School's out for the Farm Bill
by Brian DeVoreWith the Food, Conservation and Energy Act of 2008 finally wrapping up, the Land Stewardship Project has developed a report card on where the legislation finally landed in terms of conservation, local food systems, sustainable agriculture and family farmers. Overall, we give it a C-. Not exactly honor roll material, but the initiatives that keep this bill from being a farm country flunker turn out to be pretty key. See for yourself by clicking here.
October 31st, 2008 at 5:56 pm
[...] Solberg says that natural resource professionals are starting to come around on the “working lands conservation” concept as they increasingly see firsthand how farmers can balance production and conservation. It doesn’t hurt that science is starting to back up this idea with some solid research results. Even state and federal government is beginning to see that farmland and wildland shouldn’t be two unrelated entities locked away in their own separate boxes. The 2008 Farm Bill, while highly flawed, did provide some key resources for the Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP), an initiative that is nothing short of revolutionary in its support for farming that benefits the environment (check out LSP’s latest CSP fact sheet here). [...]
May 15th, 2009 at 3:17 pm
[...] The fact that funds are set aside for these two purposes is a major breakthrough in federal farm policy; it was backed by LSP and supported by U.S. House Agriculture Committee Chair Collin Peterson during the debate on the 2008 Farm Bill. [...]
October 2nd, 2009 at 9:34 pm
[...] policy has been a barrier, especially when the government makes it clear it values monocrops of corn more than a diverse mix [...]