ShareThisMinnesota will be the nation's first test site for a federal program designed to stem the flow of agricultural pollution strangling some of the country's great bodies of water, including the Chesapeake Bay, the Gulf of Mexico and the Mississippi River.
At the Capitol Tuesday, Gov. Mark Dayton announced Minnesota's leading role in the project with Tom Vilsack, U.S. secretary of agriculture, and Lisa Jackson, administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
They are promoting the pilot project as the start of an ambitious federal strategy that, in essence, would give farmers a green seal of approval if they voluntarily choose to put land conservation and water quality ahead of crop yields.
Behind the new strategy is a combination of political and fiscal realities, officials said: The public is increasingly concerned about clean water. But imposing environmental rules on farmers faces insurmountable political hurdles. At the same time, funding for longstanding farm conservation programs is facing major cutbacks in the upcoming farm bill, victim of both the federal budget crunch and the anti-regulatory fervor in Washington.
Farmers who participate would agree to follow land management practices that slow soil erosion and runoff of fertilizers, pesticides and manure into streams and groundwater. In exchange, they would get financial and technical support and be protected against new environmental requirements during the life of their agreement, perhaps as long as 10 years.
Participating farmers would also be certified through the new Agricultural Water Quality Certification Program, a seal of approval that could be used as a marketing tool and, eventually, on consumer products.
But the plan is generating sharp criticism from some conservation and water-quality advocates. They say 40 years of voluntary efforts have been insufficient to reduce farm runoff that dumps sediment, bacteria and other pollutants into rivers and streams -- despite the 1970s-era federal Clean Water Act's requirements to clearly identify specific sources of water pollution.
Skeptics say the new plan would exempt farmers from specific requirements to reduce their contribution to overall runoff, creating an unfair burden for cities, sewage treatment plants and other landowners who will be asked to bear significant costs to achieve water-quality standards.
Vilsack said Minnesota was chosen as the test site because it's a big agricultural state. It's also home of the headwaters of the Mississippi, a river with so much agricultural pollution that it's created a massive "dead zone" at its mouth in the Gulf of Mexico.
Funding most likely would be determined by the next federal farm bill, which Congress is expected to take up this year, Vilsack said. Already, congressional leaders have made it clear that the popular Conservation Reserve Program, in which farmers are paid to set aside environmentally sensitive land, will be cut -- perhaps drastically.
Environmental groups and other experts say the critical issue will be whether the program is incorporated with specific cleanup plans. Researchers have found a tenfold increase this century in the amount of sediment from the Minnesota River valley entering the Mississippi, largely because of heavily cultivated corn and soybeans replacing native prairie.
If the new program integrates farmers into a targeted cleanup plan for the Minnesota and Mississippi rivers, it might work, said Whitney Clark, executive director of Friends of the Mississippi, an environmental advocacy group. But if it simply protects farmers from having to make real changes to slow the loss of water and soil from their land, then it won't.
Others say the certification program will be a significant improvement.
"It's a great opportunity for Minnesota to help lead the way, and for us to use our financial and technical assistance to expand conservation," Vilsack said.
(Contact Josephine Marcotty at josephine.marcotty(at)startribune.com.)
(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.scrippsnews.com.)
Editors: This story is for print use only. Must credit Minneapolis Star Tribune
