Farm Bill Funds Can Help Water Quality, Sprawl & Wildlife

Food for Thought, a new report, shows America’s most pressing environmental problems cannot be solved unless farm spending is refocused to give farmers and ranchers incentives to help the environment. The report is available at www.environmentaldefense.org.

“Less than ten percent of the money Congress spends now helps farmers help the environment. The remainder actually harms the environment,” said Tim Searchinger, principal author of the report and an Environmental Defense senior attorney. “Only farmers and ranchers can solve many of our country’s biggest environmental problems. Its time for Congress to help them,” said Searchinger.

Farmland occupies half of this country’s land, and many current farming practices help make agriculture the nation’s leading source of water pollution and problems for endangered species. If given the right incentives, however, farmers can use proven techniques to provide clean water and restore imperiled species. Farms can serve as a bulwark against sprawl and can be part of the solution to global warming.

Two thirds of all farmers receive no direct financial farm support, according to the report, and most of the remainder is targeted at the tiny percentage of largest farms. Many major farming states receive almost no support at all. Meanwhile, three quarters of all farmers and ranchers seeking support to help the environment are turned away because of a lack of funds. Traditional programs can cause crop surpluses and low prices that drive out family farms. Programs that reward environmental stewardship would give more help to family farmers than traditional farm programs.

The report also discusses how farm programs can preserve and enhance private forests and address critical public health concerns, including growing problems with antibiotic-resistant diseases, and pesticides.

The upcoming Farm Bill will spend almost three times as much money each year as the last Farm Bill (1996). The House Agriculture Committee will start to mark-up its bill Thursday, which is expected to mirror past Farm Bill spending patterns. However, the Working Lands Stewardship Act (HR 2375), with eighty bi-partisan co-sponsors, devotes roughly one third of its funds to conservation incentives.

Food for Thought was also authored by American Farmland Trust, Center for Science in the Public Interest, Defenders of Wildlife, Environmental Working Group and Trout Unlimited.