. wheat in the current market. NAWG Director of Communications Melissa George Kessler and U.S. Wheat Director of Communications Steve Mercer, also attended.
Cleavinger, Kessler and Mercer also participated with the National Agri-Marketing Association’s 2009 Trends in Agriculture conference, held Tuesday and Wednesday. Cleavinger spoke on a panel Tuesday afternoon about how he uses technology and coalitions in his farm operation. Mercer was the chairman of the 2009 Trends in Agriculture program.
