As harvest season wraps up across much of the U.S., farmers are battling intensified climate upheaval–drought, flooding, and destructive seasonal disruptions that pose huge challenges to reaping the bounty we’ve grown accustomed to, from the field to the marketplace and our plates.
Meanwhile, it’s farm bill season in Washington, D.C., where policymakers’ decisions will define future harvests and agriculture’s impact on the growing climate emergency. With a newly minted speaker in place, Republicans are now pushing hard to pass a new farm bill that could set back vital progress on the climate crisis, food aid to the poor, and more.
The current farm bill expired Sept. 30, and funding for many farm programs ends Dec. 31. Democrats are urging against cuts to conservation and other farm bill programs, while lawmakers are "quietly debating" extending the current law via the next emergency budget measure in November.
But the climate crisis demands bolder action. Amid record heat and rain across much of the U.S. this year, Congress must address agriculture’s hefty climate impacts–and help farmers adapt and become more resilient to climate upheaval. The farm bill can make a huge difference in how U.S. agriculture impacts–and experiences–the climate crisis.
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According to EPA estimates, agriculture makes up roughly 10 percent of U.S. climate-harming emissions (however, international analyses repeatedly put agriculture’s emissions at one-third of worldwide greenhouse gasses). Despite many well-documented solutions, the farming sector has failed to reduce its huge climate footprint even while other industries have made some progress. Without serious changes, experts project agricultural emissions to soar in coming years.
Industrial livestock production alone generates a remarkable 36 percent of all methane emissions in the U.S., more than the oil and gas industries. A recent study found that the livestock industry's air pollution is responsible for more than 12,700 deaths per year — more deaths than are attributed to coal-fired power plants.
Record heat and drought severely threatened this year’s soybean crop’s yield and quality, High Plains Journal reported. Across much of the “breadbasket” region including Kansas, Nebraska, and parts of Texas and Missouri, extended drought and heat waves have taxed withering water reserves while harming crop production.
This past summer, “food went weird,” The Guardian reported: “In Texas, farmers reported smaller yields as their corn and cotton crops struggled to survive soaring summer temperatures. In Arizona, beekeepers spotted dead honey bees outside hives. Even underwater, off the coast of Long Island, kelp farmers recorded another year of shrinking yields.”
Farmers aren’t the only ones suffering.Farmworkers are at severe risk of serious injury and death from heat exposures, and are still not protected by any national heat standard.
The farm bill, a legislative behemoth spanning agricultural and nutrition and food stamps policies, is a critical opportunity to address this harvest of upheaval.
A nationwide coalition of several hundred organizations is urging Congress to prioritize soil conservation funds to rebuild farmland soils ravaged by decades of over-farming and toxic chemical fertilizers. Restoring and revitalizing soil can play a pivotal role in storing carbon and making farmlands more resilient to climate chaos.
To create a more sustainable and resilient harvest, the farm bill must, at a minimum, fund these climate-restoring priorities:
- Protect Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) conservation funding and utilize IRA Conservation funding to rebuild America’s soils.
- Support conservation practices and promote organic farming
- Promote crop insurance that incentivizes healthy soil practices.
- Secure funding for research & on-farm education and technical assistance to farmers.
- Ensure funding for strong regional food infrastructure.
One promising bill that would move these critical goals forward is Rep. Chellie Pingree’s Agriculture Resilience Act (ARA), which has 44 cosponsors in the House of Representatives. The measure would provide funds and incentives for farmers to improve soil health, protect farmlands, expand pasture-based livestock systems that can help reduce methane emissions, and boost on-farm renewable energy.
The ARA would significantly advance on climate-healing progress made in the Inflation Reduction Act by funding climate and agriculture research, supporting markets for regenerative meat, boosting local and regional marketing for sustainable products, and addressing food waste and composting. Pingree’s far-reaching bill would transform our nation’s food and farming, helping to expand critical climate-restoring approaches such as agroforestry, organic farming, farmland protection, pasture-based systems, conservation set-asides, manure management, and agriculture-based renewable energy systems, making America’s food and farming more sustainable and resilient.
Another critical piece of the solution is the Opportunities in Organic Act, which would support food and farming businesses to make the jump to organic, making certification more affordable and providing resources for farmers to go organic and stay organic. Despite organic’s popularity, less than one percent of America’s farmland is organic—a massive shortcoming that directly harms our health and climate through toxic pesticides and fertilizers derived from fossil fuels.
To restore our climate and protect our environment, we must also reject harmful legislation currently within the farm bill, such as the Agricultural Labeling Uniformity Act, which would prevent states and localities from enacting stronger-than-federal protections against pesticides that threaten environmental and human health. This measure, spearheaded by Republicans, violates state and local control in the name of blocking laws that would protect our health and environment.
More directly, this preemption law by Rep. Rusty Johnson (R-SD)and Rep. Jim Costa (D-CA) is "a blatant attempt to preempt California from issuing cancer warnings on products–like Roundup and its active ingredient, glyphosate–that have the potential to cause cancer," said Center for Food Safety attorney Amy van Saun. Numerous peer-reviewed studies and meta-analyses have documented that glyphosate poses significant risks for causing cancer and non-Hodgkin lymphoma.
The intensifying climate crisis is directly harming farmers, farmworkers, and consumers in countless ways. There is no time to waste, and we cannot afford any steps backward that enable more toxic chemicals and more greenhouse gas emissions that harm our health and environment. We are all paying the price in our taxes, in massive crop losses and insurance, in farmland destruction from climate upheaval, and more. This is one of new House Speaker Mike Johnson’s first big tests. It’s time for a farm bill that heals and restores our health, our climate, and our farmlands, for our collective future.
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