- SOIL HEALTH PRACTICES AND PROGRAMS THAT SUPPORT REGENERATIVE AGRICULTURE

[House Hearing, 117 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]

SOIL HEALTH PRACTICES AND PROGRAMS THAT SUPPORT REGENERATIVE
AGRICULTURE

=======================================================================

HEARING

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED SEVENTEENTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

__________

SEPTEMBER 14, 2022

__________

Serial No. 117-38

[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

Printed for the use of the Committee on Agriculture
agriculture.house.gov

______

U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE

49-701 PDF WASHINGTON : 2022

COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE

DAVID SCOTT, Georgia, Chairman

JIM COSTA, California GLENN THOMPSON, Pennsylvania,
JAMES P. McGOVERN, Massachusetts Ranking Minority Member
ALMA S. ADAMS, North Carolina, Vice AUSTIN SCOTT, Georgia
Chair ERIC A. ``RICK'' CRAWFORD,
ABIGAIL DAVIS SPANBERGER, Virginia Arkansas
JAHANA HAYES, Connecticut SCOTT DesJARLAIS, Tennessee
SHONTEL M. BROWN, Ohio VICKY HARTZLER, Missouri
BOBBY L. RUSH, Illinois DOUG LaMALFA, California
CHELLIE PINGREE, Maine RODNEY DAVIS, Illinois
GREGORIO KILILI CAMACHO SABLAN, RICK W. ALLEN, Georgia
Northern Mariana Islands DAVID ROUZER, North Carolina
ANN M. KUSTER, New Hampshire TRENT KELLY, Mississippi
CHERI BUSTOS, Illinois DON BACON, Nebraska
SEAN PATRICK MALONEY, New York DUSTY JOHNSON, South Dakota
STACEY E. PLASKETT, Virgin Islands JAMES R. BAIRD, Indiana
TOM O'HALLERAN, Arizona CHRIS JACOBS, New York
SALUD O. CARBAJAL, California TROY BALDERSON, Ohio
RO KHANNA, California MICHAEL CLOUD, Texas
AL LAWSON, Jr., Florida TRACEY MANN, Kansas
J. LUIS CORREA, California RANDY FEENSTRA, Iowa
ANGIE CRAIG, Minnesota MARY E. MILLER, Illinois
JOSH HARDER, California BARRY MOORE, Alabama
CYNTHIA AXNE, Iowa KAT CAMMACK, Florida
KIM SCHRIER, Washington MICHELLE FISCHBACH, Minnesota
JIMMY PANETTA, California MAYRA FLORES, Texas
SANFORD D. BISHOP, Jr., Georgia BRAD FINSTAD, Minnesota
MARCY KAPTUR, Ohio
SHARICE DAVIDS, Kansas

______

Anne Simmons, Staff Director

Parish Braden, Minority Staff Director

(ii)

C O N T E N T S

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Page
Adams, Hon. Alma S., a Representative in Congress from North
Carolina; submitted statement on behalf of Environmental
Working Group.................................................. 77
Allen, Hon. Rick W., a Representative in Congress from Georgia,
submitted article.............................................. 78
Scott, Hon. David, a Representative in Congress from Georgia,
opening statement.............................................. 1
Prepared statement........................................... 2
Thompson, Hon. Glenn, a Representative in Congress from
Pennsylvania, opening statement................................ 3

Witnesseses

Moyer, Jeffrey W., Chief Executive Officer, Rodale Institute,
Kutztown, PA................................................... 6
Prepared statement........................................... 8
Supplementary material....................................... 87
Submitted question........................................... 104
Nygren, Steve, Founder & Chief Executive Officer, Serenbe,
Chattahoochee Hills, GA........................................ 11
Prepared statement........................................... 13
McCarty, Ken, Partner, McCarty Family Farms LLC, Colby, KS....... 17
Prepared statement........................................... 19
Clark, Rick, Owner, Farm Green & Clark Land and Cattle,
Williamsport, IN; on behalf of Regenerate America.............. 20
Prepared statement........................................... 22
Submitted questions.......................................... 105
Larson, Ph.D., Rebecca L., Chief Scientist and Vice President,
Government Affairs, Western Sugar Cooperative, Denver, CO...... 37
Prepared statement........................................... 39
Supplementary material....................................... 98

SOIL HEALTH PRACTICES AND PROGRAMS THAT SUPPORT REGENERATIVE
AGRICULTURE

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WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 14, 2022

House of Representatives,
Committee on Agriculture,
Washington, D.C.
The Committee met, pursuant to call, at 10:00 a.m., in Room
1300 of the Longworth House Office Building, Hon. David Scott
of Georgia [Chairman of the Committee] presiding.
Members present: David Scott of Georgia, Costa, McGovern,
Adams, Spanberger, Hayes, Brown, Pingree, Sablan, Kuster,
Maloney, Plaskett, O'Halleran, Carbajal, Craig, Harder, Axne,
Schrier, Panetta, Bishop, Davids, Thompson, DesJarlais,
LaMalfa, Allen, Kelly, Bacon, Johnson, Baird, Mann, Feenstra,
Miller, Cammack, Fischbach, Flores, and Finstad.
Staff present: Lyron Blum-Evitts, Ellis Collier, Ashley
Smith, Michael Stein, Kelcy Schaunaman, Adele Borne, Josh
Maxwell, Ricki Schroeder, Patricia Straughn, and Dana Sandman.

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. DAVID SCOTT, A REPRESENTATIVE IN
CONGRESS FROM GEORGIA

The Chairman. Welcome, everyone, and welcome. And I thank
you for joining us today. And the Committee will come to order.
This is an important hearing, ladies and gentlemen, because
we can do without a lot of things, but one thing we cannot do
without is food. And there are a number of critical issues
threatening the future of our food supply. And we are going to
really get into a very important process that must be done if
we are going to prevent a food shortage. That is how important
this hearing is.
And after my opening statement, Members will receive
testimony from our outstanding witnesses today, and then the
hearing will be open for questions.
And now, before we get to the business today, I would like
to take a moment and yield to our distinguished Ranking Member,
Mr. Thompson, for a very important announcement about our
newest Member.
Mr. Thompson. Well, Mr. Chairman, thank you so much. I
would like to reiterate the Chairman's comments in welcoming
Representative Finstad to the House Agriculture Committee. Brad
is the operator of a family farm and has held numerous
positions where he has served as a valuable voice for farmers
in rural communities, including State Director for USDA's Rural
Development in Minnesota, Executive Director of the Minnesota
Turkey Growers Association, area director with the Minnesota
Farm Bureau, and more.
And so given his extensive background, his knowledge, and
experience in agriculture, I can't think of another committee
that would be better served by Brad's presence. So welcome,
Brad, and we look forward to working with you. And, Mr.
Chairman, I yield back.
The Chairman. Very fine. Welcome, Brad. Good to have you
with us.
Ladies and gentlemen, today, our farmers, our ranchers, our
foresters are able to use USDA's technical and financial
assistance to support a variety of ways to increase soil
health. This is what is so important today. Our food comes from
the soil. The soil, the earth is the start of our food supply
chain, and that is why we wanted to have this hearing, so we
could share the latest information about regenerative farming,
what we must do to enrich our soil. That is the way we make
sure that we have food security.
And I want to just thank so many people who have been
active in this and been putting it together, and I want to
first mention Kiss the Ground, an extraordinary film that
opened my eyes to much of what I was only dimly aware. And Mr.
Finian Makepeace, what a name, Makepeace, did an extraordinary
job. And I am going to show a small clip of it. Mr. Makepeace,
thank you. You have really opened our eyes to what we need to
certainly address and supply the support that we need for
regenerative agriculture.
And additionally, I want to mention the exciting work being
funded by the Partnerships for Climate-Smart Commodities
Program that is being led by my good friend, Agriculture
Secretary Tom Vilsack with the USDA. And just this morning,
Secretary Vilsack announced funding for $25 million to the
outstanding Rodale Institute to be able to work with the
University of Georgia and Emory University in my state, that I
represent here in Congress, Georgia. And it will help our farm
producers expand their markets, their produce, while reducing
greenhouse gas emissions, educating consumers, and developing
technology that will improve scalability of their model. This
is so important, and I am so very supportive of what Secretary
Vilsack is doing with this program. And this project is one of
70 receiving funding. And of course, with it being in Georgia,
I can assure you that it will be most successful.
[The prepared statement of Mr. David Scott follows:]

Prepared Statement of Hon. David Scott, a Representative in Congress
from Georgia
Good morning and welcome to today's important hearing on soil
health and the existing practices and programs that support producers
as they protect and improve the health of the soil.
For decades, USDA programs have provided producers with support to
address their resource concerns. As a matter of fact, the Natural
Resources Conservation Service began as the Soil Conservation Service,
with an original focus primarily on soil health and erosion.
Today, farmers, ranchers, and foresters are able to use USDA's
technical and financial assistance to support a variety of ways to
increase soil health. Addressing soil health helps improve their
operations and has additional benefits such as increased water
retention and carbon sequestration in the soil.
I would be remiss if I didn't mention the work of the many
advocates and innovators who have driven awareness among producers and
the public, alike. For example, the excellent moving documentary Kiss
the Ground directed by Mr. Finian Makepeace who is here with us today
that brought attention to soil health. I am thrilled to play a short
clip here today created by individuals involved in that documentary
that provides agricultural producers' perspectives on practices and
programs that support regenerative agriculture.
I would like to thank our witnesses here today, as well as their
supporters. I would also like to thank those who are not able to be
here today but have made significant contributions as advocates for
innovation in agriculture.
Additionally, I would be remiss if I did not use this opportunity
to mention the exciting work being funded by the Partnerships for
Climate-Smart Commodities Program at USDA. Just this morning Secretary
Vilsack announced funding of $25 million for the Rodale Institute
working with the University of Georgia and Emory University to help
producers expand markets for their produce, while reducing greenhouse
gas emissions, educating consumers, and developing technology that will
improve scalability of their model. This is so important and I am so
very supportive of what Secretary Vilsack is doing with this program.
This project is just one of 70 receiving funding, but with it being in
Georgia, I am sure it will be the most successful.
Now I would like to play a clip from the producers of Kiss the
Ground.

Video Can Be Viewed Here *
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* Editor's note: the video is retained in Committee file; and is
available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=npk_eZ0W0kM.

With that, I'd now like to welcome the distinguished Ranking
Member, the gentleman from Pennsylvania, Mr. Thompson, for any opening
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
remarks he would like to give.

The Chairman. And now I want to share with you this clip,
and I want you to see the brilliance, the dynamic message that
Kiss the Ground is doing. This is the movement that got me
involved with this issue. So I believe our technician is ready
to play it. Enjoy and learn.
Oh, just a second. We are going to make sure we get the
volume up. We are going to pause for a moment to get the film
ready. Thank you. The Ranking Member says technology is
wonderful when it is working. So give us a moment, and we will
get it going.
What we are going to do, we do have some technological
issues. And we are going to now recognize our distinguished
Ranking Member, Mr. Thompson of Pennsylvania, for his opening
statement, and hopefully, technology will come to our rescue.

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. GLENN THOMPSON, A REPRESENTATIVE IN
CONGRESS FROM PENNSYLVANIA

Mr. Thompson. All right, Mr. Chairman, thank you so much. I
see our newest Member transitioned from attending virtually to
being in person here. So, once again, Brad, welcome. We are so
honored and pleased to have you on the Agriculture Committee
with your family history of farming and your service in so many
different ways to the industry, the number one industry in this
country, agriculture. And thank you, and we are glad to have
you on the Committee, honored to have you on the Committee.
Mr. Chairman, thank you.
Encouraging soil health and responsible conservation
practices in agriculture has been a central goal and a priority
supported by Congress since the 1930s and certainly a priority
of mine since coming to Congress.
Through the farm bill, producers, landowners can access a
variety of conservation programs and tools to incorporate
activities that support a variety of natural resources. These
programs are voluntary, they are incentive-based, and locally
led, while directly benefiting the producer and, quite frankly,
the economy and the environment. These tools that we provide
are why American farmers are really the climate heroes around
the world. These tools contribute greatly to the conclusion in
research that is pretty striking. It talks about if we want to
reduce greenhouse gases around the world, we want to do that on
this day of September of 2022, all we need to do is for
American farmers, ranchers, and foresters to produce more and
export it overseas.
So the farmers and ranchers are the original
environmentalists and have adopted proven conservation
practices to encourage soil health and other environmental
benefits. Producers and landowners are also generating soil
health benefits through grazing and active management of forest
lands. Science, technology, and innovation have always been
important to the success of agriculture, and I would say that
is the purest definition of American agriculture.
This continues to be true as we build out technologies that
improve soil health. For example, biotechnology, the use of
crop protection tools, and access to precision ag technology
will help deliver soil health and climate benefits in both
short- and long-term. Because of the investments in
agricultural research, the U.S. has become the most efficient
agricultural producer in the world. In fact, American farmers,
ranchers, and landowners produce 287 percent more than in the
1940s with little to no change in inputs. And I believe that
this industry is not static, it is dynamic, and we will
continue to provide tools. Perhaps we can take that to 400
percent increase by 2035.
Some want you to believe that regenerative agriculture is
somehow revolutionary and it is very positive, but soil health
has been a fundamental tenant of the farm bill conservation
programs from their very inception. In the 2018 Farm Bill, we
made improvements to programs like creating a conservation
incentive contract that would pave the way for easier adoption
of management activities like cover crops. We have also made
soil health a major component of the new on-farm conservation
innovation trials, and soil health is a central purpose of the
Conservation Stewardship Program.
Unfortunately, today's panelists do not represent the
breadth of the conservation movement in the United States but a
small minority that wants to redefine regenerative agriculture
as only organic, which is just not true. And while I support
farmers who want to receive a premium through organic
agriculture, I think that is a wonderful thing, I appreciate
the premiums that our organic farmers and ranchers are able to
generate through organic agriculture, we cannot let the idea
permeate that organic is the only way to be a conservation
steward. And attacks on industrial agriculture or conventional
agriculture, quite frankly, are divisive and unhelpful.
Now, please don't get me wrong. Soil health is critically
important for American agriculture and rural communities around
the nation. I got my first introduction on Schrack Farm in
Clinton County, a county I am picking back up by the way it
looks like, wonderful soil health, a day that we spent there
looking at soil samples and the difference and the changes that
can be facilitated with good, solid agricultural practices. In
fact, I was proud to host and chair actually one of the first
soil health hearings in Congress in 2014 as then-Chairman of
the Conservation, Energy, and Forestry Subcommittee.
However, I think it is necessary to make the distinction
that organic agriculture production is not the only means of
production that promotes and maintains soil health. That will
be largely what we are concentrating on at the hearing today:
organic agriculture. And I support an all-of-the-above approach
when it comes to soil conservation. We also must ensure our
USDA's conservation programs remain voluntary, locally led, and
incentive-based, and most importantly, keeps the producer
first.
The European Union's Farm-to-Fork Initiative has shown that
tying food policy to climate policy is harmful to food
production and economic viability for all. In fact, the USDA's
Economic Research Service found that the EU will see a
production decrease of 12 percent and prices increase by 17
percent by 2030 under their Farm-to-Fork Initiative. Worldwide,
we will see a nine percent price increase as a result of the
EU's adoption. And if there were to be a global adoption of
this program worldwide, food prices would increase 89 percent
by 2030.
So looking forward to the next farm bill, I am not going to
sit idly as we let decades of real bipartisan progress be
turned on its head to satisfy people who at their core think
agriculture is a blight on the landscape. I have been leaning
into the climate discussion, embracing it, and leading, but I
am not going to have us suddenly incorporate buzzwords like
regenerative agriculture into the farm bill or overemphasize
climate within the Conservation or Research Title, while
undermining the other longstanding environmental benefits that
these programs provide.
As we begin the farm bill process, we cannot allow the
promises of organic agriculture, which are many, or climate
policy to cause us to lose sight of the many other benefits
that our current food system provides under the broad goals of
farm conservation.
So, Mr. Chairman, thank you so much, I am looking forward
to hearing from our witnesses in this hearing, and I yield
back.
The Chairman. Well, thank you, Ranking Member, for your
excellent opening statement.
And what we are going to do, we are going to give our
hardworking and excellent technicians a little more time to get
this film together because it is extraordinary.
And what I would like to do while we give them a little
more time is introduce to you in the Committee and those who
are watching across the nation our distinguished lineup of
witnesses today.
And also, I want to request that other Members just submit
your opening statements for the record so that we can get our
witnesses' testimony and ensure that we have ample time for
everyone's questions. Now, our first witness today is Mr. Jeff
Moyer. Mr. Moyer is the Chief Executive Officer of the Rodale
Institute. And Mr. Jeff Moyer is doing an excellent job at the
Rodale Institute. And then certainly, congratulations to you
for the wonderful financial $25 million that we are giving to
you today to carry on that excellent work.
Our next witness is Mr. Steve Nygren. Mr. Nygren is the
founder and Chief Executive Officer of the great Serenbe, and
he is also one of my constituents. Serenbe is in the great
Chattahoochee Hills in Georgia in our 13th district. You are
doing such an outstanding job, and you are a national leader in
our agriculture industry. Welcome.
Our third witness today is Mr. Ken McCarty, who is a
partner in the McCarty Family Farms from Colby, Kansas.
Welcome.
Our fourth witness is Mr. Rick Clark, who is the owner of
Farm Green and Clark Land and Cattle, and he is testifying on
behalf of Regenerate America.
And our fifth and final witness today is Dr. Rebecca
Larson, who is the Chief Scientist and Vice President,
Government Affairs for the Western Sugar Cooperative.
Ranking Member, what a distinguished group we have today.
And now, as I mentioned this film, and you all are about to
witness an extraordinary message about the urgency, the need
for us to kiss the ground. All right, technicians, we are
ready. Thank you, Ashley.
[Video shown.]
The Chairman. Thank you. And once again, we apologize for
this technical operation, but you got a part of this film. I
encourage you to pursue it and see much more. And again, I
apologize. Technology sort of interrupted us there.
And now what I would like to do is to start with our
testimony. And, as I mentioned, the whole purpose here is to
open up this discussion and share with our nation the
importance to understanding that the very start of our food
supply chain is the Earth, and we are losing the vital
component of carbon. And so we have to do all that we can to
make sure we are getting this carbon back in the ground, and
this is why we are here.
And so our first witness today will be Mr. Moyer. Mr.
Moyer, you can start when you are ready.

STATEMENT OF JEFFREY W. MOYER, CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER, RODALE
INSTITUTE, KUTZTOWN, PA

Mr. Moyer. Chairman Scott, Ranking Member Thompson, and
Members of the Committee, thank you for the opportunity to
testify before you today. The written testimony I provided to
the Committee expands on the points I will make here.
First, I want to thank you for holding this historic
hearing. It is critically important that we focus on the health
of America's soil. It is key to solving problems I know you and
your constituents are focused on. Members of the Committee, if
you are looking for an agricultural method that increases farm
profitability, is regenerative, better for the environment, and
produces healthier food for Americans, then all you need to do
is look beneath your feet. Regenerative organic agriculture,
which prioritizes soil health, accomplishes all of that.
A strong, viable economic model that supports American
farmers transitioning to regenerative organic agriculture
already exists. And it doesn't matter what kind of tractor a
farmer drives or what kind of crops they plant. All farms can
benefit from regenerative organic practices. But we need to
adopt changes now because America's food system is broken. It
is too reliant on unstable foreign supply chains, chemical
pesticides, and government subsidies for foods that aren't
healthy for our constituents or profitable for America's
farming families. And our current agricultural systems are also
degrading America's soils.
Recent events have shown that this country must begin
working toward food independence. Russia's war against Ukraine
exposed dangerous cracks and frailties in the global food
system and supply chains. However, this is not a doomsday
scenario. We have the tools and the time to fix this and set
our farms on a positive track, and regenerative organic
agriculture is our path forward.
Rodale Institute is the 75 year old Pennsylvania-based
nonprofit research and education institution that I manage. We
confront this challenge every day with our staff of Ph.D.
scientists and farmers like me, who work to create a resilient
food system that improves soil health and the economics of
farming. So we champion regenerative organic agriculture. That
is because it is reliable, resilient, and does not depend on
foreign agricultural inputs like Russian-made synthetic
fertilizers.
Regenerative organic farms use a whole-systems approach to
grow food that actively restores soil health, which is critical
because healthy soil has always been the foundation of
successful farming. After all, soil impacts harvests and the
long-term viability of any farm. But right now, we are not
doing enough to protect our soil. And that is foolish because
it is a finite resource key to our survival.
Current estimates suggest that by 2050, soil degradation
may reduce crop yields up to ten percent. But research shows
organic farming can reverse soil degradation and actually
improve soil health. And that is not its only benefit.
Regenerative organic agriculture showcases production
strategies that conventional farmers can take advantage of like
the use of roller-crimpers, along with cover crops, to reduce
or eliminate tillage and the need for nitrogen fertilizer. But
in order for these practices to be employed at scale, we need
to tweak EQIP and crop insurance regulations to incentivize the
outcomes we want, not disincentivize them.
Rodale Institute has a 40 year long farming systems trial,
the longest of its kind running in this country, where we
examine organic agriculture and conventional agriculture side
by side in real-world contexts. The study's recent findings
show that organic systems will be more profitable for farms
while improving soil health.
Members of the Committee, we can make that the standard for
this country, more profit for farmers and healthier soil, too.
Look, it would be a lot easier if we as humans could just eat
soil. No one would go to the supermarket or restaurant and ask
for soil laced with fungicides, pesticides, and salt-based
fertilizer. We would ask for good organic soil and rich
compost. Well, in effect, we do eat soil, or at least the
plants we eat do. Let's make it possible for us all to choose a
plan that improves our soils, makes farming families more
economically secure, and puts America on a path to food
independence. Regenerative organic agriculture is how we get
there.
Thank you for taking time to listen to my testimony today,
and I do look forward to your questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Moyer follows:]

Prepared Statement of Jeffrey W. Moyer, Chief Executive Officer, Rodale
Institute, Kutztown, PA
I. Introduction
Chairman Scott, Ranking Member Thompson, and Members of the
Committee, thank you for the opportunity to testify before you today.
Given your positions on this esteemed Committee, it's likely you
already know that America's food system is broken. And it's likely you
already know why it's broken. It's too reliant on unstable foreign
supply chains, chemical inputs, and government subsidies for foods that
aren't nutritious for your constituents or profitable for American
farming families.
Conventional agricultural models are also degrading American
farmland.
But this is not a doomsday scenario--not just yet. We have the
tools and the time to fix this and set our farms on a positive track,
and regenerative organic agriculture is our path forward.
A strong, viable economic model that supports American farmers
transitioning to regenerative organic already exists, and there's a
role for everyone as we make this change, including conventional
farmers, organic farmers, lenders, landowners, suppliers, and
policymakers.
But we must move to make this transition now. U.S. national
security, the health of our people, and the financial stability of the
nation's farming families are all at risk.
Rodale Institute, the 75 year old Pennsylvania-based nonprofit and
research institution that I run, confronts this challenge every day.
Our 100 person staff, including nearly a dozen Ph.D.s and a handful of
farmers, are dedicated to creating a resilient food system that works
to improve soil health and the economics of farming.
Recent events, such as Russia's war against Ukraine and the
subsequent disruptions in the worldwide food system, forced American
agriculture into an inflection point and an opportunity.
We shouldn't waste it.
II. American Food Independence
Just as America works towards energy independence, it should work
towards food independence. Relying on fragile international supply
chains could jeopardize U.S. national security and lead to widespread,
unstable food prices for everyday Americans.
A. The War in Ukraine Exposed Dangerous Cracks in the Global Food
System
With farmers and commodities experts predicting lower yields,
skyrocketing prices, and extreme hunger in some parts of the world, we
have to rethink our food systems to break American agriculture's
reliance on fragile international supply chains.
If we do this right, we can produce healthier, chemical-free food.
That should be a priority because not only must we figure out how to
feed this nation, we must feed it better.
The food system that can accomplish that objective--producing
enough nourishing food in the United States--is regenerative organic
agriculture.
B. The Answer to American Food Independence Can Be Found Right Under
Our Feet
Russia's war in Ukraine caused a near doubling of the price of
natural gas, a key ingredient in nitrogen fertilizer. The increased
cost and limited availability forced some farmers to reduce fertilizer
use for their crops, which shrunk yields in some cases. Facing a
profitless growing season, some farmers may have given up altogether.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture responded by issuing $250
million in grants to spur U.S. fertilizer production. But that was a
Band-Aid for a wound that will never heal. The long-term solution is
right under our feet.
Regenerative organic agriculture is a reliable, resilient method of
growing food that does not depend on synthetic fertilizers or off-farm
inputs. Regenerative organic farms use a whole-systems approach to
agricultural production, which actively restores the health of soil.
Farms practicing these methods rely on cover crops, crop rotations,
reduced-till practices, composting, and, in some cases, fertilization
by animal manures--spread by responsible grazing practices--to nourish
and enhance soils.
III. The Science
Soil is the foundation of successful farming. It is also the
foundation for the ecosystem services that life depends on.
A. Unmitigated Soil Erosion and Destruction Could Jeopardize the Food
Supply
Research shows that 30% of the world's arable land (land that is
used for growing crops) has become unproductive in the past 40 years
due to soil erosion. Soil degradation is the physical, chemical, and
biological decline in soil quality occurring in various forms such as
erosion, salinization, acidification, compaction, loss of fertility,
decline in soil biological activity, and loss of soil organic matter.
About \1/3\ of the world's soil has already been degraded, and if the
current rate of soil degradation continues, all of the world's topsoil
could be lost within 60 years.
Unsustainable agricultural practices, such as over grazing,
improper land use change, and deforestation--especially clear cutting--
are major contributors to soil degradation.
In the U.S., 98 percent of farms practice conventional agriculture,
which relies heavily on pesticides and synthetic fertilizers, many of
which are toxic to humans, animals, pollinators, and soil micro and
macro biota.
In addition, conventional farms usually have low crop diversity,
which can contribute to the destruction of biodiversity in soil. That's
important because when there are fewer microorganisms in the soil, it
compromises nutrient cycling and nutrient availability for plants. The
result is weaker plants that are more susceptible to infections and
pests and therefore require additional synthetic fertilizers for the
plant to grow to maturity. This all leads to increasing dependence on
synthetic inputs, increased emissions from the soil, increased water
pollution, and reduced soil health.
Current estimates suggest that by 2050, soil erosion may reduce up
to 10% of crop yields, the equivalent of removing millions of acres of
land from production. Simultaneously, the world's population is
expected to exceed nine billion, which puts global food security in
jeopardy.
B. Regenerative Organic Agriculture Improves Soil, the Environment, and
the Economic Security of U.S. Farming Families
The term ``regenerative organic'' describes a holistic approach to
farming that encourages continuous innovation and improvement of
environmental, social, and economic factors. The regenerative organic
farming model doesn't just maintain resources--it improves them. In
addition, it is a food system that relies on natural cycles and
management.
Critically, research shows that organic farming has the potential
to diminish soil erosion (Erhart and Hartl 2009).\1\ Soil erosion rates
measured under simulated heavy rainfall in the Swiss Farming System and
Tillage experiment revealed that organic farming decreased mean
sediment delivery compared to conventional farming by 30% (0.54 t
ha^-1 h^-1) (Seitz, et al., 2019).\2\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13593-018-0545-
z#ref-CR12.
\2\ https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13593-018-0545-z.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Key Methods of Regenerative Organic Agriculture:

Utilizing Organic no-till: Organic no-till practices
are central to maintaining or improving soil quality and
vitality in the regenerative organic model. The practice is
both a technique and a tool to reduce tillage and improve
soil organic matter.

Utilizing the Roller-Crimper: Employing the roller-
crimper tractor attachment is an indispensable tool to
avoid destructive practices to terminate cover crops, such
as tillage and pesticide application. The roller-crimper,
which was developed at Rodale Institute, reduces soil
erosion, improves soil health, and increases biodiversity.
Of note, Rodale Institute posts the roller-crimper's
blueprints online. Those blueprints can be accessed at no
financial cost.

Managing Weeds with Cover Crops: Cover Crops are
critical to weed management in a regenerative organic
farming system as they actively suppress weed growth and
enhance soil health. Cover crops also protect soil from
erosion and nutrient loss and play an important role in
carbon drawdown.

Key Benefits:

Drought Resistant Crops: Crop yields under organic
farming systems are more likely to be resilient to extreme
weather. Rodale Institute's long-running Farming Systems
Trial found that in drought years, yields were consistently
higher in organic systems. For example, in one case,
organic corn yields were found to be 28% to 34% higher than
conventional. Part of the organic system's resilience is
linked to the increased soil organic matter that has
greater moisture holding capacity during a drought episode.

Greater Economic Returns for U.S. Farmers: Research
conducted by Rodale Institute has proven that organic
systems earn three to six times greater profit for American
farmers. In addition, Flanagan State Bank found from 2016-
2020, organic incomes were 163% higher than conventional
incomes for corn, 145% higher for soybeans, 182% higher for
wheat, and 103% higher for hay. Organic systems also use
45% less energy than conventional systems and improve a
farm's soil health by building organic soil matter over
time.

Less Reliance on Off-Farm Inputs, Especially Synthetic
Fertilizers: Regenerative organic farmers are less
vulnerable to foreign supply chain disruptions and price
shocks in the agricultural commodities market as they don't
use off-farm inputs as much as conventional farmers.

Higher Quality Food for Consumers: Industrial
agriculture has depleted soils and bred plants for size and
rate of growth--not nutrition--in a narrow pursuit of ever-
increasing yields. Additionally, plants are more often
exposed to stressful situations in organic systems due to
the lack of pesticides use which can lead to increased
biosynthesis and accumulation of natural defense
substances, such as phenolic compounds \3\ (Faller &
Fialho, 2009).\4\ The food consumed today also contains
less protein, calcium, phosphorus, iron, riboflavin, and
vitamin C than food produced just a half-century ago.
Results from Rodale Institute's projects show that all
essential amino acids (except lysine, histidine and
methionine) were greater in organic oat grains compared to
conventional grains (Omondi, et al., 2021).*
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\3\ https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/food-science/phenolic-
compound.
\4\ https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/
S0924224417303679?.
* Editor's note: there was no embedded hyperlink for this in-text
reference.

Predictable Food Prices: Relying on the regenerative
organic farming model and its domestic inputs can insulate
American producers from the unstable costs conventional
farming is subject to due to its reliance on foreign
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
agricultural commodities.

Carbon Capture and Sequestration: Research by Rodale
Institute shows that after 40 years of management, soil
organic matter levels were significantly higher in an
organic manure-based system than in the conventional
systems studied, which reflects greater carbon
sequestration in the organic system (FST 40 year report).*
IV. Farmer Choice: The U.S. Government Must Level the ``Farmer Playing
Field''
Crop insurance is at odds with organic farming. Current federally
backed crop insurance policies create disincentives for American
farmers seeking to transition to and operate under a regenerative
organic model. But it doesn't have to be this way.
A. U.S. Taxpayers and Crop Insurance
Established following the Dust Bowl of the 1930s and expanded
since, the U.S. crop insurance program is operated by the Federal Crop
Insurance Corporation (FCIC), which is wholly owned by the Federal
Government and managed by USDA's Risk Management Agency (RMA). RMA
oversees 14 private sector insurance companies, which issue more than
one million policies covering nearly 375 million acres of U.S. farm and
ranch land.
Under the program, participating farmers receive compensation when
farms are ravaged by disasters such as fires, storms, and drought.
Indemnity payments are also made to farmers when their yields fall
below expectations or if oversupply drives down the prices they can
charge. And all of this is underwritten by taxpayer-funded subsidies,
which help farmers purchase crop insurance at an annual cost to
taxpayers of nearly $10 billion.
B. The Bad News About Crop Insurance Policies
Today's crop insurance programs are impeding widespread adoption of
regenerative organic farming methods.
That's because, too often, crop insurance policies provide no
incentive to farmers who use regenerative organic methods, such as
cover crops and reduced tilling. In fact, the premiums they are charged
are typically not discounted, even though the risk of droughts and
flooding is substantially lower on regenerative organic land. Likewise,
today's policies do not incentivize farmers to use regenerative organic
methods, even though they significantly stabilize yields from season to
season. Instead, the crop insurance program effectively underwrites
conventional intensive farming, causing harm to topsoil, waterways, the
climate, population health, and--most paradoxically--the long-term
financial health of farmers themselves.
C. The Good News About Crop Insurance Policies
USDA's newly established $300 million Organic Transition Initiative
offers the potential for issuance of a wider array of crop insurance
policies that recognize and provide appropriate coverage for the risks
faced in regenerative organic agriculture. Similarly, the crop
insurance premium subsidies recently announced by Secretary Vilsack for
the Transitional and Organic Grower Assistance (TOGA) Program is much-
needed to support climate-smart farmers and ranchers.
Crop insurance is far from being the most headline-grabbing aspect
of USDA's broad portfolio, but the fact that most producers already
rely on crop insurance coverage makes it an unparalleled tool for
effecting sweeping change. With USDA and Congress' engagement, RMA will
make more climate-smart policies available to America's farmers and
ranchers. And this single step has the power to do more than any other
to modernize agricultural practices, improve the nutritional content of
food, and foster repair of the environment.
D. 2023 Farm Bill
Regenerative organic agriculture demands planning, resources, and
investment. The 2023 Farm Bill should include priorities that support
American farmers pursuing regenerative organic models.
These priorities include:

1. Allocating funding for cover crop utilization by farmers.

2. Allocating additional funding for the USDA's Organic Transition
Initiative, which provides technical and financial
assistance to farmers during the 36 month organic
transition period.

3. Establishing a Strategic Plan with key stakeholders for data
collection, policy creation, monitoring, reporting, and
standards development to better serve farmers adopting
regenerative organic models.
V. Conclusion
Regenerative organic agriculture can improve soil health and the
economics of farming and put the U.S. on a path towards food
independence. With proper support at the Federal level, American
farmers can be encouraged to adopt the practices that achieve these
goals.
Thank you for offering me the opportunity to testify before the
Committee. I look forward to your questions.

The Chairman. And thank you, Mr. Moyer, for your excellent
testimony.
And now, Mr. Nygren, you are now recognized for your 5
minutes. And welcome to our Committee.

STATEMENT OF STEVE NYGREN, FOUNDER & CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER,
SERENBE, CHATTAHOOCHEE HILLS, GA

Mr. Nygren. Thank you, Chairman Scott, Ranking Member
Thompson, and Members of the Committee, for the honor of
addressing you today. My name is Steve Nygren, founder and CEO
of Serenbe located in Chattahoochee Hills, Georgia's 13th
Congressional District.
I want to talk about soil health and how it leads to
economic vitality. My written testimony will expand on these
points. It starts with the local farm and farmers. The
recognition that we need healthy soil should compel us to
recognize our American agrarian economy and what drives it,
starting with how we inhabit the landscape. We must produce
food locally, implement policies and programs that support this
local production, and prioritize regenerative organic farming.
You are aware of the shrinking number of U.S. farmers and
the conversion to industrial agriculture, replacing the local
family farm. What we do not talk about is the effect on the
local agrarian economy. Industrial ag dollars do not support
the local bank, the local hardware store, or the main street
merchants in the same way that local farmers do. Rural America
has been stripped of its identity and economic stability. We
are now feeling some of the negative results of this drastic
shift and consolidation.
The good news is there has been a renewed interest in local
farms, markets, and foods that continues to accelerate. The
pandemic has also placed a spotlight on food production, the
increased health issues our country faces, and how people are
dramatically reassessing where they live and what they eat.
In 1950, Georgia produced 80 percent of the food consumed
in the state. Today, it is a fraction of that amount. We are
consuming products imported from around the world and eating
food grown on U.S. soil with detrimental chemicals based on
relationships with foreign governments. This increased
dependence on a global supply chain for our food can make the
difficulties of the pandemic seem mild should there be a
disruption in our global industrial food system.
I grew up on a generational farm in Colorado. Following
college, I became a hospitality entrepreneur. For those of you
who worked on the Hill in the 1980s and early 1990s, you might
remember the Peasant on Pennsylvania. During this period, I
bought a historic farm just outside Atlanta in an area that
would later become Chairman Scott's district, enabling my young
children to experience in a small way the rural life I had
grown up with.
Recognizing the need for investments in local community and
our farmlands, in 2000 I drove an effort to save the rural
landscape we had come to love with 500 local neighbors. We
formed a county overlay for 40,000 acres, saving 70 percent of
the land for agriculture. We passed historic legislation for
Georgia and in 2004 broke ground on Serenbe, a community model
of balanced growth with a working organic farm at its center.
Serenbe is an example of how agriculture can be incorporated
within developments as a financial and lifestyle advantage.
For $34 a week, 75 families receive a farm share that
includes their produce for the week, hundreds more reached
through our farmers' market and local restaurants. And to
combat food waste, our farm has opened the first citywide
compost station. Serenbe stands as a model of the agri-hood
movement.
I may have built a town, but Will Harris of White Oak
Pastures has saved one. Bluffton, Georgia, has gone from a
ghost town to a destination in 1 decade. His transition to
regenerative cattle farming now employs 180 people with more
than $100,000 in weekly payroll. White Oak is the largest
private employer in the county, restoring an economy and
changing the lives of one small rural community.
Today, we need programs in place to support and promote the
growing market for locally produced food grown in chemical-free
soil. Small farms and regenerative organic farmers need an
equal opportunity. They need supporting policies, designated
dollars that will reach the hardworking farmers in the fields
such as Matthew Raiford, who is with us today. Think of soil
health as a platform to bring our small towns back to life.
When farming and soil is rescued, then many other businesses
and value-added production will follow.
Soil health is imperative to American health. Through the
farm bill and the direct actions of this Committee, you can
affect real change for our farmers, our food systems, our
economy, and our communities. I urge you to fund organizations
that will directly impact small and historically marginalized
farmers working to produce regenerative organic foods. Thank
you for your time.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Nygren follows:]

Prepared Statement of Steve Nygren, Founder & Chief Executive Officer,
Serenbe, Chattahoochee Hills, GA
Thank you to Chairman Scott, Ranking Member Thompson, and Members
of the Committee for the honor to address you today.
My name is Steve Nygren, Founder & CEO of Serenbe, a 20 year old
community located in Chattahoochee Hills, in Georgia's 13th District. I
want to talk about soil health and how it can lead to economic
vitality--my written testimony will expand on these points.
It starts with the local farm and farmers. It leads to the physical
and economic health of our citizens and our planet.
The recognition that we need healthy soil should compel us to
reorganize our American agrarian economy and what drives it--starting
with how we inhabit the landscape. We must produce food locally,
implement policies and programs that support this local production, and
prioritize regenerative organic farming.
You are very aware of the shrinking number of U.S. farmers and the
conversion to industrial agriculture, replacing the family farm. The
U.S. lost \2/3\ of farms during the 25 years period from 1945-1970.
What we don't talk about is the damage to the local agrarian economy.
Industrial ag dollars do not support the local banks, the local
hardware stores, or the main street merchants in the same way that
local farmers do. Prior to this Industrialization, every rural
community processed its farm production locally. These foods were also
consumed locally. Every farm community had an abattoir and butcher, a
grist mill, a creamery, a vegetable packing shed, and all other
necessary infrastructure to maintain a local foodshed. Farmers strove
to increase the value of their production by adding as much quality as
they could. In essence, they were competing against each other in their
local market. After the Centralization, the goal was to merely meet
``minimum standards'' and accept commodity prices for it. Rural America
has been stripped of its identity and economic stability. And it
doesn't end on the country roads but bleeds into the suburbs and urban
centers.
Farms, land in farms, and average acres per farm, 1850-2021
Million farms, billion acres, or 100 acres per farm

[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

Source: USDA, Economic Research Service using data from USDA,
National Agricultural Statistics Service, Censuses of
Agriculture (through 2017) and Farms and Land in Farms: 2021
Summary (February 2022).

We are now feeling some of the negative results of this drastic
shift and consolidation.
The good news is there has been a renewed interest in local farms,
markets and foods that continues to accelerate. The pandemic has also
placed a spotlight on food production, the increased health issues our
country is facing and how people are dramatically [reassessing] where
they live and what they eat.
In 1950, Georgia produced over 80% of the food consumed in the
state.\1\ Today it is a fraction of that amount. We are consuming
products imported from around the world and eating food grown on U.S.
soil with detrimental chemicals based on relationships with foreign
governments. This increased dependence on a global supply chain for our
food could make the difficulties of the pandemic seem mild--should
there be a disruption to our global industrial food system.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ Sanford H. Bederman. Southeastern Geographer Vol. 10, No. 2, A
Special Issue on Agriculture in the South (November 1970) (https://
www.jstor.org/stable/i40182694), pp. 72-82 (11 pages) Published By:
University of North Carolina Press.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
I grew up on a generational family farm in Colorado. Following
college I entered a different segment of the food industry as a
hospitality entrepreneur opening restaurants across the county. For
those of you who worked on the Hill in the 1980s and early 1990s, you
may remember my restaurant, the Peasant on Pennsylvania. During this
period, I bought a historic farm just outside of Atlanta--in an area
that would later become Chairman Scott's district--enabling my young
children to experience in a small way the rural life I had growing up.
Recognizing the need for investment in the local community and our
farmlands, in 2000, I drove an effort to save the rural landscape we
had come to love with 500 neighboring landowners. We formed a county
overlay for 40,000 acres saving 70% of the land for agriculture. In
2003, we passed Transfer Development Rights (TDR) \2\ legislation for
Georgia and in 2004 broke ground on Serenbe, as a community model of
balanced growth \3\ with a working organic farm at its center, Serenbe
Farms.\4\ Serenbe is an example of how agriculture can be incorporated
within developments, as a financial and lifestyle advantage. For $34/
week, 75 families receive a farm share that includes their produce for
the week. Hundreds more are reached through our farmers market, local
restuarants--and to [combat] food waste, our farm has opened the first
citywide compost station. Americans throw away about 25% of the food
they purchase for at-home consumption.\5\ The Serenbe model and the
emergence of the Agrihood \6\ movement is replacing the indulgence in
the golf course communities of the 1980s and 1990s.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\2\ Georgia Planning. Transfer of Development Rights. April 23,
2007. https://georgiaplanning.org/student_reports/2007/13--
TDR%20and%20Chatt%20Hill/CHC_TDR_re
port.pdf.
\3\ Serenbe. https://www.serenbe.com Accessed September 11, 2022.
\4\ Serenbe Farms. https://serenbefarms.com Accessed September 11,
2022.
\5\ American Farm Bureau Foundation for Agriculture's Food and Farm
Facts book (2021 edition) https://www.agfoundation.org/resources/food-
and-farm-facts-2021.
\6\ Urban Land Institute. Agrihoods: Cultivating Best Practices.
2018. https://2os2f877tnl1dvtmc3wy0aq1-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-
content/uploads/ULI-Documents/Agri
hoods-Final.pdf.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The 2040 Farms Under Threat analysis from American [Farmland] Trust
(AFT) mapped development scenarios for every state in the U.S. If
recent trends continue, 798,400 acres of Georgia's farmland will be
paved over, fragmented, or converted to uses that jeopardize
agriculture. That's 7%. And the equivalent of losing 7,200 farms, $756
million in farm output and 10,700 jobs.\7\ This speaks to not only the
loss of the most productive versatile and resilient soils, it points
out the loss of farms, farm output, farm jobs. These are compounded by
the inland migration that will result from coastal flooding. We can
slash conversion, save farmland and safeguard the future of agriculture
and the environment by choosing compact development.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\7\ American Farmland Trust. Farms Under Threat. 2022
www.farmland.org/farmsunderthreat.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The local regenerative organic farm is an economic solution. I may
have built a town but Will Harris of White Oak Pastures, has saved one.
Bluffton, Georgia has gone from a ghost town to a destination in a
decade. His transition to regenerative cattle farming \8\ now employs
180 with more than $100,000 in weekly payroll--White Oak is the largest
private employer in the county restoring the economy and changing lives
in one small rural community.\9\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\8\ Little, Amanda. Bloomberg. The Biggest Ideas in Farming Today
are Also The Oldest. March, 5, 2021. https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/
articles/2021-05-15/the-biggest-ideas-in-farming-today-are-also-
theoldest?.
\9\ White Oak Pastures. Our [Transition]. https://
whiteoakpastures.com/pages/our-transition Accessed September 11, 2022.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Many people are interested in returning to the land and there is a
growing market for locally produced food grown in soil without
chemicals. But we need programs in place to support and promote these
efforts. Small farms and organic regenerative farmers need an equal
opportunity. They need supportive policies with designated dollars that
reach hard working farmers in the fields. A few examples of Georgia
organizations that support farmers to thrive by providing funds and
programs are Georgia Organics and The Conservation Fund.
The member-supported, nonprofit organization, Georgia Organics, has
been rooted in providing direct support to small and organic farmers
across our state since the 1970s. It has more than doubled the number
of organic farms in the state through its organic transition campaign--
bringing nearly 3,000 more acres under organic management. They
prioritize direct outreach to farmers and also provide advice and
assistance with paperwork and organic requirements. They pair their
organic transition work with a farmer Accelerator Program that coaches
farmers on business planning, recordkeeping, and other skills that
support financial stability for farms. They point to staff training on
the organic certification process and maintaining close relationships
with producers as two key elements of their success.\10\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\10\ Georgia Organics. Farmers Services: Accelerator Program.
https://farmerservices.squarespace.com/accelerator Accessed September
11, 2022.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
In 2018, with financial support from the USDA Office of
Partnerships and Public Engagement and the Bradley-Turner Foundation,
Georgia Organics led a 1 year project to develop a supply chain and
marketplace around Certified Organic peanuts that could support small
farmers. One of their Accelerator Program participants, Sedrick Rowe,
is building the organic peanut sector in Georgia, one farmer at a
time.\11\ Rowe worked with Georgia Organics to experiment with organic
peanut production and build the Georgia Organic Peanut Association.\12\
He entices more farmers to transition by showing that organic peanut
production is both healthier and more profitable.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\11\ Black Farmer Network. Sedrick Rowe Organic Farmer. https://
blackfarmersnetwork.com/sedrick-rowe-rowe-organic-farm/ Accessed
September 11, 2022.
\12\ Georgia Peanut Tour. Growing Peanuts for The Organic Market.
https://georgiapeanuttour.com/2019/09/growing-peanuts-for-the-organic-
market/ Accessed September 11, 2022.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Conservation Fund is working to secure farmland with its
Working Farms Fund (WFF), to create patient pathways to [affordable]
land ownership and build wealth for a diverse community of next
generation farmers.\13\ In the 2021-2022 year they were able to save
eight Georgia farms across 705 acres, securing $5.9M in land,
supporting 33 farmers and $100k was invested directly in on-farm
infrastructure. Plus 75% of the farm business are minority/immigrant/
women-owned.\14\ WFF partnerships include Common Market, a distributor
of [sustainable], local farm foods helping farmers connect to new
markets by providing access to a wide variety of wholesale and retail
customers and connecting them with [institutions] and communities
throughout the Southeast.\15\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\13\ The Conservation Fund. Working Farms Fund. https://
www.conservationfund.org/our-work/working-farms-fund Accessed September
11, 2022.
\14\ Conservation Fund. Summer Update 2022. https://
www.conservationfund.org/images/WFF22-Summer-Update-Brochure-
081722.pdf.
\15\ The Common Market. https://www.thecommonmarket.org Accessed
September 11, 2022.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Think of soil health as the platform to bring our small towns back
to life. This foundational element can be local networks of
agriculture, supply and retail. When farming and the soil is rescued,
then many other businesses and value-added production will follow.
After a while, we'll have fully functioning towns again, built on
social and economic roles that give people a reason to think that life
is worth living.
Soil health is imperative to America's health.
Through the farm bill and the direct actions of this Committee, you
can affect real change for our farmers, our food systems, our economy
and our communities. I thank the Committee for their time, and urge you
to fund organizations that will directly impact small and historically
marginalized farmers working to produce regenerative organic foods. In
2020, only 1% of producers of color received EQIP and CSP funding.\16\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\16\ American Farmland Trust. 2023 Farm Bill Recommendations. July
2022. https://farmland.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/
AFT_2023_Farm_Bill_Recommendations_Summary.pdf.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Supporting innovative farmers and ranchers in adopting conservation
practices is key to adapting to and mitigating climate change while
also improving water and air quality, soil health, and even
profitability. Farm bill conservation programs provide cost share and
technical assistance (TA) to help producers implement these practices,
but these programs often need more funding and staff to address service
gaps and fulfill demand. More must be done to equitably scale up long-
term adoption of conservation and climate-smart practices by farmer-
leaders, and to set up systems of support to help others build the same
resilience. In the 2023 Farm Bill, AFT recommends that Congress:
Increase Conservation Program Funding
Increase funding to meet demand for financial support and
TA, especially for practices that improve soil health,
contribute to climate and water resilience, and reduce GHG
emissions.

Expand funding set asides for historically marginalized
producers.
Support Producers in Long-Term Adoption of Soil Health and Climate-
Smart Practices
Increase funding for the EQIP Conservation Incentive
Contracts program and focus these longer 5-10 year contracts on
soil health practices to mitigate transition risks.

Direct NRCS to continue to increase TA capacity, fill
service gaps, and streamline programs to address bottlenecks,
reduce producer wait times, and improve implementation.

Improve the Technical Service Provider program to enable
additional qualified experts to provide TA.

Establish a peer-to-peer program that offers CSP awardees
and experienced EQIP awardees training and financial incentives
to mentor other producers interested in trying out conservation
practices.

Increase funding for Conservation Innovation Grants and
Trials and soil health demonstrations. Prioritize applications
that measure soil health improvements and carbon sequestration.
Help Small-Scale and Historically Marginalized Producers Access USDA
Programs
Increase support for small-scale farms by creating an Office
of Small Farms, by piloting a tiered payment rate system that
increases EQIP and CSP payments for small farms, and by
tailoring application processes to small-scale growers' needs.

Fund Community-Based Navigators to help historically
marginalized producers apply for NRCS programs.

Support NRCS in continuing its examination of potential
inequities that may disadvantage producer participation based
on farm size, race, income, or gender through the current
application process, program ranking criteria, or payment rate-
setting process.
Improve NRCS Program Application Processes and Increase Transparency
Direct NRCS to streamline the application process for
practices that address multiple resource concerns, especially
practices that help farmers adapt to and/or mitigate climate
change.

Direct NRCS to regularly share additional aggregated
information on program applicants and awardees based on race,
gender, farm size, income level, and funded practices.

Direct USDA to regularly share additional information on
program outcomes, including GHG reductions, carbon
sequestration, water quality, and soil health.

These specific programs and recommendations were pulled from the
American Farmland Trust ``Building Resilience in a Change World: AFT's
2023 Farm Bill Recommendations''.\17\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\17\ American Farmland Trust. 2023 Farm Bill Recommendations. July
2022. https://farmland.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/
AFT_2023_Farm_Bill_Recommendations_Summary.pdf.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Additional legislation to highlight is the Agriculture Resilience
Act,\18\ that supports soil health through crop insurance, EQIP, CSP
and state assistance. Authored by folks at NSAC (National Sustainable
Agriculture Coalition), this legislation is currently looking for
cosponsors, it is a marker bill that we hope gets adopted into the farm
bill.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\18\ National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition. Agriculture
Resilience Act. April 2021. https://sustainableagriculture.net/wp-
content/uploads/2021/04/ARA-Section-by-Section-2021_FI
NAL.pdf.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
I look forward to your questions.

The Chairman. And thank you, Mr. Nygren, for your excellent
testimony.
And now, Mr. McCarty, please begin when you are ready.

STATEMENT OF KEN McCARTY, PARTNER, McCARTY FAMILY FARMS LLC,
COLBY, KS

Mr. McCarty. Good morning, Chairman Scott, Ranking Member
Thompson, and Members of the Committee. Thank you for allowing
me to join the conversation today as you prepare for the
upcoming farm bill. I am Ken McCarty, and I look forward to
discussing what regenerative agriculture means to McCarty
Family Farms.
My three brothers and I are fourth-generation dairy
farmers, originally from a small farm in Bradford County,
Pennsylvania, where my family farmed for more than 100 years.
In the late 1990s, my parents began searching for opportunities
that would allow my brothers and I to continue our family's
farm. Eventually, that led us to Rexford, Kansas, where we have
gradually grown our business to include five dairies, three
dairies in northwest Kansas, one in southwest Nebraska, and
most recently a partnership dairy with another fourth-
generation family farm in Mercer County, Ohio. We also own and
operate a milk condensing plant at the Rexford Farms that
reduces the freight to move our finished products by 75 percent
while reclaiming 65,000 gallons of fresh water every day. We
are currently in the process of building a state-of-the-art
dairy farm near the original Rexford Dairy and expanding the
processing capacity of the milk plant.
Continually improving our farm management and implementing
sustainable farming practices is key to the success and growth
of our business. Every day, we strive to create wholesome dairy
foods in a responsible and sustainable manner, and we are
deeply committed to regenerative ag practices and have been
recognized as a leader in that space. For example, McCarty
Family Farms is Validus DairyCARE-certified, FARM Program-
verified, and a Certified B Corp. And for the past 2 years, we
have been recognized as a best-for-the-world B Corp in the
environmental impact area. We have also received multiple
awards from the U.S. Dairy Innovation Center, National Milk
Producers Federation, IDFA, the State of Kansas, and others.
Also, since 2016, we have worked annually with sustainable
environmental consultants to evaluate and verify our ecosystem
impact, which is reported publicly on our website.
This approach to transparency and third-party validation
helps us market our milk and creates a foundation for
sustainable business growth. As an example, we sell most of our
milk to Danone North American, another Certified B Corp and a
leading global food and beverage company who processes our milk
into products such as Dannon, Oikos, Octavia, and Light & Fit
yogurts.
Regenerative agriculture may be a buzzword for some, but
for McCarty Family Farms, it is a holistic mindset that
encourages us to consider a multitude of practices across our
farms, especially those associated with core values like soil
health, resource conservation, animal welfare, and the welfare
of our team members, families, and communities. Practices such
as cover crops, reduced tillage, improved nutrient management,
and excellent animal care practices under one coherent vision
can optimize the performance and sustainability of our farms.
In general, regenerative agriculture should provide
measurable economic, social, and environmental benefits that
help improve rather than just sustain our ecosystems. And we
have been able to demonstrate just that. For example, water
conservation technologies have helped to save millions of
gallons of fresh water every year while reducing our input
costs. Enhancements to animal welfare has helped ensure more
milk production with fewer resources consumed.
For McCarty Family Farms and our partners, regenerative
agriculture must move beyond a qualitative concept towards
making decisions based on quantitative outcomes. By
benchmarking and tracking our environmental and economic
performance, we can better understand the impacts and make
better business decisions. In general, these regenerative
efforts have helped demonstrate that dairy farming and all of
agriculture can be a part of the solution for our climate and
our economy while, of course, helping to feed the world.
At times, USDA programs are helpful to incentivize new
ideas and reduce up-front costs when a clear short-term ROI
isn't possible. And while we know regenerative practices
produce economic benefits in the long-term such as increased
efficiency and resilient yields and improved market
opportunities, up-front costs can still be a barrier to
implementation. Traditional ag lending looks year-to-year,
while regenerative agriculture takes a longer-term view, which
is why conservation funding and incentives are crucial to
greater adoption.
When considering USDA conservation programs, budgets are
just one barrier to greater adoption. Challenges such as EQIP
backlogs, rigid contract structures, cumbersome applications,
and burdensome follow-up reporting create additional strain. We
work with our partners, including Danone, to explore different
financing and incentive models. USDA programs such as the
Conservation Innovation Grant for On-Farm Trials allowed us to
work with non-Federal partners such as Danone, Sustainable
Environmental Consultants, and National Fish and Wildlife
Foundation to finance scalable regenerative management.
By considering the applications and contract costs to
farmers and allowing farmers to work with familiar partners
rather than just USDA alone, I believe programs can support
more farms investing in regenerative agriculture. We need a
simpler, more streamlined process to engage with USDA and other
stakeholders to implement a wider variety of regenerative
innovations.
Thank you for your time today, and I look forward to
answering your questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. McCarty follows:]

Prepared Statement of Ken McCarty, Partner, McCarty Family Farms LLC,
Colby, KS
Good morning, Chairman Scott, Ranking Member Thompson, Members of
the Committee. Thank you for allowing me to join the conversation today
as you prepare for the upcoming farm bill. I'm Ken McCarty and I look
forward to discussing what regenerative agriculture means to McCarty
Family Farms
Introduction
My three brothers and I are fourth generation dairy farmers
originally from a small farm in Bradford County Pennsylvania where my
family farmed for more than 100 years. In the late 1990s my parents
began searching for opportunities that would allow my brothers and I to
continue our family's farm. Eventually that led us to Rexford, Kansas
where we have gradually grown our business to five dairies. Three
dairies in Northwest Kansas, one in Southwest Nebraska and most
recently a partnership dairy with another fourth-generation farm in
Mercer County Ohio. We also own and operate a milk condensing plant at
the Rexford farm that reduces the freight to move our finished products
by 75% while reclaiming 65,000 gallons of fresh water per day. We are
currently in the process of building a state-of-the-art dairy farm near
the original Rexford dairy and expanding the processing capacity of the
milk plant.
Continually improving our farm management and implementing
sustainable farming practices is key to the success and growth of our
business. Every day we strive to create wholesome dairy foods in a
responsible and sustainable manner, and we are deeply committed to
regenerative agricultural practices and have been recognized as a
leader in that space.
For example, McCarty Family Farms is Validus DairyCARE certified,
FARM Program verified and are a Certified B Corp and for the past 2
years, we have been recognized as a ``Best For the World'' B Corp in
the Environmental Impact area. We have also received multiple awards
from the U.S. Dairy Innovation Center, National Milk Producers
Federation, IDFA, The State of Kansas, and others. Also, since 2016, we
have worked annually with Sustainable Environmental Consultants to
evaluate and verify our ecosystem impact which is reported publicly on
our website.
This approach to transparency and third-party validation helps us
market our milk and creates a foundation for sustainable business
growth. As an example, we sell most of our milk to Danone North
America--another certified B Corp and a leading global food and
beverage company--who processes our milk into products such as Dannon,
Oikos, Activia and Light & Fit yogurts.
What is Regenerative Agriculture?
Regenerative Agriculture may be a buzz word for some, but for
McCarty Family Farms it is a holistic mindset that encourages us to
consider a multitude of practices across our farms; especially those
associated with core values like soil health, resource conservation,
animal welfare, and the welfare of our team members, families, and
communities. Practices such as cover crops, reduced tillage, improved
nutrient management, and excellent animal care practices under one
coherent vision, can optimize the performance and sustainability of our
farms.
What are the benefits of Regenerative Agriculture?
In general, regenerative agriculture should provide measurable
economic, social, and environmental benefits that help improve, rather
than just sustain our ecosystems and we have been able to demonstrate
just that. For example, water conservation technologies have helped us
save millions of gallons of fresh water every year while reducing our
input costs. Enhancements to animal welfare have helped ensure more
milk production with fewer resources consumed.
For McCarty Family Farm and our partners, regenerative agriculture
must move beyond a qualitative concept towards making decisions based
on quantitative outcomes. By benchmarking and tracking our
environmental and economic performance we can better understand the
impacts and make better business decisions
In general, these regenerative efforts have helped demonstrate that
dairy farming, and all of agriculture can be a part of the solution for
our climate and our economy, while of course helping to feed the world.
Policy Recommendations
At times, USDA programs are helpful to incentivize new ideas and
reduce up-front costs when a clear, short-term ROI isn't possible and
while we know regenerative practices produce economic benefits in the
long term such as increased efficiency, resilient yields, and improved
market opportunities, up-front costs can still be a barrier to
implementation. Traditional ag. lending looks year-to-year, while
regenerative farming takes a longer-term view which is why conservation
funding and incentives are crucial greater adoption.
When considering USDA conservation programs, budgets, are just one
barrier to greater adoption. Challenges such as EQIP backlogs, rigid
contract structures, cumbersome applications and burdensome follow up
reporting create additional strain.
We work with our partners, including Danone, to explore different
financing and incentive models. USDA programs such as the Conservation
Innovation Grant for On-Farm Trials allowed us to work with non-Federal
partners such as Danone, Sustainable Environmental Consultants and
National Fish & Wildlife Foundation to finance scalable regenerative
management. By considering the applications and contract costs to
farmers and allowing farmers to work with familiar partners rather than
just USDA, I believe programs can support more farms investing in
regenerative agriculture. We need a simpler more streamlined processes
to engage with USDA and other stakeholders to implement a wider variety
of regenerative innovations.
Thank you for the time today and I look forward to answering your
questions.

The Chairman. Thank you, Mr. McCarty, for your excellent
testimony.
And now, Mr. Clark, please begin when you are ready.

STATEMENT OF RICK CLARK, OWNER, FARM GREEN & CLARK LAND AND
CATTLE, WILLIAMSPORT, IN; ON BEHALF OF
REGENERATE AMERICA

Mr. Clark. Chairman Scott, Ranking Member Thompson, Members
of the Committee, thank you for having me here today. I am
absolutely honored.
My name is Rick Clark. I am a fifth-generation farmer from
west central Indiana, and we farm about 7,000 acres of row
crops.
Folks, this is urgent and it is critical that we have
bipartisan action on the topic at hand today. I am a
Republican, and I have spoken to thousands of farmers across
this country, and not once has my party affiliation come up.
The witnesses here today do not represent the diversity of
regenerative farmers and ranchers. We are especially missing
voices of indigenous leaders and farmers of color. And it is
critical in this farming journey that you have the support of
your family, and I am going to tell you, they have my back.
American farmers are the most productive in the world, but
we have to acknowledge the condition our soils are in. We are
in trouble. Five-point-six tons per acre per year of soil are
leaving our fields. I am not here today to offend the practices
of any farmer, and we have to understand the heritage and
history they have. We also need to understand our soil is
fragile and degrading right in front of our eyes, which leads
me to why I am here today. Adopting soil health practices can
slow down and reverse the degradation of soil. I want to leave
you today with the confidence that regenerative agriculture can
be incorporated into any farming operation and be far better
for your bottom line.
After decades of heavy tillage on our farm, a 1" rain event
created so much erosion on our farm, I knew it was time to do
something different. Like thousands of farmers, I started cover
cropping through EQIP. This is an essential program to increase
farmers' comfort level of change. In my written testimony,
there is a photo of my soil and my neighbor's soil just 20
apart from each other. The difference is astounding. My soils
have water infiltration rates of 20" per hour, and the
neighbors have an infiltration rate of \1/2\" of rain per hour.
Our soils have 1.5 million earthworms per acre; the neighbor's
farms have nearly zero earthworms.
So how do we get there? We need to follow the six
principles of soil health. One, context. This is key. While
practices change from Texas to Indiana, principles are
universal. Two, minimize disturbance; three, maximize
diversity; four, living roots; five, armor the soil; six,
animal integration.
Here is a little bit more about our operation. We have not
used starter fertilizer, seed treatments, fungicides,
insecticides, pesticides, phosphorus, or potassium in 8 years.
And to boot we are organic with no tillage. I am far down this
path, but any farm can start and experience incredible results
with ecologically and economically, especially with proper
education and support. And note, it doesn't have to be organic.
Cover crops are doing more than protecting and building
soil. On our operation, cover crops have become an offensive
juggernaut with cereal rye giving us upwards of $435 per acre
worth of NPK and legume cover crops giving us upwards of $969
worth of value when terminated with a roller-crimper at
maturity. Most farmers can't achieve this without tools,
education, and changes to crop insurance rules that require
termination well before maturity.
On our farm, we have currently reduced diesel fuel
consumption by 50 percent, chemistry and fertility by 100
percent, and, based on regional input spending averages, we are
saving $1,957,000 annually.
Last, our farm is more resilient against flood and drought,
we are more resilient to supply disruptions, and we have a
systematic approach that will be economically profitable and
viable for generations to come. We need to help American
farmers integrate cover crops into their operation within their
context. We need to also help American ranchers adopt
regenerative grazing practices.
On behalf of Regenerate America Coalition, we are pushing
to ensure the next farm bill robustly supports regenerative ag.
We need better education and technical assistance, equitable
opportunities and access, infrastructure and processing,
healthy and regionally sourced food, farmland preservation,
incentives for soil health and risk mitigation.
Thank you so much for allowing me to speak today. I look
forward to future hearings and conversations with each of you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Clark follows:]

Prepared Statement of Rick Clark, Owner, Farm Green & Clark Land and
Cattle, Williamsport, IN; on Behalf of Regenerate America
Dear Honorable Chairman Scott, Ranking Member Thompson, and Members
of the Committee--thank you for providing me the opportunity to testify
before you today.
My name is Rick Clark. I am the owner and operator of Clark Land
and Cattle, a 7,000 acre regenerative-organic farm near Williamsport,
Indiana, where we have transitioned from conventional tillage to 100%
organic no-till and use 100% cover crops and non-chemical termination
(roller-crimpers) to build soil health and soil organic matter as we
suppress weeds and sequester carbon. I am a fifth generation family
farmer. Our family has farmed this land since the 1880s, producing food
and agricultural products during each generation in what we have
believed to be the best and most innovative ways that the latest
science and our personal experience taught us was vital to keeping the
land healthy and viable to be handed down to the next generation.
I am honored to be here on behalf of Regenerate America,\1\ where I
serve as a member of the Farmer Leadership Council. Regenerate America
is a national, bipartisan coalition of farmers, businesses, nonprofits
and individuals. Alongside thousands of farmers and ranchers across the
country, I am asking Congress to make soil health and regenerative
agriculture a primary focus in the 2023 Farm Bill.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ Regenerate America. 2022. https://regenerateamerica.com/.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
I want to thank Chairman Scott for having the vision and courage to
call this hearing today about what I believe is one of the most
important issues of our time: How will we, as farmers and a nation,
continue to feed ourselves and our families and neighbors in ways that
are the least harmful to the land and have the most beneficial impacts
for recovering our soils and human health?
I also want to thank Ranking Member G.T. Thompson, who, as a fellow
farmer not only knows the challenges that farmers face personally, but
also as someone who is in a critical leadership position, has the
chance to help farmers transition to better soil health and climate-
smart practices at a time of economic instability and increasing
threats posed by inclement weather.
As a registered Republican, I want to say that healthy soil and
improving our nation's soil resource need not be a political issue.
Soil health is truly our common ground, and is one of the most
bipartisan issues I have found as I have transitioned our family's farm
over the past 13 years and worked with thousands of farmers across the
country to help them save money and climate-proof their own fields
through regenerative soil health practices. We cannot afford to make
soil health a political issue today. This is about helping farmers and
our nation.
While it is an incredible honor to be here representing on behalf
of the regenerative agriculture movement, among such distinguished
experts, I feel it is important to acknowledge that not any one of us
portray the breadth and origins of regenerative agriculture. The
principles and practices that help us rebuild soil health and ecosystem
function combine indigenous knowledge, adaptive holistic management
frameworks, and recent discoveries in science and technology; it needs
all, and is all.
Many critical voices and perspectives are missing from this hearing
today. And, might I remind us, that many of these practices and
principles were utilized by earlier generations of American farmers,
and many of our parents and grandparents. Farmers and ranchers are, by
nature, land stewards, however, because of policies and other long-
lasting intentions, such as ``get big or get out'' of the 1970s, our
practices have been steered away from what is ultimately best for
farmers and the betterment of the soil.
The State of Our Soils
In addition to being a farmer, I have had the incredible honor of
crisscrossing the entirety of this country to train farmers in
regenerative and biological approaches. Because of this, I have visited
and seen hundreds of farms in 25 states. While American farmers and
ranchers are at the heart of this country and are some of the most
innovative, successful, and productive farmers in the world, I want to
be crystal clear for a moment to recognize the perilous state of our
soils--the real wealth of our nation, the foundation of American
resilience and prosperity. The situation is urgent and must be
considered as such.

[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

Changing land use, particularly the shift to our modern systems of
agriculture in the United States and across the world, has been one of
the biggest drivers of many issues we face today. Through
mismanagement, our land and our soil are now heavily degraded and in
many cases barely function, or worse, are completely desertified.
Right now the majority of American agricultural soils (over 50%)
are severely degraded.^{2, 3} We are losing topsoil at a rate
of 5.6 tons per acre (ten times faster than it is being
replenished).\4\ Conventional practices have led to the Corn Belt
completely losing \1/3\ of its topsoil.\5\ This is causing serious
flooding, drought and soil loss and erosion, and depletion of water
resources across rural America, leading to a concerning loss of
biodiversity, significant declines of on farm stability, and is costing
our farmers $44 billion annually.\6\ One study found lost topsoil in my
state of Indiana is causing annual losses of $362 million, and 6-9% in
annual crop yield reductions per county.\7\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\2\ https://www.politico.com/agenda/story/2017/09/13/soil-health-
agriculture-trend-usda-000513.
\3\ The numbers in the United States are mirrored around the world,
with scientists estimating that some 52% of global agricultural land is
degraded.
\4\ https://www.farmprogress.com/soil-health/economics-soil-loss.
\5\ Thaler, Evan A., Larsen, Isaac J., and Yu, Qian. 2021. The
extent of soil loss across the US Corn Belt. Proceedings of the
National Academy of Sciences, 118(8), https://www.pnas.org/content/118/
8/e1922375118.
\6\ The $44 billion per year includes lost productivity, along with
sedimentation and eutrophication of water reservoirs according https://
www.farmprogress.com/soil-health/high-cost-soil-erosion. Sartori, et
al. (2019) estimated the global costs of soil erosion due to water at
$8 billion annually, reducing global food production by 33.7 million
tonnes and raising prices by up to 3.5%.
\7\ Thaler, Evan A., et al. ``The extent of soil loss across the US
Corn Belt.''
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This is greatly concerning to me, and is a huge problem for food
security and national security. I want to make clear that it's not just
a question of carbon or greenhouse gasses. To a large extent, in
breaking our soils, we've broken the hydrological cycle, carbon storage
capacity, and nutrient cycle. Much of our land's soil is degraded to
such a state it is no longer properly functioning, and it will only be
worsened by climate change.
Over the past several decades, farmers across the country have
faced increasingly severe weather events, such as swings between
drought conditions and sudden, intense rainfalls and windstorms that
are not only battering crops and profitability for that season, but
also washing away their long-term profitability with massive erosion
events that are leaving vast scars on the land across millions of acres
of farmland.
Just 2 years ago, on August 10, 2020, the Midwest experienced the
most expensive thunderstorm in U.S. history, with winds gusting over
100 miles per hour over a 14 hour period while a derecho traveled over
770 miles across Nebraska, Iowa, Minnesota, Indiana and Ohio.\8\ These
winds moved with hurricane force, devastating over $11.5 billion in
corn and soybean crops across the Midwest and damaging an estimated 14
million acres of crops in Iowa, and millions more acres across the Corn
Belt.\9\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\8\ Sorace, Stephen, ``Iowa farmers devastated after derecho
damages 14 million acres of farmland, grain bins'', Fox Business New,
August 24, 2020. https://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/iowa-farmers-
devastated-after-derecho-damages-14-million-acres-of-farmland-grain-
bins.
\9\ Barreda, Virginia, ``Today marks 2 years since devastating Aug.
10 derecho slammed Iowa'', Des Moines Register, August 10, 2022.
https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/weather/2022/08/10/iowa-
weather-two-years-since-derecho-blew-across-state/10286537002/.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
These storms are both a cause and a consequence of soil erosion.
This spring, the derecho that ripped through the Midwest caused an
estimated 3-12 tons of lost soil per acre (1 ton is approximately equal
to a pickup truck bed full of soil) on South Dakota farms on the day
the storm hit.\10\ The maximum amount farmers in the region can lose
before it impacts their production levels is 5 tons per acre per
year.\11\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\10\ Gewin, Virginia. June 6, 2022. ``A Wild, Windy Spring Is
Creating a Soil Erosion Nightmare for Farmers''. Civil Eats. https://
civileats.com/2022/06/06/a-wild-windy-spring-is-creating-a-soil-
erosion-nightmare-for-farmers/.
\11\ Gewin, Virginia. June 6, 2022. ``A Wild, Windy Spring Is
Creating a Soil Erosion Nightmare for Farmers''. Civil Eats. https://
civileats.com/2022/06/06/a-wild-windy-spring-is-creating-a-soil-
erosion-nightmare-for-farmers/.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
As these extreme weather events occur more regularly, now is the
time to invest in helping farmers climate-proof their fields, increase
resilience, and build soil health, rather than continuing to pay out
billions of dollars in disaster assistance. Agriculture is one of the
few sectors that can not only reduce its emissions but with the right
management practices, can be emissions negative. Failure to act will
have a catastrophic impact on our ability to grow food to feed
ourselves and other nations and will have a significant and
increasingly negative impact on our economy over the coming decades.
The State of Farm Economics
Just as farmers and ranchers are needing to transition to better
soil health and regenerative farming practices, current market and
policy conditions impede the process or make it nearly impossible,
significantly harming our nation's ability to meet present and future
challenges of climate change.
Today, our farmers are facing unprecedented challenges. Record high
farm input costs, short supply of fertilizers, price inflation, and
supply chain disruptions from the pandemic and war in Ukraine are
squeezing already razor-thin margins and jeopardizing farmer's
livelihoods. Fertilizer prices have risen 300% since 2021.\12\
According to Farm Progress: ``Since 2020, all nitrogen fertilizers are
now more than double in price: anhydrous is up by 131% and urea by
110%. Potash is up by 120%. In October of 2021 alone, the price of
anhydrous fertilizer jumped 26% from the previous month to levels not
seen since 2008.'' \13\ This year alone, nitrogen fertilizer, which
accounts for more than 50% of the commercial fertilizer used by
farmers, is expected to see price increases of more than 80% from the
previous year.\14\ This is forcing farmers to decide between planting
fewer acres or selling out to keep from going into foreclosure, and
lower supplies of commodities means increased prices for consumers.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\12\ Campbell, Lindsay, ``Farmers Struggle to Keep Up With the
Rising Costs of Fertilizer: Fertilizer prices have skyrocketed as much
as 300 percent since early 2021. Is there any relief in sight?'',
Modern Farmer, March 2, 2022. https://modernfarmer.com/2022/03/
fertilizer-prices/.
\13\ Fatka, Jacqui, ``DOJ investigation sought for fertilizer price
hikes'', Farm Progress, December 9, 2021. https://www.farmprogress.com/
farm-policy/doj-investigation-sought-fertilizer-price-hikes.
\14\ Carlson, Claire, ``Skyrocketing Fertilizer Prices Gouge Farmer
Profits, Groups Blame Consolidation'', The Daily Yonder, March 15,
2022. https://dailyyonder.com/skyrocketing-fertilizer-prices-gouge-
farmer-profits-groups-blame-consolidation/2022/03/15/.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Subsidies have been the knee-jerk response. In 2020, U.S. farm
subsidy payments rose to a record $46.5 billion, triple the normal
amount, which was up from $22.4 billion from the year before in 2019.
A big question is: what are America's farmers and the U.S. taxpayer
really getting from these subsidies? The government is willing to hand
this money out but we get very little back in return. In our current
system, subsidy payments often end up promoting farming practices that
are not improving soil health or resilience. While I do believe these
programs should remain voluntary and incentive-based, they would be
improved by implementing a tiered system wherein farmers and ranchers
who are utilizing best practices receive the biggest share of the
subsidy benefits. We will not be able to subsidize our way out of this
crisis, but by incentivizing soil health practices, farmers can regain
independence and reduce reliance on inputs.
The situation is highlighting the extent to which our current food
production system is trapping farmers in a cycle of dependency. Farm
debt is rising by 4% each year,\15\ yet even as more of the food dollar
leaves the farmers' pocket, rural communities are left behind as those
dollars leave the local economy. At one point during the pandemic,
cattle prices had declined by 18%, while box beef prices increased by
80%. And just 14% of every food dollar goes to the farmer today.\16\
According to an American Farm Bureau Federation survey, a strong
majority of farmers/farmworkers think financial issues (91%), fear of
losing the farm (87%), and farm or business problems (88%) impact the
mental health of farmers.\17\ I encounter this all the time--from
loans, insurance, peer pressure, markets, to simply not jeopardizing
the livelihood of the farm, there is so much stress on the farmer's
plate, there is so much out of their control.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\15\ https://farmdocdaily.illinois.edu/2018/08/agricultural-debt-
continues-to-increase-2.html.
\16\ Editor's note: this footnote was blank in the submitted
statement.
\17\ American Farm Bureau Federation. 2019. ``Rural Stress Polling
Presentation''. https://www.fb.org/files/
AFBF_Rural_Stress_Polling_Presentation_04.16.19.pdf.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Subsidies and inputs are, at best, band-aids to the current farm
crisis--at worst, they are exacerbating it. Regenerative agriculture is
a permanent solution that works for farmers of all sizes, from small
diversified farms to large scale row-crop producers like me, all across
the nation, and benefits not only farmers and their families but all
Americans.
The Soil Solution
Regenerative agriculture focuses on improving soil health using a
variety of agricultural management practices that work in alignment
with natural systems. Increasing soil organic matter content in our
soils can reduce or stop soil erosion, and improve aggregate stability,
water infiltration, water retention, nutrient cycling, plant health,
crop yields, crop resilience, biodiversity, and more. More organic
matter in the soil also means we are moving carbon from the atmosphere
and depositing it into the soil, where it can be a net positive for the
planet and society.
When we are looking at a farm or ranch, regenerative agriculture
incorporates six key components. The first one is really important and
unique to each person, the other five are the principles that are
employed depending on your context:

1. Understand Context: Economic, personal, community, ecological,
climate, bioregion, etc.

2. Minimize Disturbance: This refers to tillage, chemical
fertilizers, pesticides, and more.

3. Establish a ``Living Root'': Have a plant photosynthesize and
pump carbon-based exudates into the soil to feed the soil
biology for as long as possible throughout the growing
season.

4. Provide Soil Armor: cover cropping or ensuring to leave mulch or
plant residue is critical. Bare soil exposed to the
elements harms soil health, so it's recommended to always
have some living or dead debris covering the soil.

5. Integrate Animals: Have one or more types of animals move across
your fields if it can work in your context, otherwise known
as planned grazing.

6. Enhance Diversity: Add diversity to whatever it is you are
growing--this could be planting diverse hedgerows
throughout the farm, installing owl boxes, integrating
honeybees, or diverse multi-species cover crops.

Important practices for implementing these principles include:
cover cropping, no-till/reduced-till, planned/adaptive multi-paddock
(AMP) grazing, diverse crop rotations, and much more.

[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

My Regenerative Journey
I was fortunate enough to see some of the problems of soil loss
coming almost 2 decades ago, when I began my transition to no-till and
cover crops. Many years ago when we were still practicing conventional
tillage, there was a 1" rain event that created so much erosion on my
farm, I was determined to do something about it. This was the turning
point for me.

A 1" rain event should not cause any issues on your land--
your soil should easily be able to absorb and retain that water
(for every additional 1% of soil organic matter, any acre can
capture an extra 27 thousand gallons more water).\18\ We do not
have a ``flood problem'' when it rains 1" to 3" in an hour and
most of the water runs off--we have a water infiltration
problem.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\18\ Editor's note: this footnote was blank in the submitted
statement.

As I've incorporated more regenerative soil health practices over
the years, I have been able to reduce my input costs on fertilizer
(chemistry and fertility) to zero dollars and decrease our fuel usage
by 60%. Currently, I'm saving $286 per acre per year on avoided
inputs--that's $2 million in savings per year on 7,000 acres. And I'm
maintaining stability through hard times.
Here is a great example of where savings come from on my operation:
The Power of Legume Cocktails

[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

August 1, 2022.

Farmers usually look to cover crops and no-till as defenses to
combat a problem like erosion. But, once you become comfortable with
cover crops and no-till, they become offensive juggernauts, providing
far more benefits than just erosion control. We are currently utilizing
complex mixes of cover crops, no-till, and non-chemical termination
with roller-crimpers across our row crop operation growing corn and
soybeans. I was able to eliminate the practice of ``burning down'' or
killing cover crops with herbicides in 3 years. I now use a roller-
crimper to flatten cover crops, which provide a mulch for soybeans to
suppress weeds. I always encourage farmers to not till or plow their
fields. Every time you till, you not only make your soil more
vulnerable, you are also regerminating weeds.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

Photo: My farm is doing non-chemical termination of a diverse
cover crop with roller-crimper while simultaneously direct
seeding cash crop with no-till drill.

We're not just saving costs, we're bringing in a healthy profit
that gives us the room to experiment and incorporate new practices that
we can then share with others. The farm's best return on investment
(ROI) was when we reduced inputs by 60%. The yields were increasing
year over year. This is when corn was valued at $3.75 and soybeans were
at $7.85.
Another key point is that although yield is a critical benchmark,
what is not talked about sufficiently and is honestly even more
important, is yield stability. Conventional systems are not only
vulnerable to increasingly severe cycles of flood and drought (because
poor soil health limits the amount of water retention and absorption),
they are also at the mercy of global energy pricing, as chemical inputs
are tied to those markets. The hyper focus on yields has ultimately
made our soils more vulnerable and therefore less consistent because of
drought, flood, etc. Maximizing returns in a single year is simply not
as critical as being able to produce year after year in a sustainable
fashion, resilient to both weather and markets.
Stability
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Yield stability on my operation through soil health
practices.

5,600 of our 7,000 acres are also certified organic and the rest
are in transition. As I mentioned previously, I first turned to
regenerative practices to combat erosion and soil loss. My regenerative
journey put me within reach of the market opportunity and demand for
domestically produced organic products. However, as I always tell
farmers, whatever you're doing, whether or not you are doing organic,
soil function is what really matters.
No-till organic isn't always easy, but I am particular about doing
things a different way in order to prove this model. And, because
myself and so many other farmer leaders around the country have
challenged ourselves, these practices are now much more accessible and
within reach than when I began my journey.
It is very important to understand that this is a systematic
approach to building soil health, human health, and ensuring water
quality. When you start down the regenerative journey, you see soil
change before your eyes. Increased water infiltration rates, increased
water holding capacity, increased aggregate stability, increased
earthworm counts, increased beneficial organisms, increased nutrient
density, and increased microbial activity: these accomplishments are
only done if you follow the principles of soil health. Period.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

Photos: Two shovels full of soil, taken Sunday Sept 11th,
2022 during a rain event. Left: my neighbor's corn field.
Right: my soybean field planted into cover crops that were
terminated while green with roller-crimper. Fields are only 15
yards apart.

Above are two photographs of a shovel full of soil. The neighbor's
field is on the left. It has no aggregate stability, no visible
earthworms, slow infiltration rate around \1/2\" per hour, very little
water holding capacity, and no root exudates that would feed the
microbes and create soil aggregation. On the other hand, the shovel
full of soil on the right is from one of our fields. It has aggregate
stability that measures down 8", this soil's infiltration rate is now
20" an hour and the earth worm count is currently 1.5 million
earthworms per acre (compared to when we began this trajectory it was
near zero).
The difference of healthy soil is the difference of input cost
reductions, it is the difference of flooding or drought, it is the
difference of wind and water erosion rates and keeping fertility on my
land, it is the difference between knowing my family is safe from so
many harmful chemicals, and, it is possible for all farmers and
ranchers to implement this principles in all agriculture in every
region of this country and experience substantial results.
As my fellow regenerative agriculture pioneer, Gabe Brown, says,
``Whether your primary concern is a farmer's bottom line, rural
economic recovery, climate mitigation, reversing biodiversity collapse,
cleaning our water and air, rehydrating our land so aquifers charge and
springs flow again, providing land access for minorities and beginning
farmers, or addressing the health crisis, regenerative agriculture
provides the solution.''
5. Scaling Up Regenerative Ag
Over the past several years, I have witnessed incredible advances
in the adoption of regenerative agriculture practices. The demand for
regenerative agriculture is here and on the rise--now is time for all
of us to help farmers lead this incredible opportunity for our country.
While the expansion and adoption of practices like no-till and
cover cropping is important (in 2017, 104 million acres were under no-
till production, 15.4 million acres were under cover crops), by
combining these practices we can achieve far greater financial and
ecological benefits, which is a tremendous opportunity that we must
more broadly support.
I want to share a few case studies from my fellow farmers that
demonstrate this is not an anomaly for my farm in Indiana. Yes, this
can work with farmers in your district. Soil health practices work in
every corner of our country.
David Brandt, Carroll, Ohio: ^{19, 20}
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\19\ https://understandingag.com/case_studies/brandt-farms-case-
study/.
\20\ https://www.nrcs.usda.gov/wps/portal/nrcs/oh/soils/
STELPRDB1166409/.

One of the first and likely the longest term no-till farmers
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
in Ohio. 100% no-till since 1971.

He currently has 736 acres of no-till row crops and cover
crops on his corn, wheat, and soybean operation, and uses a
diverse cover crop species mix with 8- to 14-way blends.

In 1971 the soil organic matter on David's newly purchased
farm was 0.75%. By 2019, the soil organic matter ranged from
6.8% to 8.0%.

David's ability to infiltrate water has increased from less
than 25,000 gallons per acre to more than 175,000 gallons of
water per acre.

From 150-250 pounds of nitrogen fertilizer per acre for corn
in 1971, he now uses 20-30 pounds. He uses no fertilization for
his soybeans. No fungicides or insecticides. No seed treatment.

His cash crop yields have been increasing by an average of
5% annually for the past 5-6 years.

His input costs have decreased 72-78% from 2009 to 2019.

David also has a cover crop seed company and a seed-cleaning
business that operate on the farm.

The operation now involves three generations of the family
that are actively involved.

``It will take 6-7 years to change or improve a soil with
just no-till, but that time can be shortened to 4-5 years or as
few as 3 years if you also use the right blend of cover
crops.''

Loran Steinlage, West Union, Iowa: \21\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\21\ https://www.agtechsowhat.com/agtechsowhatepisodes/2021/9/8/
getting-off-the-commodities-treadmill.

Second-generation farmer, owns and operates FLOLOfarms,
farming 750 acres in Iowa's northeast corner, and custom farms
another 750 acres in West Union with his wife, Brenda.
Currently producing corn, soybeans, cereal rye, winter wheat,
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
malt barley and buckwheat.

Uses relay cropping, the practice of planting the second
crop into the first crop before harvest. This allows him to
grow a crop 365 days a year, even under snow.

Loran also uses no-till, interseeding, cover crops, and
controlled traffic farming.

Works in equipment design for technology that helps farmers
build soil health.

Restored native trout to his stream by purifying water and
improving water quality.

While other farmers in the area are focused on growing row
crops at scale, Loran is focused on increased crop diversity,
reducing the costs of production, and ultimately getting off
the ``commodities treadmill''.

Keith Berns, Bladen, Nebraska[:] ^{22, 23}
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\22\ https://greencover.com/keith-berns/.
\23\ https://non-gmoreport.com/articles/green-cover-seed-leads-the-
charge-on-cover-crop-
growth/.

Fourth-generation farmer; operates 2,500 acres of irrigated
and dryland corn, soybeans, rye, triticale, peas, sunflowers,
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
and buckwheat under no-till in south central Nebraska.

Co-owns and operates Green Cover Seed, one of the major
cover crop seed providers and educators in the United States,
which sells 120 different cover crop varieties. In 2021, Green
Cover sold enough cover crop seeds to cover a million acres.
The seeds are non-GMO and not treated, and there are plans to
sell certified organic seed mixes.

Honored by the White House as a 2016 Champion of Change for
Sustainable and Climate-Smart Agriculture.

Developed the SmartMix Calculator^ATM}\24\ one of
the most widely used cover crop selection tools.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\24\ https://smartmix.greencoverseed.com/.

Appointed by Nebraska Governor to serve as Chairman of
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Nebraska Healthy Soils Task Force.

Teaches on cover crops and soil health more than 30 times
per year to various groups and audiences.

Dan DeSutter, Attica, Indiana[:]^{25, 26, 27, 28}
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\25\ https://hoosiergrassfedbeef.com/about-our-farm.
\26\ https://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/07/business/cover-crops-a-
farming-revolution-with-deep-roots-in-the-past.html.
\27\ https://www.ccsin.org/post/dan-desutter-fountain-county.
\28\ https://www.morningagclips.com/farmer-teacher-student/.

Owns and operates Hoosier Grassfed Beef, a 5,000 acre
grassfed beef and organic row-crop operation where he practices
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
organic no-till and uses cover crops to build soil health.

The livestock and row-crop model allows the cows to graze
cover crops in the off season, increasing the number of days
the cows are on fresh pasture.

The no-till organic system relies on a multi-pronged
approach to weed management that includes cover crops, roller-
crimpers, mowing and electrical termination.

Actual production history (APH) in corn is 30 to 35% over
the county average.

One thing each of these regenerative farmers has in common is that
they focus on educating other farmers in these practices. At the same
time, larger scale studies are confirming what we already knew: farmers
across the country are achieving profitability, resilience, and
economic benefits with soil health systems. The National Association of
Conservation Districts and Datu Research found that soil health
practices can result in an economic return of over $100 per acre,\29\
while American Farmland Trust found soil health practices to improve
bottom lines between $4-$824 per acre per year.\30\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\29\ National Association of Conservation Districts, ``Case studies
show big economic benefits of soil health practices,'' August 29, 2017,
https://www.nacdnet.org/newsroom/case-studies-show-big-economic-
benefits-soil-health-practices/.
\30\ American Farmland Trust, ``Quantifying Economic and
Environmental Benefits of Soil Health,'' https://farmland.org/project/
quantifying-economic-and-environmental-benefits-of-soil-health/.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Soil Health Institute recently interviewed 100 farmers in nine
Midwestern states who have adopted soil health systems on corn and soy
operations to determine the impact of soil health practices on
profitability.\31\ Through adopting soil health systems:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\31\ Soil Health Institute and Cargill. 2022. ``Economics of Soil
Health Systems in Midwest Corn and Soy''. https://
soilhealthinstitute.org/economics.

Net income increased for 85% of farmers growing corn and 88%
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
of farmers growing soybean

Average costs decreased by $24/acre for corn and $17/acre
for soybean

Average net farm income increased by $52/acre for corn and
$45/acre for soybean

67% reported a higher yield than their conventional system

100% reported improved water quality

97% reported increased crop resilience to extreme weather

93% reported increased access to their fields

83% reduced fertilizer inputs
Congress Must Support the Advancement of Regenerative Agriculture
There is much more awareness and support for adopting soil health
today than when I started, such that a farmer can pair cost share
programs, private sector incentives, and advice from local farmers to
implement systems correctly, so that their farm doesn't have to suffer
a huge loss in profitability during the transition. However, there are
still widespread barriers that have led to low adoption rates
nationwide.\32\ Congress has an incredible opportunity to remove
barriers for farmers and ranchers and invest in regenerative transition
across the board to address a wide range of policy issues from
restoring food security and public health, to reviving rural America,
to building climate resilience. Here are some of the top priority
areas:
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\32\ Editor's note: this footnote was blank in the submitted
statement.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ensure all farmers and ranchers are getting access to education and
technical assistance: Seeing results on my operation took time, but
with the right education, we can enable more farmers and ranchers to
shift to and realize the immense benefits of regenerative soil health
practices. We want producers to have success with these practices the
first time so they will stick with them. We know education, especially
farmer-centered and farmer-led, is absolutely essential for successful
adoption. With the right knowledge and support, we can see positive
economic and ecological results within the first year, and significant
changes within 3 years.
Our current conventional agriculture education and technical
assistance systems are not adequately addressing the fact that the
average farm in America is still losing over 5.8 tons of topsoil per
acre per year. The agriculture education that is available today favors
short-term results and chemistry-oriented solutions while overlooking
biological and physical soil function. America's farmers, and the
institutions that support them, need urgent access to updated education
that promotes resilient, healthy soil and the transition to
regenerative agriculture, based on the latest cutting-edge science and
context-based principles for climate adaptation. This must include deep
context-based education not only for cropping systems, but also for
regenerative pasture and rangeland management, with an emphasis on
opportunities for the integration of crops and animals.
While I in no way think that livestock are a fit for every farmer,
we need to understand the critical role of livestock in building soil
health (one of the most efficient and quickest ways possible). While
everyone's situation is different, as Will Harris says, ``I would argue
that truly degraded land cannot cost-effectively be regenerated without
animal impact. Every ecosystem I am familiar with had animal impact in
its evolution.'' \33\ The benefits of grazing can double carbon
sequestration--for example, Gabe Brown realized significant carbon
gains on his farm from no-till but the real change came from
integrating livestock. We must make sure transition tools for
implementing planned/AMP grazing like cost share for mobile fencing are
much more widely available.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\33\ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lroe4pXNtKw.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
It is very important that we do not offend any farmers with their
current practices. We are not here to put anyone down or say they are
doing it wrong. This is why teaching is so critical. When I speak to a
group of farmers, I hope to instill a thinking process to change one or
two dynamics of their farm. This is success. Ultimately, it needs to
work for your economics and your situation.
Access to USDA soil health programs--a hand up not a hand out: To
get farmers started but ultimately save the government money. I have so
much gratitude and appreciation for programs like EQIP because it is
literally what allowed me to begin this journey. The cost-share paid
for the cover crop seed and let me see the benefits without the risk.
This was huge. Farmers are generally not eager for change but programs
like this, especially if they were extended out to 5 years, would allow
for much more confidence and staying power through the transition.
Long-term and individualized support is vital so farmers don't walk
away from the practices after their contracts end. I have seen this
happen too many times.
To rebuild soil, we need to help farmers and ranchers cover more of
the land with living plants for more of the year. And we need to ensure
support for cover crops and equipment like roller-crimpers are more
regionally available.
BIPOC, Tribal, women, beginning, limited resource, and veteran
farmers and ranchers, as well as small farms are often likely to use
soil health principles in their operations, but face barriers in
accessing USDA programs and support. As a result, historically
underserved producers and small operations struggle to access and
retain farmland, and have to fight to start out and keep up in the
farming business. We need to make sure all farmers can get the support
they need to start building soil health.
Rebuild local and regional infrastructure for processing to make
the regenerative transition economically feasible: The current lack of
access to local processing and markets for producers is preventing a
huge opportunity to increase net farm or ranch profitability and keep
more food dollars inside local economies. Investing in local and
regional access to infrastructure, processing and markets will help
regenerative producers make new products available and meet the
increasing consumer demand for their products, while reducing foreign
supply chain dependence and increasing domestic food supply. Increasing
access will allow more farmers to integrate regeneratively managed
livestock or specialty crops into their cropping systems (building soil
health and reducing reliance on chemical inputs), while improving
public health and providing local food security during times of crisis.
And if the farm has access to processing and distribution, the farmers
can operate on any scale that's comfortable for them.
Removing barriers and incentivizing soil health in financing and
insurance: The finance and insurance products that farmers rely on have
immense potential to support a transition to regenerative agriculture,
but current policies have created a system that often undermines, or
even actively prevents, common sense soil health practices that reduce
risk on farms--resulting in large scale soil loss and land degradation
at an enormous cost to U.S. taxpayers.\34\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\34\ https://www.nrdc.org/sites/default/files/federal-crop-
insurance-program-reforms-ip.pdf.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Over the past decade, crop insurance has become the most important
component of the farm safety net. The Federal Crop Insurance Program
(FCIP), administered by the USDA Risk Management Agency (RMA), receives
a greater portion of funding than all conservation programs combined,
and has more than 90 percent of U.S. cropland enrolled.\35\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\35\ https://sgp.fas.org/crs/misc/R46686.pdf.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Crop insurance payouts have nearly doubled in the last decade in
the face of ever increasing extreme weather.\36\ Without mitigating
actions, one study found that rising temperatures could increase annual
subsidies by $2.2 billion (or 34%), while USDA research found that
unmitigated climate impacts could increase subsidies for key crops by
$4.2 billion annually.\37\ This is putting the entire program in danger
over the long term.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\36\ https://www.nrdc.org/sites/default/files/federal-crop-
insurance-program-reforms-ip.pdf.
\37\ https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2902688.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The most effective way that we have of reducing on-farm risk is
applying conservation practices that build soil health. As my own
experience and that of my fellow farmers has shown (and the lesson
applies whether or not you take out crop insurance), these practices
decrease production risk in the face of increasing flood and drought,
and improve long-term resilience and stability for farmers.
If we are to have an effective farm safety net, then we have to
help farmers reduce risk (i.e., increase conservation practice
adoption) so we can keep premiums affordable, save rising taxpayer
costs, and keep the farm safety net resilient and strong for producers
in the years to come. This means bolstering crop insurance by removing
outdated barriers and creating incentives that recognize the risk-
reduction benefits of soil health and conservation practices and reward
farmers implementing those practices--it's like a ``good driver''
discount on your car insurance. By improving your soil health, you're
making your operation less risky and providing significant benefits to
society.
When the day comes that carbon markets fully arrive, farmers will
absolutely need the principles of soil health to leverage that
opportunity. Healthy soil is what's going to get the outcomes needed to
make participation in carbon markets successful.
If Congress provides the resources and correct program funding for
the transition to climate adaptive and soil regenerating practices,
farmers, ranchers and rural America will thrive.
Mr. Chairman, supporting America's farmers and ranchers in adopting
soil health, regenerative agriculture and climate-smart practices is
both an imperative and the opportunity of our time--not only to avert
imminent food supply and insecurity issues, but also to reverse soil
degradation, safeguard food security, farm profitability and
productivity, revive rural communities, and mitigate the impacts of a
changing climate.
Attachment

[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

The Chairman. Thank you. Excellent testimonies we are
getting here today, right on target. Thank you.
And now, Dr. Larson, you are now recognized for your 5
minutes.

STATEMENT OF REBECCA L. LARSON, Ph.D., CHIEF SCIENTIST AND VICE
PRESIDENT, GOVERNMENT AFFAIRS, WESTERN SUGAR COOPERATIVE,
DENVER, CO

Dr. Larson. Chairman Scott, Ranking Member Thompson, and
Members of the Committee, thank you for inviting me here today.
I have a Ph.D. in plant science and 22 years of diverse
experience with sugarbeets. I work for 800 small family farmer
owners of Western Sugar Cooperative. We have a 100 year history
that spans 110,000 acres across Colorado, Nebraska, Wyoming,
and Montana. I help measure the environmental impact of our
farmers' practices and guide their investment in public
research. Included with my written testimony is the data
substantiating the gains our farmers have made in soil health
and regenerative agriculture.
Soil health is critical for farmers. It reduces crop
inputs, increases crop productivity, and instills resiliency in
the agroecosystem. The USDA recognizes four soil health
principles: minimize soil disturbance, keep soil covered,
maintain living roots, and employ diverse crop rotation.
Tillage, mechanical work into the soil, works against three of
those principles and is arguably the biggest threat to soil
health.
I am here to provide concrete examples from our cooperative
and national trends that demonstrate conventional farming has
made significant gains in soil health. Since the 1950s, modern
agriculture has enabled exponential adoption of conservation
tillage across the U.S. Today, a majority of conventionally
produced U.S. commodity crops use conservation tillage. One out
of every five is no-till. Clearly, farmers value soil health,
as \1/3\ of conservation tillage was adopted with zero outside
incentive.
I see similar trends for sugarbeets. Eighty-two percent of
Western Sugar growers use conservation tillage, which has
tangibly improved soil health and imparted other dramatic
environmental benefits. At the same time, our yield has climbed
from 8,000 to more than 11,000 pounds of sugar per acre. This
is true sustainable intensification.
Conventional agriculture paved the way with conservation
tillage. More recently, no-till organic cropping has emerged.
However, most organic systems still rely on tillage, especially
row crops, small grains, and vegetable crops. For both
conventional and organic farms, adoption of conservation
tillage is highly dependent on soil type, climate, scale, and
cropping system. Ultimately, for Western Sugar farmers, the
adoption of genetically engineered sugarbeets with glyphosate
tolerance has allowed for widespread elimination of plowing and
conversion to conservation tillage.
Some claim pesticides are harmful to soil health. We have
not found that to be true. Our farm measurement across Western
Sugar shows microbial diversity and function is up six-fold
following the adoption of conservation tillage, despite
judicious use of pesticides. The data suggests tillage is far
more detrimental to soil health than pesticides. Despite that,
in the last decade and a half Western Sugar farmers have cut
the quantity of pesticides applied by 40 percent and reduced
the overall environmental impact by 92 percent, similar to
national trends across conventional farming. Technology on the
horizon will further reduce reliance on pesticides in the
future. However, mandates against pesticides today will hurt,
not help, the climate-smart agenda, most critically in the
areas of food waste and land conversion.
Cover crops also promote soil health. Most closely
associated with organic farming, it is also used in
conventional systems across the United States. Implementation
varies by region and cropping system, as does method of cover
crop termination. Western Sugar farmers use cover crops under a
variety of circumstances. However, our primary soil armor is a
residue left from the previous crop, which also serves to
promote soil health as we integrate in livestock for managed
grazing, further building soil health.
Conservation crop rotation is also key to soil health. All
Western Sugar growers rotate a diverse range of crops,
including the occasional perennials. These rotations include
high-residue and low-nitrogen-demand crops that balance
nutrient demands and protect the biodiversity that is important
to crop health.
The evolution of conventional ag practices has reduced soil
erosion by 35 percent across the United States. It is important
to recognize that the U.S. is currently a leader in climate-
smart ag, and farmers are accepting of further improvement.
Innovations in modern, conventional agriculture are primed to
achieve climate-smart goals. Programs authorized by this
Committee like CIG, the Sustainable Ag Research and Education
Program, and EQIP have been highly effective in helping growers
adopt climate-smart practices. Western Sugar has used these
programs to improve nutrient stewardship and implement high-
carbon soil amendment to regenerate soil health.
As you turn your attention to drafting the next farm bill,
I encourage you to continue to support programs like these and
invest in outcomes-based solutions that keep the farmer in the
driver's seat as they understand the nuance in their production
system. It is also imperative to bolster research for
agricultural outcomes to enable our next step change in
farming.
In summary, conventional farming has employed conservation
practices like reduced tillage, cover cropping, and diverse
rotations and are continuing to innovate. Thank you for the
time today, and I look forward to taking questions.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Larson follows:]

Prepared Statement of Rebecca L. Larson, Ph.D., Chief Scientist and
Vice President, Government Affairs, Western Sugar Cooperative, Denver,
CO
Chairman Scott, Ranking Member Thompson, and Members of the
Committee, thank you for inviting me today. I have a Ph.D. in Plant
Science and 22 years' diverse experience with sugarbeets. I'm work for
the 800 small family farmer-owners of the Western Sugar Cooperative.
The cooperative spans 110,000 acres across Colorado, Nebraska, Wyoming,
and Montana. I help measure the environmental impact of our farmers'
practices and guide their investment in public research. Included with
my written testimony is the data substantiating the gains our farmers
have made in soil health and regenerative agriculture.
Soil health is critical for farmers and the environment. For the
farmer healthier soil reduces crop inputs, increases crop productivity,
and instills resiliency in the agroecosystem. For the environment, it
can help mitigate climate change, using the soil as a sponge to absorb
carbon from the atmosphere.
The USDA recognizes four soil health principles: (1) keep soil
covered, (2) minimize soil disturbance, (3) employ diverse crop
rotation, and (4) maintain living roots.\1\ Tillage, mechanical working
of the soil, works against three of the four principles making it
arguably the biggest threat to soil health.
I am here to provide concrete examples from our cooperative and
national trends that demonstrate conventional farming has made
significant gains in soil health. Since the 1950s,\2\ modern
agriculture has enabled exponential adoption of conservation tillage
across the U.S.\3\ Today, a majority of conventionally produced U.S.
commodity crops use conservation tillage; 1 out of 5 acres is no till.
Clearly, farmers value soil health, as a third of conservation tillage
was adopted with zero outside incentive.\4\ I see similar trends for
sugarbeet; 82% of Western Sugar growers use conservation tillage
(Figure 1). The switch to conservation tillage improved soil health and
imparted other dramatic environmental benefits: (1) erosion is down 90%
(Figure 2), (2) soil microbial diversity and function is up six-fold
(Figure 3), (3) fuel consumption and greenhouse gas emissions are down
40% (Figure 4), and (4) water use efficiency is up 30%. Concurrently,
yield has climbed from 8,000 to more than 11,000 pounds of sugar per
acre,\5\ true sustainable intensification (Figure 5). Conventional
agriculture paved the way with conservation tillage. More recently no
till organic cropping has emerged.\6\ However, most organic systems
²³ still rely on tillage,^{7, 8} especially row
crops, small grains, and vegetable crops. For both conventional and
organic farms, adoption of conservation tillage is highly dependent on
soil type, climate, scale, and cropping system.^{4, 6, 9, 10}
Ultimately, for Western Sugar farmers, the adoption genetically
engineered sugarbeets with glyphosate tolerance allowed for widespread
elimination of plowing and conversion to conservation tillage.
Some claim pesticides are harmful to soil health. We have not found
that to be true. On farm measurement across Western Sugar shows
microbial diversity and function is up six-fold following the adoption
of conservation tillage (Figure 3), despite judicious use of
pesticides. The data suggests tillage is far more detrimental to soil
health than pesticides (Figure 9), consistent with reports in the
literature.^{11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16} Despite that, in the last
decade and a half Western Sugar farmers have cut the quantity of
pesticides applied by 40% and reduced the overall environmental impact
by 92%, similar to national trends in conventional farming.\17\ Western
Sugar, like all beet sugar cooperatives, determines what seeds can be
planted on our farms. We require the seed largely defend itself against
prevalent pests and diseases, allowing for robust integrated pest
management. Combined with disease prediction models and precision
application tools, pesticides are used with the highest levels of
stewardship. Technology on the horizon will further reduce reliance on
pesticides in the future.^{18, 19, 20} However, mandates
against pesticides today will hurt, not help climate-smart agendas,
most critically in the areas of food waste \21\ and land
conversion.\22\
Cover crops also promote soil health. Most closely associated with
organic farming, it is also used in conventional systems across the
U.S.^{23, 24} Implementation varies by region and cropping
system,\25\ as does method of cover crop termination. Western Sugar
farmers use cover crops under a variety of circumstances: (1) 15-20% of
sugarbeet harvest occurs early enough to be followed by a fall-seeded
crop like winter wheat, (2) where irrigation allows, fall-seeded cover
crops are planted following regular harvest as well, and (3) spring
planted rye is used to protect delicate seedlings from prevalent,
seasonal winds and shows promise for additional weed management (Figure
7). However, our primary soil armor is the residue left from the
previous crop (Figure 1) which also serves to promote soil
health.^{26, 27} Across Western Sugar, crop residue allows for
the integration of livestock through managed grazing further building
soil health.\28\
The USDA recognizes conservation crop rotation \29\ is also key to
soil health. All Western Sugar growers engage in this practice,
rotating small grains, corn, dry edible beans, and sugarbeets. Many
also integrate perennial crops such as alfalfa in the rotation. These
diverse rotations such as these that include high residue and low
nitrogen demand crops are paramount for soil health by balancing
nutrient demands in the agroecosystem and protect biodiversity
important to crop health.^{30, 31}
The evolution of conventional ag practices has reduced soil erosion
by 35% across the U.S.\32\ It is important to recognize the U.S. is a
leader in climate-smart ag,^{33, 34, 35} and farmers are
accepting of further improvement. Innovations in modern, conventional
agriculture are primed to achieve climate-smart goals. Programs
authorized by this Committee--the Conservation Innovation Grants (CIG),
the Sustainable Ag Research and Education (SARE) program, and the
Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP) have been highly
effective in helping growers adopt climate-smart practices. Western
Sugar has used these programs to improve nutrient stewardship and
implement high carbon soil amendment \36\ to regenerate soil health
(Figure 8). As you turn your attention to drafting the next farm bill,
I encourage you to continue to support programs like these and invest
in outcome-based solutions that keep the farmer in the driver's seat as
they understand the nuance of their production system. It is also
imperative to increase investment in agricultural research to develop
frontier technologies that will drive the next step change in farming.
In summary, conventional farming practices have improved soil health by
employing conservation tillage, cover cropping and diverse crop
rotations and are continuing to innovate. Again, thank you for inviting
me to be here today. I look forward to taking questions.
(Figure 1)
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

Photos from a Western Sugar farm using conservation tillage.
(A) sugarbeets planted into previous crop's wheat stubble. (B)
zoomed in image of sugarbeets growing in wheat stubble. Residue
prevents wind/water erosion and evaporative loss of water;
remaining roots feed the micro/microbiome & build organic
matter.
(Figure 2)
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

Western Sugar partnered with the Irrigation Innovation
Consortium (FFAR project, Dr. Jay Hamm, Colorado State
University) on a 3 year study collecting samples in edge-of-
field monitoring to determine the impact of conservation
tillage on irrigation-based soil erosion. Water was collected
during each rain and irrigation event (A). Sediment and
nutrient load were analyzed following filtration of the samples
(B). Conservation tillage significantly reduces erosion and
therefore protects water quality.
(Figure 3)
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

Soil samples collected and analyzed by Dr. Pankaj Trivedi
(Colorado State University) to compare the soil microbiome
under conventional and no-tillage systems from across the
cooperative. Greater diversity in bacteria (A, blue dot) and
fungi (A, orange dot) under conservation tillage (A). Soil
function was also measured by Dr. Trivedi by measuring nutrient
cycling (B); greater diversity/quantity of soil microbes = six-
fold higher nutrient cycling (B). Western Sugar continues to
financially support Dr. Trivedi ($30,000/annually) in the
development of soil health bioindicators.
(Figure 4)
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

* conservation tillage has reduced emissions from soil 83%.
Western Sugar hired Dr. Douglas Warner and his team
(University of Hertfordshire, UK) to conduct a lifecycle
assessment of sugarbeet production in the cooperative before
and after the introduction of genetically engineered (GE)
sugarbeets. Emissions dropped 40% with GE sugarbeets primarily
because of the adoption of conservation tillage. Note emissions
are denoted in terms of units of production this is a key
component of sustainable intensification. Ignoring productivity
can force the unintended consequence of land conversion and
market leakage.
(Figure 5)
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

As Lancet Commission noted, environmental gains must be
balanced against productivity to protect the global
environment. Promoting environmental gains that reduce per unit
productivity can lead to worsening climate change as additional
acres are converted from native habitat to cropland to
compensate for yield losses with a growing population. It is
imperative Climate-Smart agendas focus on sustainable
intensification: improving environmental outcomes while
promoting yield. Western Sugar has made significant advances in
climate-smart practices while also improving crop productivity
30% thanks to the adoption of genetically engineered (GE)
sugarbeets.
(Figure 6)
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

All beet sugar cooperatives operate as closed systems,
approving what seed can or cannot be sold to our growers and
enabling robust integrated pest management. Western Sugar
requires the plant be [able] to defend itself against seven
prevalent pests and diseases. In addition, switching from non-
genetically engineered (GE) and conventional herbicides to GE
and glyphosate has reduced the environmental impact of
sugarbeet production 92% as determined from pesticide fate and
risk modeling conducted by Dr. Douglas Warner at the University
of Hertfordshire in the UK.
(Figure 7)
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

Western Sugar farmers who use cover crops tend to use wheat
or rye (fast growing & cold tolerant). Some growers plant cover
crops between rows (A), others seed the whole field to wheat
then strip-till prior to planting sugarbeets (B). Western Sugar
is currently funding development of best management practices
for spring planted rye cover crops for additional weed control
and resistance management at the University of Wyoming (Dr.
Andrew Kniss) and Montana State University (Dr. Lovreet
Shergill).
(Figure 8)
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

Western Sugar pioneered the use of a factory waste stream for
beneficial use in high carbon soil amendment Using this product
to regenerate soil health improves soil water holding capacity,
reduces soilborne nitrous oxide emissions, increases long-term
soil carbon sequestration potential and avoids methane
emissions from land-filling the product [status quo (A);
repurposing waste for beneficial use (B)]. The product has now
been applied to nearly 6% of acres across the Rocky Mountain
West with tangible improvements to soil health quantified by
Dr. Bijesh Maharjan at the University of Nebraska. Growers
readily adopted the practice because of the immediate benefit
of improved crop productivity [visual impact on corn (C) and
dry beans (D)].
(Figure 9)
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

Dr. Pankaj Trivedi at Colorado State University analyzed
population diversity of bacteria (A) and fungi (B) in different
production systems (no-till or tillage) and with herbicide (H)
and without herbicide (C) mimicking options for Western Sugar
producers. Samples were collected at three different times (T1-
T3). In all instances, tillage was the main driver of diversity
loss; use of herbicides did not impact diversity (statistical
significance denoted by letter above box plot, those with
different letters are statistically different from one
another).

[Endnotes]

\1\ https://www.nrcs.usda.gov/wps/portal/nrcs/detailfull/national/
soils/health/?cid=stelprdb1048783.
\2\ Islam, R., Reeder, R. (2014). No-till and conservation
agriculture in the United States: An example from the David Brandt
Farm, Carroll, Ohio. International Soil and Water Conservation
Research. 2(1): 97-107.
\3\ https://www.no-tillfarmer.com/articles/11095-timeline-of-the-no-
till-revolution.
\4\ Tillage Intensity and Conservation Cropping in the United States
(https://www.ers.usda.gov/webdocs/publications/90201/eib-197.pdf)
(usda.gov).
\5\ Pulled from USDA ERS and NASS reporting for sugarbeet production
in Montana, Wyoming, Nebraska & Colorado.
\6\ https://www.no-tillfarmer.com/articles/11095-timeline-of-the-no-
till-revolution.
\7\ What is ``Organic No-till,'' and Is It Practical? (https://
eorganic.org/node/2594) eOrganic.
\8\ Farming Systems Trial (https://rodaleinstitute.org/science/
farming-systems-trial/) Rodale Institute.
\9\ Uri, N.D. (1999) Factors affecting the use of conservation
tillage in the United States. Water, Air and Soil Pollution. 116: 621-
638.
\10\ Carr, P.M., Gramig, G.G., Liebig, M.A. (2013) Impacts of
organic zero tillage systems on crops, weeds, and soil quality.
Sustainability. 5(7): 3172-3201.
\11\ Barre, K., Le Viol, I., Julliard, R., Chiron, F., Kerbiriou, C.
(2018) Tillage and herbicide reduction mitigate the gap between
conventional and organic farming effects on foraging activity of
insectivorous bats. Ecology and Evolution. 8(3): 1496-1506.
\12\ Babujia, et al. (2016) Impact of long-term cropping of
glyphosate-resistant transgenic soybean on soil microbiome. Transgenic
Research. 25: 425-440.
\13\ Gornish, et al. (2020) Buffelgrass invasion and glyphosate
effects on desert soil microbiome communities. Biological Invasions.
22: 2587-2597.
\14\ Schlatter, et al. (2017) Impacts of repeated glyphosate use on
wheat-associated bacteria are small and depend on glyphosate use
history. Applied and Environmental Microbiology.
\15\ Lupwayi, et al. (2020) Profiles of wheat rhizobacterial
communities in response to repeated glyphosate applications, crop
rotation and tillage. Canadian Journal of Soil Science. https://doi.org/
10.1139/cjss-2020-0008.
\16\ Wilkes, et al. (2020) Tillage, glyphosate and beneficial
arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi: optimizing crop management for plant-
fungal symbiosis. 10(11): 520.
\17\ Brooks, G., Barfoot, P. (2020). Environmental impacts of
genetically modified (GM) crop use 1996-2018: impacts on pesticide use
and carbon emissions. GM Crops and Food. 11(4): 215-241.
\18\ See & SprayTM Ultimate D Precision Ag D John Deere US (https://
www.deere.com/en/sprayers/see-spray-ultimate/).
\19\ Carbon Robotics (https://carbonrobotics.com/).
\20\ Zabala-Pardo, D., Gaines, T., Lamego, F.P., Avila, L.A. (2022)
RNAi as a tool for weed management: challenges and opportunities.
Advances in Weed Science. 40 (Spec1): e020220096.
\21\ https://www.fao.org/family-farming/detail/en/c/1203273/
\22\ Willet, et al. (2019) Food in the [Anthropocene]: the EAT-
Lancet Commission on healthy diets from sustainable food systems. The
Lancet Commission. 393(10170): 447-492.
\23\ https://www.sare.org/wp-content/uploads/2019-2020-National-
Cover-Crop-Survey.pdf.
\24\ Cover Crop Trends, Programs, and Practices in the United States
(https://www.ers.usda.gov/webdocs/publications/100551/eib-222.pdf)
(usda.gov).
\25\ USDA ERS (https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/chart-gallery/
gallery/chart-detail/?chartId=103975) Chart Detail.
\26\ Melman, D.A., Kelly, C., Schneekloth, J., Calderon, F., Fonte,
S.J. (2019) Tillage and residue management drive rapid changes in soil
macrofauna communities and soil properties in a semiarid cropping
system of Eastern Colorado. Applied Soil Ecology. 143: 98-106.
\27\ Nunes, M.R., Karlen, D.L., Veum, K.S., Moorman, T.B.,
Cambardella, C.A. (2020) Biological soil health indicators respond to
tillage intensity: A US meta-analysis. Geoderma. 369: 114335.
\28\ Carvalho, P.C.d.F., et al. (2010) Managing grazing animals to
achieve nutrient cycling and soil improvement in no-till integrated
systems. Nutrient Cycling in Agroecosystems. 8con8: 259-273.
\29\ Conservation Choices: Crop Rotation (https://www.nrcs.usda.gov/
wps/portal/nrcs/detail/null/?cid=nrcseprd414440) (usda.gov).
\30\ Yang, T., Siddique, K.H.M., Liu, K. (2020) Cropping systems in
agriculture and their impact on soil health--A review. Global Ecology
and Conservation. 23: e01118.
\31\ Nunes, M.R., van Es, H.M., Schindelbeck, R., Ristow, A.J.,
Ryan, M. (2018) No-till and cropping system diversification improve
soil health and crop yield. Geoderma. 328(15): 30-43.
\32\ 2017NRISummary_Final (1).pdf (file:///C:/Users/rlarson/
Downloads/2017NRISummary_Final%20(1).pdf).
\33\ Kassam, A., Friedrich, T., Derpsch, R. (2022) Successful
experiences and lessons from conservation agriculture worldwide.
Agronomy. 12(4): 769.
\34\ https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/chart-gallery/gallery/
chart-detail/?chartId=98305.
\35\ Global Greenhouse Gas Emissions Data (https://www.epa.gov/
ghgemissions/global-greenhouse-gas-emissions-data) US EPA.
\36\ Paustian, K., Larson, E., Kent, J., Marx, E., Swan, A. (2019)
Soil carbon sequestration as a biological negative emission strategy.
Frontiers in Climate 1:8.

The Chairman. And thank you for your excellent testimony,
and all of you, powerful. And this is why we are having this
hearing.
Now at this time, Members will be recognized for questions
in order of seniority, alternating between Majority and
Minority Members. Each of you will be recognized for 5 minutes
to get your questions in. And please, as always, keep your
microphones muted until you are recognized so that we can
eliminate background noise.
And now I recognize myself for 5 minutes.
First of all, you all were just brilliant in helping to
confirm our great need here. And this great need is what I
refer to as a Paul Revere moment. It might not be the British
that are coming, but if we do not listen to you and what you
are saying about the urgency of regenerative farming, dealing
with the source of our food, which is the soil, we will have a
food shortage in this country.
And I want to start with you, Steve, Mr. Nygren, my friend.
You mentioned the status of us in the world. You mentioned also
the status of us in our rural communities. And I tell people
all the time, you love the milk, you love the beef, but it is
in our rural communities, which must grow the vegetation, the
soil enrichment, which feeds our animal stocks. Tell us, the
shape that we are in right now and your level of concern about
our food security in this nation if we don't move forthrightly
on what you have suggested.
Mr. Nygren. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Having grown up on a
farm in the 1940s and the 1950s and then moving to Georgia, in
both states, I have seen the rural communities go from vital
centers and economic centers to places that are many times
ghost towns, with many people having to change careers. I have
18 first cousins. They have all left the industry except for
three, and they are larger farmers today.
The idea of our food system is not only going to affect
what we eat but the very economic fiber of this country. And I
think some of the things that you see that have happened in
rural America is an example of the changing systems that we
have had. As you have heard today, there are solutions that
will both give us better food and an economic foundation for
our rural areas, and the farm bill could really change that.
The Chairman. Thank you. And Mr. Moyer, you are doing a
wonderful job at Rodale. Tell us about your work there. And do
you agree with me, if we fail to move on this, we could be
facing a food shortage? Please.
Mr. Moyer. Thank you for the question, Chairman Scott. Yes,
of course, it is critical that we move rapidly to make
adjustments to allow farmers to express their desire to improve
the health of their soil. Regenerative agriculture,
regenerative organic agriculture is all part of a journey. And
we are not suggesting that conventional agriculture or
conventional farming has not made great advances since the
1950s, but we also have a long way to go. The concept that we
simply want to sustain a current system or current set of
practices to maintain what we have is not adequate. We really
need to move forward rapidly with the concept of regenerating
the health of our soil to build up earthworm populations, as
Mr. Clark already told us about between his farm and his
neighbor's. We can do that. Again, we have the tools, we have
the time, we have the ability. We need support from Members of
this Committee and from policymakers in order to just tweak
some of the programs that we have to allow farmers to make the
decisions on their landscapes to improve the health of their
soil.
The Chairman. Thank you. And, Mr. Clark, I want to get to
your salient points because I believe you are right on target
here. What will happen if we do not regenerate our soil? Where
we will be in a world where we have to depend upon Russia for
our food? We are already depending upon Russia, for 66
percent--they control 66 percent of the world's fertilizer.
Yes.
Mr. Clark. Chairman Scott, thank you for the question. Yes,
we have gone down this journey, and we have weaned ourselves
off of these inputs, and we have become more resilient, less
negativity toward instability within the world. And yes, we
need to preserve our soil because that is going to be the
future of the farming industry.
The Chairman. Thank you. And now I recognize the
distinguished gentleman from Pennsylvania, our outstanding
Ranking Member Thompson, for your 5 minutes.
Mr. Thompson. Mr. Chairman, thank you so much. I appreciate
your leadership. I appreciate, it is just a pleasure to work
with you on something we are both very passionate about
agriculture.
The Chairman. Same.
Mr. Thompson. Some of the numbers--well, I referenced a
number that our productivity has increased 278 percent since
the 1940s. Just a couple months ago, we were 287 percent, so
the differential is not an erosion of soil health. And I think
we all acknowledge that. There are other factors that go into
productivity, and productivity is important. We are providing
so much more food and fiber and building material and energy
resources on the lands. I used to call it rural America. I call
them essential America today because they are essential to
every American family, what we produce.
But the factors are, quite frankly, it has been the
inflation. It has been the elimination of crop protection
tools. It has been the fertilizer that has not been available.
That is what has impacted and put us at risk of being able to
provide all the food that needs to be produced at this point.
That is a nine percent reduction. Those things are all fixable.
They are just bad policy that has come out of out of
Washington.
I have had a chance to travel around as Ranking Member to a
lot of different states, talk with a lot of different farmers
and ranchers, foresters, and just people in central America. In
my home state, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, which is one
of the top ten cover crop states--excuse me--in the United
States, there has been a 33 percent increase in cover crop use
since 2012, which is outstanding. Now, again, this is an
industry that is not static, it is dynamic, and we can do even
better. And I think we are all dedicated to that. And that data
came from the 2017 USDA Census of Agriculture.
However, in my travels to almost 40 states over the past 19
months, I have seen that cover crops are not economic or
applicable across all farmlands, which is why the hearing today
is so important. I have been in states--specifically, it was in
Texas with the dry conditions. If they put a cover crop in, it
is going to suck every bit of moisture out of the ground. And
whatever crop that you are looking to produce will not
flourish, will not grow, certainly will not produce a
significant yield.
So, Dr. Larson, do you agree that we have to make available
all the tools in the toolbox and that prescribing or endorsing
certain practices or systems like regenerative organic
agriculture in a silo, alone, could stifle research,
technology, and innovation of future practices?
Dr. Larson. Absolutely. There is no scientific consensus on
the best practice to farm because there is too much nuance in
farming. So when you look at the Rocky Mountain West, you
mentioned it would suck all the water out of the ground. So our
growers use cover crops very judiciously. So after they dig
their sugarbeets out of the ground, the ground could be left
there. Instead, they often opt to plant a subsequent cash crop
like winter wheat if they can get in there early enough.
Otherwise, if they get in late, they will plant something like
rye to keep the ground covered.
We have a lot of money that we are investing at both the
University of Wyoming and Montana State to be able to create
cover crops for weed manage in the spring as well and explore
additional options. But ultimately, if we didn't have access to
adequate technology such as herbicides to control a broadleaf
weed and a broadleaf crop, we would be in big trouble and
wouldn't be able to implement the conservation tillage that we
have today.
Mr. Thompson. Yes, a lot of diversity it is--American
agriculture is--well, that is something I think all the Members
of this Committee are very passionate about, but it is--and
there are a lot of similarities, right, when you walk from one
farm to another, different parts of country, but there is
differences, too, the climate and soil types and weather
patterns. And so it really is--there is no single tool. We have
to use every tool in the toolbox.
Mr. McCarty, it is nice to meet somebody whose family
originated next to my district anyway, Bradford County. I am in
McKean County right next door. It is one of my counties in
Pennsylvania. And I get it, you all--the size of your farms--I
guess first question, Mr. McCarty is, how many dairy cows does
your family farms have altogether?
Mr. McCarty. So in total today across the five dairies we
milk about 13,000 cows. And once our expansion is done, we will
be close to 19,000 milking cows.
Mr. Thompson. That is pretty impressive. Knowing Bradford
County, I have family in Bradford County, I am guessing that
you were in the average statistics where in Pennsylvania, where
dairy is our number one agriculture commodity of our largest
industry, agriculture, and there are 5,200 dairies and the
average herd size is 91, so that is quite--the geography makes
a difference for you all with the states and where you have
moved to.
So let me just finish up by making the point, small farmers
can't always take on the risks that large farms can when
adapting new practices, and I certainly don't want to be the
person who walks on to one of their farms and tells them the
Federal Government mandates that they upend their economic
viability of their operations and livelihoods for the sake of
climate change, especially when they aren't the bad actors in
the first place.
So one of the things that I know, and I think the Chairman
is committed to this, we are looking at how do we protect the
small farmer and specifically like the small dairy farmers in
my district and the small producers across the United States
who can't afford always the risk that someone like with an
economy-of-scale like your family has taken on?
So, Mr. Chairman, I know my time has well expired. I
appreciate your patience today.
The Chairman. Oh, my pleasure. And the point you made about
our dairy farmers, they have informed me that now, right now,
we are losing a dairy farmer every single day. That is 365 this
year and next year. So you have hit upon a very important
thing. And of course, we are addressing that, along with our
beef cattle, where we are losing 17,000 small beef cattle
ranchers every year. When you put that together with our
hesitancy to move forthrightly on our soil erosion, we have a
burgeoning crisis. That is why we are here. Thank you for your
excellent remarks.
And now we will hear from the gentlewoman from Connecticut,
Mrs. Hayes, who was also the Chairwoman of the Subcommittee on
Nutrition, Oversight, and Department Operations. Mrs. Hayes,
you are recognized for 5 minutes.
Mrs. Hayes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
My district is a growing leader in climate-smart
agriculture. Our producers use ecofriendly practices like cover
crops to run their small, diversified farms. Last month, I
hosted a roundtable in my district, with U.S. Deputy Secretary
Dr. Jewel Bronaugh. Farmers there stressed how committed they
were to expanding their regenerative agricultural practices.
Unfortunately, as many of you know, this can be expensive and
risky. This is especially true for the small farmers and new
and beginning farmers that I represent in Connecticut's Fifth
District.
As this Congress continues to make critical investments to
mitigate climate change, I am hoping that our witnesses can
provide testimony that gives us solutions to help farms of all
sizes. Mr. Moyer, you talked about soil health quite
extensively. Can you tell me a little bit about how improved
soil health can protect farmers against increased drought and
flooding? Because that is what we are hearing a lot about in my
State of Connecticut.
Mr. Moyer. Certainly, and thank you for the question. There
are certain things we can do with soil health and certain
things we can't. We can't change the weather, we can't change
weather patterns, we can't change the impact of climate change.
What we can do is change the soil's ability to interact with
weather. So we can, as you heard from other testimony here this
morning, we can change the soil's ability to hold and retain
water. So while we heard western states, they say it is too dry
to go cover crops, we have many farmers in western states that
say it is too dry not to grow cover crops. We can grow cover
crops, hold moisture in the plant. Cover crops is a term, but
it doesn't really clearly spell out all the varieties of crops
that we can grow as cover crops. There are hundreds and
hundreds of different species of crops we can grow that all
serve different purposes. So while we say cover crops as one
word, there are many different tools that we can use.
So we are suggesting that farms have the ability, through
changes and tweaks in our EQIP and crop insurance legislation
in the farm bill, that will allow farmers to make those
decisions on their own farm, whether they are conventional or
organic, to try to improve the health of their soil and improve
their ability to interact with changing weather patterns to
build resiliency and sustainability into their production
models.
Mrs. Hayes. Thank you. I appreciate that and look forward
to getting more information. I can tell you every news station
in my home state last week was running stories about drought
and showing just the devastation to small farmers and what it
means, we can't change weather patterns, so we need to really
be proactive in solutions to how do we engage differently in
these environments.
Mr. Clark, you talked about your family's farm switching to
regenerative agricultural practices.
Mr. Clark. Yes.
Mrs. Hayes. Can you talk to us about some of the positive
changes you saw in the first few years after those switches?
Mr. Clark. Right. Thank you for the question.
Representative Hayes, thank you. Yes, when we started this
journey several years ago, we were actually at a point where I
was having discussions with my wife, I am not sure if we are
going to be able to afford to plant corn and beans anymore. We
have to do something different. So the first immediate thing
that we saw was the simple fact that the soil came to life. You
could see it change right in front of your eyes. We have
aggregate stability now that is that is 8" deep. We have water
infiltration rates of 20" an hour. We have water holding
capacity. We are sequestering carbon, all of these things we
are doing, and you can see a lot of these changes with very
simple tests. You can have a hammer, ring, a couple of tubes
full of water, and you can show soil health every single day.
So the immediate thing that we saw was just the breath of
fresh air that we are now able to expand and grow vertically
and not just be tied to a corn and soybean type rotation.
Mrs. Hayes. Thank you, that is very important information.
Mr. Nygren, the Working Farms Fund at the Conservation Fund
has helped 33 farmers secure land in the past few years. How
can we better engage to expand those programs so that more
farmers can access them and have help with conservation on the
ground?
Mr. Nygren. I believe make sure that the money is going to
organizations that do not have large overhead so that it is
hitting the farmers actually in the fields. And there are many
organizations that are connected directly with the small
farmers, and I think we need to be aware of those programs and
how the money is distributed.
Mrs. Hayes. Thank you. Right on time. Mr. Chairman, I yield
back.
The Chairman. Good job. And now the gentleman from
California, Mr. LaMalfa, is recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. LaMalfa. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Dr. Larson, you are
beet grower or cover that in Colorado, and I heard some really
positive things, some of the methods that you have been able to
utilize there, a lot of it gearing around no-till. Tillage is
being looked down upon more and more these days, but that might
apply well for beets and other crops. But do you see that there
are other crop types that can be readily converted to no-till
that--I mean, is this supposed to be a one-size-fits-all for
all crops be converting to no-till?
Dr. Larson. It is absolutely not one size fits all. As I
mentioned, controlling broadleaf weeds and a broadleaf crop
thanks to genetically engineered sugarbeets with glyphosate
tolerance was a gamechanger for us. If you can control the
weeds, you don't need to use mechanical removal or tillage to
get rid of them. So there are a lot of crops like ours that are
difficult to control weeds in that require some alternative
method to control them. And often, farmers rely on tillage.
Overwhelmingly, organic and conventional farmers rely on
tillage.
Mr. LaMalfa. Certainly, okay. So when you talk about the
beets, you have had to use genetically modified so that you can
use different types of pesticides?
Dr. Larson. Yes, to use a specific herbicide that helps
control the weeds more consistently and completely.
Mr. LaMalfa. Did you see any market reverberations for
switching to genetically modified seeds?
Dr. Larson. No, we did not.
Mr. LaMalfa. Okay. All right. Mr. Moyer, you mentioned in
the testimony that America's food system is broken, and
conventional ag models are degrading farmland. Now, way back in
the 1930s in the Dust Bowl and even before that, but the
Federal Government set on a path to try and do things to
conserve soil because we saw some terrible outcomes from
weather and such affecting soil. So much work has been done
over the years before this concept of doing things to conserve
soil, not lose it to erosion and things of that nature. So we
have seen tremendous gains made in crop yield, and less labor
being required for agriculture in this country. It used to be
50 percent. Now, it is less than one percent of people work in
agriculture these days, it seems. So labor's declined, land use
has declined in order to get increased crop yields.
So one thing I found and am in strong agreement with you on
is the reliance on international food supply is really going to
be dangerous for all of us. We see Russia's invasion of
Ukraine. The world is going to be in a bad way. With that,
India and Hungary have decided they are not going to export
grain this year. And so we are going to have a real 2023 food
supply issue, as well as the gas and fertilizer needs that we
have to produce fertilizer, natural gas. So Sri Lanka has tried
to go against using fertilizer and such, and their economy is
collapsing. The Netherlands, the Dutch dairy farmers are in an
all out protest over that. And we see Canada, our friendly
neighbor to the North, go in that direction, too. But The
Netherlands will close 11,000 farms and affect over 17,000
farmers.
So if our government enacts similar measures, getting rid
of nitrogen and all these things, it would have a catastrophic
effect on the U.S. food supply and also the world. So the
suggestion to reapproach farming as regenerative organic seems
to be counterintuitive to part of the testimony. So how is it
when we have a global food shortage, that when we are talking
about these alternative forms of farming and we are going to
end up with less food and less crop grown, or we are converting
to cover crops, we are going to have lower yield with
regenerative organic as you term it, how is that going to work
in a world that is already going to see perilous food
shortages, as even promised by President Biden?
Mr. Moyer. Well, I think there is--thank you for the
question, Congressman. I think there are a whole lot of issues
that you stated that need to be unpacked. It is not as simple
as saying organic or regenerative organic food production has
lower yields. That is not true. Our science and our research
indicates that we can match or in many cases during drought or
when it is either too wet or too dry, our regenerative organic
yields surpass those of conventional farming.
Mr. LaMalfa. I farm rice. My family has been doing it since
31 and my cousin since 13.
Mr. Moyer. Yes.
Mr. LaMalfa. When you farm organic rice, you lose yield,
and it costs a lot more. So which \1/3\ of the people aren't
going to get food?
Mr. Moyer. So I am suggesting that a lot more research
needs to be done in the area of regenerative organic
agriculture to show how we can sustain yields that are equal or
greater than conventional yields. It is not all about--we are
sacrificing short-term yield for long-term stability in our
soil. And yes, while we have reduced erosion, over the years,
we are down to a national average of 6 ton per acre, which is
not something we can sustain. There are many different forms of
soil degradation. Erosion is just one of them. Nutritional
quality and nutritional content of the soil is another.
Microbial activity, biological activity is another. We have
lost over 50 percent of the soil's fungal capacity to maintain
the integrity of a phytonutrient called ergothioneine.
Ergothioneine has a health impact on our----
Mr. LaMalfa. On the whole, yields have been increasing and
more production has been coming out of the land. Now, we need
to do things to conserve soil and keep going in that direction,
but a one-size-fits-all--if government ends up, because of this
climate change situation, forcing this on farmers, we are going
to be in a bad way in this country as our people and others
around the world look to us----
The Chairman. Unfortunately, the----
Mr. LaMalfa. I appreciate it, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.
The Chairman. And I appreciate your line of questioning.
You hit the nail on the head. This is exactly why we are here,
to avoid a food shortage in our nation. Thank you for your
questions.
And now the gentlewoman from Ohio, Ms. Brown, is now
recognized for 5 minutes.
Ms. Brown. Thank you, Chairman Scott and Ranking Member
Thompson, for holding this hearing today. And thank you to our
expert panel for being here. Your perspectives are helpful as
we look ahead to the next farm bill.
Unlike organic agriculture, which must meet Federal
standards and are subject to inspections, regenerative
agriculture lacks a clear scientific definition. And it is
currently not governed by any USDA standards. So my question is
for Mr. Clark, but I welcome others to jump in if they have
thoughts as well. Mr. Clark, should USDA clarify and set
standards as to what it means to label something regenerative?
Mr. Clark. Yes. And thank you for the question,
Representative Brown, and you are exactly correct. There is not
a standard definition of regenerative ag. I am not saying today
that we need one, but if we do work toward that goal, let's
keep it simple. Something like incorporating agricultural
practices that continue to build soil health. That is pretty
simple. And yes, I think that that type of nomenclature or
designation needs to be on the food that is available for the
consumer.
Ms. Brown. Any others?
Dr. Larson. I would like to comment on that, too, if I may,
please. I think it is very dangerous to try and come up with a
blanket statement or a blanket label for one particular type of
practice because there is so much nuance in it that requires
physical measurement of the impact of the practices that you
are implementing. One of the studies cited by Mr. Moyer gave an
example of erosion differences between different cultivation
practices. And it showed that conventional no-till had far
superior erosion prevention capability than the best management
practices within organic. So we want to be very careful about
trying to say one particular type of production practice should
have the label of regenerative and rather focus on measuring
the physical outcomes that we all desire to have to mitigate
climate change.
Ms. Brown. Thank you. Thank you all. It seems to me that
further clarity can also help consumers understand what it
means when they see a product at the grocery store with the
words farmed using regenerative techniques. So I appreciate
your responses.
Mr. Clark, in your testimony, you also talked about the
demand for scaling up regenerative agriculture practices. As we
look to the next farm bill, what can we as Congress and the
USDA do to be supportive of these efforts?
Mr. Clark. Yes, I am sorry. Did you say scaling up? Is that
what you said?
Ms. Brown. Yes, sir.
Mr. Clark. Yes, yes, what we need to do is we have to start
with the education process. We have to make sure that the
teachers are in place. I think it is absolutely imperative that
when a farmer goes down this road of change and they are so
unfamiliar with this, they need the guidance, the support to
help make the very first time they try this to be successful
because I am afraid if they do not have success, they will not
come back. Believe me, I have heard every excuse. I live too
far north, it is too cold, growing season is too short. I have
heard them all. So we need to take those excuses away and help
build that confidence within that farmer.
So within answering your question, we need to make sure the
six principles of soil health are implemented and that they
then are put on a system that monitors the progress. Teaching
and support group is so critical here. Thank you.
Ms. Brown. Thank you. And if you could just go over those
six points again very quickly.
Mr. Clark. Sure. You need to--it is context, it is
diversity, the living root, armor the soil, integrate
livestock, and I am--and minimize disturbance. That is my
number one. Thank you. Minimize disturbance. So those are the
six.
Ms. Brown. Okay, thank you. So much for reminding us, and
thank you for your comments.
Mr. Chairman, with that, I yield back.
The Chairman. And now the gentleman from Indiana, Mr.
Baird, is now recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. Baird. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member. I
really appreciate having this conversation. And I always
appreciate the witnesses taking the time to share their
background and ideas with the Committee so we can have a better
idea of some of the issues that we have in the farm bill.
But my first question goes to Dr. Larson. And it has to do
with the idea that others on the panel have claimed that
organically produced food is more nutritious because the soil
in their system is healthier. What does the science say about
that? Any thoughts there?
Dr. Larson. Yes, thank you for the question. I am happy to
provide copious amounts of scientific research from peer-
reviewed journals that shows that there is no correlation
between soil health and nutrition within a plant. I can also
show you that there is no scientifically credible evidence that
suggests that food grown through organic practices is safer or
more nutritious than food grown with conventional ag. Just to
give a couple of examples of where some of that fear-based
marketing can have negative effects, especially for
marginalized and low-income communities, is that when people
are led to believe that one type of production practice is
safer or more nutritious than another, it actually drives down
total consumption of fruits, vegetables, and grains. So there
can be a negative impact from not speaking to the facts of
science and scientific consensus.
[The information referred to is located on p. 98.]
Mr. Baird. Very good.
Mr. Moyer. I would add that Rodale Institute would be more
than happy to supply additional data that showcases the
opposite side of that conversation because science can show
what people want it to show, but there are clear differences in
nutritional quality of crops that are produced in soils that
are farmed differently.
[The information referred to is located on p. 89.]
Mr. Baird. Thank you. You can submit those to the
Committee.
So Dr. Larson, one more question. Can you elaborate on your
comment about how the wholesale elimination of pesticides will
hurt, not help climate-smart in this? And you specifically
referenced effects on food waste and food conversion. Can you
make any additional comments about those issues?
Dr. Larson. Yes, thank you so much for the question.
Twenty-twenty was recognized by the UN as the year of plant
health. And, as a plant pathologist, that made me very happy.
Forty percent of all food waste happens on-farm before anything
gets to the grocery store because there is poor pest and
disease management. So access to pesticides to be able to
control those pests and diseases on-farm is critically
important. And more and more farmers are engaged in integrated
pest management that reduces their reliance on synthetic
fertilizers, and emerging breeding techniques like gene editing
are going to reduce reliance on pesticides even further, but
need to be able to control the pests and diseases that are
going to be prevalent on farms.
Mr. Baird. And one more question for you, Dr. Larson, if
you will. In your testimony, you mentioned Western Sugar
farmers would not have been able to transition to no-till or
conservation tillage without the use of glyphosate. Will you
expand upon the role of glyphosate and what it plays in
facilitating conservation practices in the farms? And why do
some claim it is detrimental to soil health?
Dr. Larson. Yes, thank you so much. For us controlling
broadleaf weeds, which are a prevalent weed species across the
Rocky Mountain West, is very difficult in a broadleaf crop. It
is hard to kill something that is very similar in nature
without dinging the crop as well. So it is critical. When we
got glyphosate, it allowed farmers to have more consistent and
complete weed control so they could put away their plows, they
could put away their cultivation equipment and not have to
disturb the ground anymore. They had chemical correction.
And because of the sentiment that glyphosate is killing the
soil microbiome, we actually have invested tens of thousands of
dollars doing routine soil analysis across all of our farms to
show that the depth and breadth and diversity and soil function
has not been affected by the application of glyphosate. In
fact, the diversity and activity of our soil microbiome is up
six-fold, suggesting that tillage itself is far more
detrimental to soil health and the soil microbiome than
chemical applications.
Mr. Baird. Thank you very much. And I see my time is almost
over, so I yield back.
The Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Baird.
And now the gentlewoman from Maine, Ms. Pingree, is
recognized for 5 minutes.
Ms. Pingree. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. And thank
you so much for holding this hearing. It is a critically
important topic as we go into work on the next farm bill, and I
am very grateful for that. And I want to thank all the
witnesses. You have all really given us a lot of interesting
testimony from all points of view, but it all leads back to an
important understanding of how critical soil health is to both
dealing with climate change and then the future of farming and
success for our farmers, so thank you for that.
I am glad to hear about all of this because I think the
more we can move conventional agriculture into regenerative
practices, the better off we will all be and better off our
environment and our farmers will be. But I have a particular
interest in organic farming, having been a certified organic
farmer myself and involved in it for a very long time, also a
big fan of the Rodale Institute. So thank you so much, Mr.
Moyer, for being with us today.
I know you have done some work there, sort of a more of a
big-picture scale about conversion to organic agriculture and
soil health and how much carbon can actually be sequestered out
of the atmosphere. And since that is such a critical topic
right now, what techniques do we use to sequester carbon, can
you talk a little bit more about the studies that have been
done there and sort of the quantification of how much carbon we
can sequester?
Mr. Moyer. Yes, thank you very much for the question about
the conversation around carbon and carbon sequestration. We
know that the way we manage soils can have a huge impact on its
ability to sequester carbon. Many of our practices that we
employ, we have already discussed about cover crops, and we may
have discussed about crop rotations. These are all tools that
farmers can implement to sequester carbon. It is becoming more
and more critical. The amount of carbon we can sequester is
certainly dependent upon the relationship between the practices
that we are superimposing on the landscape and the soils innate
ability through clay particles and the different soil types to
sequester carbon.
What is equally as important is that we sequester carbon at
greater depths. As those of us who are being pulled into the
concepts around carbon marketing, want to know that our carbon
is not simply cycling. If you are aware of carbon, then you are
aware of the word carbon cycle, which means it moves throughout
the environment. It is in the air, it is in the water, it is in
the soil. And we want to be able to sequester carbon at greater
depths so it is more permanently sequestered and not
volatilized back into the atmosphere.
So yes, our work at Rodale Institute is continually
exploring and expanding the concepts around carbon
sequestration, and we have a tremendous amount of data that we
would be more than happy to share with this Committee and with
you in particular.
Ms. Pingree. Thanks so much. We will look forward to
exploring that more.\1\ And I do appreciate your mention of the
deep roots, which was also one of the principles that Mr. Clark
mentioned.
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\1\ Editor's note: Mr. Moyer's supplementary material submission is
located on p. 87.
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Now I am going to get a little more technical or I guess
into the weeds, which is sort of a bad pun. But, we are talking
a little bit about the use of glyphosate and how challenging it
can be, particularly, in organic farming to deal with weeds, to
deal with sort of ending the life of your cover crop and doing
so with no-till. And so if maybe Mr. McCarty or Mr. Clark, you
both are practicing organic farmers on a big scale, how do you
deal with this challenge or how do you see us looking at that
in the future and what more research or support needs to be out
there to avoid having to use herbicides in practices like we
are talking about?
Mr. Clark. Great, great question. Thank you for the
question. What we have found is the basis for our weed
suppression is the biomass that is generated by the cover crop.
Then you mechanically terminate that cover crop with a roller-
crimper. You are creating a mat, a mulch, an armor on the soil.
And this armor does many, many things. And you can now look at
arid environments that make the claim we can't grow cover crops
here, but once you armor the soil and eliminate or mitigate the
evaporation that is taking place and you build that soil
health, you are building the aggregate stability, you are
building your water holding capacity. So when it rains, and
your neighbor says, ``Hey, I have a 1" of rain, how much did
you get?'' Your answer is, ``I got it all because it went into
the ground.''
Ms. Pingree. That is great. I have to move to Mr. McCarty,
but I do appreciate that and maybe I can follow up with you.
And thanks for reminding us that this topic is nonpartisan. So
Mr. McCarty, what do you do as a technique? I thought the
roller-crimping is interesting.
Mr. McCarty. Yes, so one thing that I think is important to
know is that my farms are not organic farms. We are non-GMO
project verified, but we are not organic. But the practices
that we use to mitigate the use of pesticides is varied, we
live in a very different climate than what Rick lives in. And
we utilize cover crops. We have explored different planting
population densities and planting row widths to try to shade
out those weeds faster. We are working on different varieties
of cover crop programs that will help choke out pests, weeds,
especially those that are resistant to current herbicide
chemicals. We are also looking at different crop rotations and
exploring those types of crop rotations where we can break that
weed cycle, as opposed to a corn on corn on corn type of
cropping cycle. All of those different methodologies have shown
some and varied levels of effectiveness at controlling weed
populations across our farms.
Ms. Pingree. Thank you.
The Chairman. Unfortunately, the gentlelady's time----
Ms. Pingree. I am out of time. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you. I appreciate that.
And now the gentleman from Iowa, Mr. Feenstra, is
recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. Feenstra. Thank you, Chairman Scott and Ranking Member
Thompson, for holding this hearing today.
I want to start out by just giving a shout-out to our
producers. They do an amazing job. They are the breadbasket to
the world. They are the literal ones that are producing the
food. My district, Iowa's Fourth District, is either number one
or two in the nation when it comes to corn and soybean
production. Actually, my county where I live, Sioux County, is
number one when it comes to corn and cattle and other things.
So I take this very seriously.
And I want to say this about our producers--my in-laws are
one of them--is that we take soil health very seriously. Why do
we take it seriously? Because when you have good soil health,
you also create more production. It goes hand-in-hand,
literally goes hand-in-hand. So our farmers in the Midwest, in
Iowa, are every day looking at better ways to create soil
health from cover crops and no-till to rotations to terraces,
you name it. And I think about when I was a kid, when we hear
about how if we can only get 125 bushel of corn per acre, today
the farmer is looking at over 200, and if he doesn't get over
200, it is a disappointment. And frankly, in Sioux County, if
we don't hit over 250, we are upset. It is just amazing what
has happened.
But there is always research that is needed, and that is
why I love my land-grant institution so much, Iowa State
University that does a tremendous job.
And with that, Dr. Larson, I would like to ask, Iowa State
is doing a lot of different research on hybrids, on soils and
stuff like that. Where do you see more research needed from our
land-grant institutions?
Dr. Larson. Thank you for the question. Having worked in
basic research at a university and USDA myself, I see a lot of
value in what these third-party researchers do. To me, there
are a lot of really interesting ideas that come out of academic
research that lack the capability to be scaled, and so we need
a way for universities to have better structure and
scalability. I think that is first and foremost.
And I think one thing that has not been mentioned on this
panel is that all of these great practices that we have talked
about today, soil scientists recognize they only have the
capacity to offset current emissions. If everybody everywhere
around the world that is farming did all of those practices, it
would only sequester enough carbon to offset what we emit
today, does nothing for the legacy load. So soil scientists are
crying for frontier technologies like high carbon soil
amendment, perennial grains that are going to allow us to be
able to start pulling down and actually draw down on that
legacy load. And universities will play a big role in that.
Mr. Feenstra. Yes, I agree 100 percent, Dr. Larson, and
thank you for those comments. And I love the academic arena
that is looking at different things. But we always have to
remember that, my in-laws, the producers out there, they want
to do what is best, they really do, but they also want to make
a living. They want to add value. And we see this, and if you
could talk about this, Dr. Larson. So, we talked about
academic. I was an academic. I was a professor. How do we take
it from academia to the real world? And I think about Iowa
State Extension, by the way, started in my hometown, Hull,
Iowa. But how do we deploy these new strategies and get the
farming community to add value to what they are already seeing
in production?
Dr. Larson. We are big fans of private-public partnerships.
So I will give you a quick example from Nebraska. Western Sugar
farmers pulled dollars out of their pockets, funded a
university scientist to see can we improve nutrient
stewardship. He demonstrated in 110\2\ that we can, but that
is not enough to convince farmers that that is the option,
going forward. So we applied for a USDA SARE grants and got
$75,000 that allowed us to test that on five large pivots to
show our growers that even though we have increased yield 35
percent, we can cut back on fertilizer by 30.
Mr. Feenstra. Yes.
Dr. Larson. So that is an excellent example of scale-up
from academic to practical.
Mr. Feenstra. And you nailed it, right? If you can cut back
fertilizer, that is an input cost and a significant input cost,
especially today, right? And that helps added value. And I
sometimes think that we are going at it the wrong way is how do
we add value to the production? Because that is all the farmers
want. They want to have great soil, they absolutely do, but
they also have to make a living. And we are the breadbasket to
the world, and we continually will be, all right? Everybody
looks to us, all right? And I don't ever want anybody to think
that we are the monsters in the room. We are not. I mean, our
producers are the greatest people in this great country. And I
just, I am here to say, how can I help them? How can we make a
difference? I know, Dr. Larson, you think the same thing. So
thank you. With that, I yield back.
The Chairman. Thank you.
And now the gentlewoman from Iowa, Mrs. Axne, is recognized
for 5 minutes.
Mrs. Axne. Thank you, Chairman Scott. Thank you to my
colleague from Iowa, Representative Feenstra. He is absolutely
right. We have the best stewards of the environment in Iowa
because we got a lot of farmers. And you all certainly know all
about that.
Thanks for being here. This is a really important topic.
And, as you just heard Representative Feenstra describe what we
produce in Iowa, we have the best soil in the country, often
described as black gold, that we absolutely want to keep and
that we are unfortunately scared that this runoff is going to
continue, that we will continue to see less nutrients, and so
we are doing everything we can to protect it. So today is a
very important discussion. Thank you.
There is some serious concerns about the sustainability of
our practices. It has been estimated that the Corn Belt has
lost \1/3\ of our topsoil, and we are losing it ten times
faster than that of replenishment. And the studies estimate
that soil loss in Iowa is worse than any other state, greatly
endangering our state's biggest asset and the ability for
future generations to farm as their predecessors had.
But thankfully, there are a lot of tools that we can
utilize to help combat this problem, and studies are showing
that farmers are utilizing those tools to combat that soil
loss. Cover cropping of course, for example, is a key
regenerative approach to help us rebuild our soil. And while
there are a number of USDA programs that can be used to support
cover cropping, I was particularly pleased to see the USDA
rollout the Pandemic Cover Crop Program, a $5 per acre
incentive crop insurance to help farmers employ cover crops as
a risk management tool. It is a bill I am on, so I am pretty
supportive of it.
You may know that in 2021 in Iowa, this program
incentivized over 850,000 acres of cover crops with over 4.2
million to Iowa farmers to incentivize soil health. And
nationwide last year, almost $60 million for cover crops were
distributed on over 12 million acres, so it is clearly
successful. And codifying it in the next farm bill will ensure
farmers have long-term opportunity to ramp up the opportunity
for cover crop adaptation. So let's hopefully get my
legislation, the COVER Act (H.R. 8527, Conservation Opportunity
and Voluntary Environment Resilience Program Act), passed
because it will ensure resilience in the crop--I like that
thumbs up from the crowd over there--insurance program to
strengthen this long-term success.
So let me get to a producer right here, Mr. Clark.
Obviously, we know you utilize cover crops on all your acres.
Can you elaborate on what you have seen with implementing cover
crops, and what has it done for your soil health, your yields,
your input? Let's talk bottom line here.
Mr. Clark. Yes, exactly. Well, so many times,
Representative Axne, a farmer's success is based on yield. And
we are looking at how are we going to maximize our ROI per acre
on everything that we have in the farming operation. So when
you start to look at the journey that we were on, when we were
absolutely maximizing our efficiency on the farm, we were at
100 percent no-till, 100 percent cover crop, and a 60 percent
reduction of inputs. So we were still using some fertilizers,
some chemistry, but at a greatly reduced rate. We had yields
that were increasing year over year, and our stability within
the system had gone from a yield variance of 30 bushels of corn
to less than 5. So that means it is a stable environment. When
you have a stable environment, you then are powerful because
then you can react to market fluctuations. When something crazy
happens and the markets spike and they take off, you have the
ability and the comfort to safely sell into that anomaly
because you have this stability now that has been created. And
it is not just 1 year, it is 2. This is multiple years of
seeing this stability. Thank you for the question.
Mrs. Axne. Well, and listen, thank you for that answer. If
there is anything I know, certainty for our farmers is the
number one thing that they are looking for.
Mr. Clark. I would like to say that there is a county in
Iowa, Washington County is a tremendous--I am not sure whose
district that would be in--tremendous county, and that is a
county that absolutely--they feed off of each other, and they
are just growing this. This soil health regenerative movement
is exploding in that county.
Mrs. Axne. Well, that is good to know, and I will
absolutely check into it.
So I want to follow up a bit here on this need for more
education on technical assistance, which you have mentioned. I
want to really--because I hear from our farmers, and they are
talking about the great soil testing and the data that they are
getting from that and how they are using it. Do you think that
is an area where we could be using more technical assistance in
soil testing and interpretation of those results?
Mr. Clark. Oh, yes. Oh, yes. Well, here is what we are
doing at home in Indiana. Every year, we have a USDA NRCS
training on our farm, so we are talking to the leaders of the
state within USDA. They contact the district conservationists.
The DCs are coming to our farm, and we are having a soil health
day on our farm. And exactly--we are doing these principles. We
are showing the--like the slake test or a slope test. We are
showing these things. Then these DCs get to understand this
because the DC is the first contact that farmer is going to
have. It is imperative that this group of individuals are
properly trained so they know how to have a conversation about
what is that guy down the road doing?
The Chairman. The gentlelady's time has expired
unfortunately.
Mr. Clark. Thank you.
The Chairman. And now I recognize the gentlelady from
Minnesota, Mrs. Fischbach, is recognized for 5 minutes.
Mrs. Fischbach. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I
appreciate the opportunity. And, first, even though I am from
Minnesota and we don't often agree with people from Iowa, I
just wanted to join Mr. Feenstra in thanking the producers,
because I really think that is something that we don't always
do and really recognize them as a vital part of the country.
And I strongly share his thoughts on the producers and their
concerns and their care for the soil health and that we really
should be here to help them. And so I just wanted to just
reiterate what Mr. Feenstra had mentioned.
And then I just wanted to--Dr. Larson, I appreciate all of
your thoughtful answers and have been listening carefully. And
in your opinion, Dr. Larson, how do we correct the narrative
that American agriculture has killed our soils? And I know that
one of the other panelists actually had said that in the
written testimony, and so I just wanted to see what your
thoughts on how we stop that kind of narrative that is going
through America?
Dr. Larson. Yes, I appreciate that question. As you know,
as a scientist and looking at the scientific literature, doing
direct physical measurements of the soil to show improvements
is tough because the soil by itself is very heterogenic. There
is not much uniformity. So to be able to get concrete data and
be able to measure very, very tiny changes and this very
variable background in immediate time is tough. So we have
pivoted to actually looking at the soil microbiome, so
measuring the little microbes that are there, the fungi and the
bacteria, to understand how our cultural practices impact that
dynamic because all of those critters that are in the soil are
responsible for ultimately building soil health, cycling
nutrients and sequestering carbon. So I think that getting
those tools affordable and in the hands of farmers is critical.
And I am a strong believer in trying to create bioindicators.
So instead of having to look at the entirety of the soil
microbiome community, find some key indicator species that can
reliably be used to predict in real time what cultural
practices are helping or hurting so that we can get that real-
time measurement.
Mrs. Fischbach. And I appreciate that answer. And I would
just say I think that we also just need to really recognize and
continue to talk about, like Mr. Feenstra did, that for
producers that is their first concern: soil health. It is their
livelihood. They need to make a living. And I am just concerned
that this kind of narrative that agriculture is ruining soil is
a problem, but there are certainly things that we can do to
help change that, and I appreciate it.
And with that, Mr. Chairman, I will yield back.
The Chairman. Thank you.
And now the gentlewoman from Washington, Ms. Schrier, is
recognized for 5 minutes.
Ms. Schrier. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And welcome to all of
our witnesses. I am loving this discussion. As this Committee
examines soil health practices with the farm bill on the
horizon, it is worth exploring existing USDA programs that aid
growers looking to improve the health of their soils, as we
have heard a lot about today. One of the lesser known programs,
although I just heard a nod to it earlier, is SARE, the
Sustainable Agriculture Research and Extension Program. SARE is
a USDA research program that provides grants to farmers to
focus research on their very specific needs and communicate
their findings and best practices to their community. SARE has
funded nearly 200 projects in Washington State alone, focusing
on a broad range of topics, including soil additives, tree
fruit pests, and sustainable grazing practices.
I am currently working on a bill to modernize SARE to
ensure that we are maximizing every tool at our disposal to
improve ag research capacity and our ability to study novel
regenerative practices that will improve soil health and on-
farm productivity.
Dr. Larson, I would love to get your input here. We know
that programs like CSP are very popular and often
oversubscribed, even in the neighborhood of like three to one
in Washington State. I was wondering if you could talk a little
bit about SARE or other small-dollar programs that have an
outsized impact on soil health and associated climate and
yields, as we just heard, benefits?
Dr. Larson. Yes, so as an academic myself, I appreciate
this question. There is so many cool things that happen in
110\2\. And academics are very quick to say, hey, look what I
did. Now, let's do that on every farm across America. It is not
that simple. And I am a huge fan of SARE and promote it widely
across all of the sugarbeet cooperatives because it is a very
useful tool to help bridge from that interesting academic idea
to prove scalability. And we see it honestly as a stepping
stone. So I mentioned we are able to use a SARE grant to show
our farmers that what happened in 110\2\ in this instance is
going to work at large scale, that we can cut back fertilizer
30 percent even though we have increased yield 35 percent. And
it provides a foundation of data now for next week.
Dr. Bijesh Maharjan at the University of Nebraska and
Western Sugar are jointly submitting a CIG On-Farm Innovation
Trial grants with the data that we obtained from SARE, the
learnings that we had from SARE about the hurdles for grower
adoption to be able to scale it up across 100 farmers in two
states over 5 years. So SARE is a really important program, and
I am so happy that you are expanding and supporting that
program.
Ms. Schrier. I love that answer because especially now with
scarcity of fertilizer and increased costs, the notion that you
can cut inputs and increase yields is so important.
I also wanted to highlight the Washington Soil Health
Initiative. It is an innovative partnership between Washington
State Department of Agriculture, Washington State University,
and the Washington State Conservation Commission. And the
initiative established a coordinated approach to soil health
across the state. The initiative is currently doing a state-of-
the-soils assessment to track soil health over time in region
and different soil types and developing soil carbon
verification metrics for the State Sustainable Farms and Field
Program that provides funding for farmers and ranchers to adopt
climate-smart practices, and we need the data to back those up.
So this is a unique model that uses a multi-pronged approach to
study the scientific nuances, while providing pathways for
adoption of behavior change. This initiative requires
tremendous coordination, and I am so proud to say that
Washington State is leading the way.
And as we look to the next farm bill, the initiatives staff
highlighted for me and my staff that a national soil health
effort would greatly benefit from similar coordination and
collaboration between agencies, universities to unify and
maximize the impact. So we need to make sure, for example, that
we have adequate and diverse staffing like economists and
sociologists, data scientists, in addition to farmers to
demonstrate the impacts of regenerative practices in organized
national and regional adoption efforts. So I look forward to
working with my colleagues to provide Federal investment in the
SARE program and in these collaborative programs to improve
soil health across the board.
And I yield back. Thank you for this discussion.
The Chairman. Thank you, Ms. Schrier.
And now the gentleman from Minnesota, Mr. Finstad, please,
is recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. Finstad. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. First and foremost, I
just want to say it is so great for me to be here. This is my
first Committee hearing as a new Member to Congress. And it
couldn't be a better Committee hearing to be at and a Committee
to be on.
I am a fourth-generation farmer from southern Minnesota.
Soil is important to us. It is something that we have passed on
generation to generation, and the health of the soil is so
important that my family actually started and owns and operates
a soil laboratory. So you can imagine I am geeking out here
today with all of you and the interest that you have in soil
health, so it is near and dear to me.
When I look at what we do in southern Minnesota, it is so
generationally driven that we care about our land because we
know that that is what we have to pass on. And so I am proud to
say that my senior in high school, oldest son, has taken an
interest in farming, so the soil is pretty important to us and
making sure that we are leaving it better for him to farm in
the next generation.
But as I look at farming practices and policy that we have
the opportunity to discuss here, I like looking at data and I
like trying to understand the science behind the data and
understanding the application and the implication of the
policies that we do here.
So, Dr. Larson, a 2017 survey found that more than 95
percent of Nebraska growers use herbicide to terminate cover
crops. A 2021 study found that about 80 percent of all U.S.
growers use herbicides to terminate cover crops. And so
presumably, this is because herbicides are the most effective
methods to do that. And, as a farmer and as someone that has
seen the pros and cons and the effects of using herbicides and
using them at the right rate at the right time to control
cropping decisions, my question, Dr. Larson, is would you agree
that herbicides are an important tool for growers to have
available at our fingertips to improve cover crop adoption in
the United States?
Dr. Larson. Absolutely 100 percent. And I appreciate that
question. If we lose those tools, it is going to be a major
step backwards in terms of conventional agriculture that
dominates a majority of the farming acres. If we take those
away, mechanical removal is the next best option, and that is
going to disturb the soil, it is going to release the carbon
that was captured in the soil back into the atmosphere, and it
is going to destroy the soil microbiome down beneath the soil.
Mr. Finstad. Thank you, Dr. Larson. And, for me, the
discussion of herbicides and the use of herbicides, the when
and the where and the how, is just a real and alive issue for
me, someone that grew up walking beans in southern Minnesota.
There was definitely great value in that work ethic and that
family bonding that happened during that process. But there is
also the efficiencies gained and the yields that we were able
to see the increase based on the timely use of herbicide and
the right use of herbicides. And I will say that as we as
farmers are asked to feed a growing global world, it is so
important for us to have that balance and maybe not a one-size-
fits-all or nothing approach. So I appreciate your willingness
to be here today and your adding to this conversation and all
of you for the work that you are doing, again, to preserve the
soil that is the greatest asset that we have to pass on to our
next generation, so thank you all.
I yield back, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you. And now the gentleman from
California, Mr. Panetta, is recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. Panetta. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you to our
witnesses. And, Mr. Finstad, welcome. I look forward to working
with you. It is good to be here. Thank you.
I come from the Central Coast of California. Obviously, we
have a lot of specialty crops there. As you know it and as I
like to say, you name it, we grow it. But despite that, I feel
that my producers in my district are doing a lot when it comes
to paving the way for climate-smart, soil-smart farming
practices.
To that end, I want to address a bill that Representative
Baird from Indiana and myself have put forward, H.R. 7752, the
Plant Biostimulant Act. As some of you may be aware, plant
biostimulants are an emerging and rapidly growing ag input that
have the ability to improve and enhance our soil health. The
plant biostimulant category covers a diverse set of
technologies, but most of the products are derived from
naturally occurring materials or microbes that were discovered
to be beneficial to the soil or plant health or even both.
Now, similar to how probiotics are good for us, plant
biostimulants can increase diversity of the soil microbiome,
fix nitrogen in the soil, make nutrients more available to the
plants, and improve soil structure that increase water holding
capacity or organic content. The bill that we introduced would
create a Federal definition for plant biostimulants, which is a
term that has not yet been defined at the Federal level. It
would also amend and clarify two other related definitions and
authorize USDA to perform a soil health study on plant
biostimulants so that we can fully understand and advance the
contributions to better our soil health. That is why I do
believe that H.R. 7752 is an important bill.
Now, Mr. Clark or Mr. McCarty that is virtual, have you
heard of the term plant biostimulant?
Mr. Clark. Oh, yes. I am glad you brought this up.
Mr. Panetta. Great.
Mr. Clark. This is right where I want to be.
Mr. Panetta. In what way?
Mr. Clark. I am not a biologist, but I do know that there
is a living, breathing microbiome below our feet. And I feel
like, through our journey, I was very stubborn in not pursuing
these avenues of bringing these stimulants to the farm because
this is going to speed up the soil health-building process.
Okay? So my stubbornness has probably delayed our seeing this
by a few years, but I think if a person is in a high-tillage
environment and they want to transition to regenerative
practices, this is what you add as an augmentation to your
system. And it is a system. The microbial package has got to be
a system just like anything else is.
Mr. Panetta. Yes. Now, Mr. Clark, what do you think we in
Congress or this Committee could be doing better to ensure
further education around plant biostimulants or other
innovative soil health technologies and practices?
Mr. Clark. I think there needs to be--academia needs to
have students that are going to go out and we need to identify
more of this microbial biome. And then what do certain sectors
do? For example, I think where we are going to head one day is
we are going to sit down and we are going to say, ``Okay, what
are your three biggest weed problems? What is your next cash
crop going to be? And now this is the cocktail package we are
going to put together and augment it with a stimulant package
because it is going to create an environment that water hemp,
for example, is not going to want to germinate and grow in.''
That is where this needs to go.
Mr. Panetta. Great. And that starts with the passing of the
Plant Biostimulant Act, right?
Mr. Clark. Yes.
Mr. Panetta. Great. Thank you.
Mr. Clark. Thanks for bringing this up.
Mr. Panetta. Just checking.
Mr. Moyer, let me pivot to you. Your testimony describes
regenerative organic. In my district, look, we get it when it
comes to the value of organic and the reason why consumers
trust that label. Now I met with a group yesterday that
referenced how regenerative could mean six or seven different
things when it comes to agriculture. To me, that seems to
complicate things for our longstanding organic producers that
have relied on the National Organic Program for years to market
and certify their products. Can you discuss, Mr. Moyer, whether
there is a need to formalize that definition at the Federal
level at the USDA and what the lack of standards or consistent
definitions might mean for producers on both sides of the
conversation?
Mr. Moyer. Yes, a complicated question, and thank you very
much for it. I do not think that we need a national standard at
this point in time. We have great partnerships with industry
and nonprofits and the Federal Government currently, so we do
have a standard out there for regenerative organic that is
being rolled-out across the world, and we are seeing great
success in that partnership between the Federal Government,
nonprofits, and the food industry, giving people the
opportunity to have great input and impact into how they define
it.
Mr. Panetta. Thank you, Mr. Moyer. I am out of time. Mr.
Chairman, I yield back.
The Chairman. Absolutely. Thank you.
And now the gentleman from Nebraska, Mr. Bacon, is
recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. Bacon. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
It is great to have a Nebraska panelist with us as well, so
welcome. In fact, my first question is for you, Dr. Larson, if
I may. I have read this, and I want you to just give me your
comments if it is true or not or your insights. People say
organic food is produced without the use of pesticides, but
that is not really the case. While organic production cannot
use synthetic pesticides, you can still use organic pesticides.
Because these organic pesticides are generally less effective,
they tend to be used more intensely. And organic producers
often have to apply them multiple times throughout the growing
season. Dr. Larson, can you talk more about how organic
herbicides are not always better for soil health and just give
us your insights?
Dr. Larson. Yes, so organic farmers do have the capability
to use non-synthetic herbicides, so oftentimes, they will
resort to things like acids. Acetic acid is a common one to
terminate cover crops. But they primarily rely on tillage in
order to destroy cover crops and manage weeds. And even in the
no-till organic system that--if you look at the Rodale
Institute's website--indicates they still have to plow every
other year. And so if you have taken the time to sequester all
that carbon into your soil and then you reintroduce a plow,
whether it is every year or every other year, that carbon
storage is not permanent. It is reversible. And so when they go
through with that plow, they are releasing all of that carbon
that they have stored and worked so hard for back into the
environment. But yes, tillage is the primary thing that they
rely on. But yes, many people think that there are no chemicals
in organic, but there are. They are just natural and usually
less effective.
Mr. Moyer. I would like to correct one statement, having
being at Rodale Institute. If you look at the data that we put
out there, and I would encourage you to look at the facts that
we do not till every other year. That is not the system that we
are employing. So tillage is not the enemy, depending on how
and where you do it, and I think we can mitigate many of those
problems.
Mr. Bacon. But you do use organic herbicides or pesticides,
right?
Mr. Moyer. I am sorry?
Mr. Bacon. But you do use organic--I want to make sure I
get my right terms on here--inputs.
Mr. Moyer. We use organic inputs?
Mr. Bacon. Okay.
Mr. Moyer. I am sorry----
Mr. Bacon. The question was--okay, let me find my right
question here, go back to this one. You are still using organic
pesticides. Am I correct?
Mr. Moyer. We do not.
Mr. Bacon. Okay.
Dr. Larson. I will recognize the fact that I did cite the
Rodale Institute's website directly, and it is within my
written comments that says that with organic no-till, you have
to plow every other year. I don't implement it, I don't know
much about it, but that was just pulled from Rodale Institute's
website.
Mr. Bacon. Okay. And with that, Mr. Chairman, I will yield
back.
The Chairman. Thank you.
And now the gentlewoman from North Carolina, Ms. Adams, who
is also the Vice Chair of the Committee on Agriculture, is now
recognized for 5 minutes.
Ms. Adams. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you so much also
to the Ranking Member for today's hearing on soil health. And
to our witnesses, thank you for your testimony.
Soil is the source of our lives, and it is responsible for
life on Earth. So listening to our witnesses today describe a
broken food system and sound the alarm--the alarm is going
off--the alarm to increasing soil degradation leads me to
acknowledge that regenerative agriculture is part of the
solution to this crisis. It has also proven to be a profitable
way to farm, but yet only one percent of American farmland is
certified organic and farmed regeneratively. So it is time for
a massive shift to save our agri-system.
Mr. Clark, the importance of conservation opportunities has
been cited throughout this panel. Farmers can sign up for
climate-friendly bundles under the Conservation Stewardship
Program, but not many do. What incentives can we provide to
farmers to increase their participation in CSP?
Mr. Clark. Right, that is a great question. I think it goes
back to the teaching again. I think, unfortunately, there may
be just plain and simply the farmer does not have faith in that
individual to guide them in the right direction. For example, I
mentioned earlier in testimony that we have teachings at our
farm through USDA NRCS. We were very fortunate to have a very
great group of young DCs. Every one of these DCs did not have
any agricultural background. So it is imperative that the
proper teaching is given to these folks so that they then can
properly implement these great programs like CSP, EQIP, no-till
programs and such. So thank you for the question,
Representative Adams.
Ms. Adams. Education is the key.
So, Mr. Nygren, in my home State of North Carolina,
millions of hogs and chickens are being raised in large factory
farms. These operations are clustered within communities of
color, and many have faced environmental and health impacts. So
how can more regenerative agriculture help strengthen the
economies of rural communities in North Carolina?
Mr. Nygren. We realize that we have lost a lot of our small
family farms. They are the ones that really support the
agrarian economy, the local merchants. And if we bring small
farms back into our rural communities across the United States,
we will not only have a local food system that doesn't depend
on the fossil fuels to get it to the shelf, but it can go
directly from the farms to the consumer. But it will really
stimulate the local economy, which will totally change our
small towns across America.
Ms. Adams. Okay, thank you. So let me ask Mr. Clark about
regenerative practices that that you have undertaken. You
mentioned that the transition to some can take years, while
incentives are sometimes only focused on the short-term. So how
were you able to successfully bridge that gap?
Mr. Clark. Yes, that that is a great question. It takes
courage. You have to be faithful and understand that you are
starting to work with Mother Nature. And we need to figure out
how the best ways are to accommodate working with this
microbial biome. I mean, this was just 15 years ago. I knew
nothing about this. It has been there for a long time. I knew
nothing about it. I am not a biologist. I am not an expert in
this area. I do know that biology exists. I have seen it. I
have a microscope myself. I can get it out. I can look at
things. I don't know what they are all called. But I can see
the change. I can see the numbers are different. So it is very,
very important that you surround yourself with positive people
that give you reinforcement. This is very important. Negativity
brings everybody down, so positive reinforcement, and everyone
is on the journey, the ride of the journey. And that is what
this is. You are trying to figure out how to work and grow with
Mother Nature and build soil health and what we haven't talked
much about today is human health.
Ms. Adams. Thank you, sir. I am out of time.
Thank you so much.
Mr. Clark. Human health is very important also.
Ms. Adams. Thank you, sir. I am out of time. Mr. Chairman,
I yield back.
Mr. Clark. Thank you.
The Chairman. And thank you, Vice Chairlady.
And now gentlelady from Florida, Mrs. Cammack, is now
recognized for 5 minutes.
Mrs. Cammack. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I
appreciate the conversation today regarding soil health.
Representing a state that produces over 300 specialty crops and
is a major contributor to our nation and the world's
agriculture, this is a very important topic.
I am going to focus in on a couple of key issues, but this
first question goes to all of our panelists. We can start going
down the line. First and foremost, thank you for being here
today both to, as I said, the Chairman and the Ranking Member.
But I want to start out with a discussion about biochar in
agricultural production and its application. In Florida, the
use of biochar derived from wood products or waste is viewed as
a positive new advancement for soil health and agricultural
production. For example, there are a number of nurseries,
citrus groves, and others who have incorporated the use of
biochar into their operations. Now, according to the University
of Florida's Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, IFAS,
biochar can have benefits for waste production, energy
production, carbon sequestration, and soil fertility without
sacrificing any production tools needed. Now, moreover, UF IFAS
notes that biochar can positively and simultaneously improve
crop yields and reduce fertilizer requirements for crops in
certain environments, and we are going to continue to push for
additional studies on this issue. But would any one of our
witnesses be able to speak to the potential benefits for both
producers and soil health by increasing the use of biochar in
certain production areas throughout the United States?
Dr. Larson. I would like to speak to that question if that
is okay?
Mrs. Cammack. Wonderful.
Dr. Larson. We actually got a grant just this morning from
the Partnerships for Climate-Smart Commodities that is focused
on this exact principle, high carbon soil amendment with
biochar. This is imperative in terms of trying to address our
soil health challenges. As I mentioned, all the stuff that we
have talked about today that is currently recognized in
conservation practice standards by NRCS is not enough to do
more than just offset current emissions. We need frontier
technologies such as biochar and high carbon soil amendment to
help repair some of the damage from the past and be able to
take care of some of that legacy load of carbon within the
atmosphere. And this is an excellent opportunity. We are
actually recycling a waste stream from our factory to implement
this high carbon soil amendment, but the overarching goal of
our project is to be able to build in best management practices
to this brand new interim conservation practice standard 808 as
the biochar infrastructure is developing across the nation.
This is a great way to take material that could just sit
and rot and cause emissions into the atmosphere and turn it
into a high carbon, stable form of carbon that can be injected
directly into the soil. This is going to be a gamechanger in
terms of replacing compost. It is going to be a gamechanger for
dealing with food waste. It is an excellent opportunity for
everybody, going forward.
Mrs. Cammack. Wonderful. Thank you so much for that.
Mr. Clark. I am not an expert in biochar. I don't claim to
be. But what I would like to say is that when you implement the
principles of soil health, you increase your biomass that you
are producing from your cover crops, you are feeding this
microbial biome. I am not sure that in that instance biochar is
going to benefit me as much as I can benefit with mechanically
terminating cover crops that will feed this microbial biome.
But again, I am not an expert.
Mrs. Cammack. I appreciate your insight, Mr. Clark.
Mr. Moyer. Yes, I would agree with you, Rick. I think it
depends where you are in the spectrum of transition and the
quality and the current health of your soil. What we have
noticed is that soils that are highly degraded, the input of
biochar makes a big difference, same with those biostimulants
that we talked about earlier. And as you progress in your
journey towards a healthier soil, you see less and less impact
or measurable impact from that biochar. But there is certainly
an opportunity there to have great success by using these new
tools.
Mr. McCarty. I would add to that as well that, in
particular, where I live in the country in northwest Kansas, in
particular in the areas such as the one we are going through
today under extreme drought conditions, cover crops might not
be an issue. Frankly, they are not an issue or an option right
now for most dryland farmers. But having the tool of biochar
available in the toolbox allows for continued improvements in
soil health, carbon sequestration in years when implementing
cover crop programs are not a viable option, such as this year.
Mrs. Cammack. That is wonderful. And my time is about to
expire. I have a follow-up question that I will submit for the
record. If we could get a response, I sure would appreciate it.
And thank you all for appearing before the Committee today.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.
The Chairman. Thank you.
And now the gentleman from Georgia, Mr. Bishop, is
recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. Bishop. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. And let me
thank you and Ranking Member Thompson for hosting this hearing.
It is very, very timely. And I want to thank our witnesses and
a special shout-out to Mr. Nygren, who is from Georgia. And I
would like to address this question to Mr. Nygren.
I was very pleased to see you mentioned Mr. Will Harris in
your testimony. As you know, I represent the Second District in
Georgia where Mr. Harris lives and where he operates White Oak
Pastures. He has been recognized throughout our state, the
nation, and even globally for his impeccable stewardship and
commitment to regenerative agriculture. Mr. Sedrick Rowe, also
referenced in your written statement, is another constituent of
Georgia's Second District, and many of the practices that he
implements on his farm demonstrate benefits for both soil
health and mitigating climate change.
So I have several questions to follow up on your written
testimony. You mentioned the efforts to build the organic
peanut sector in Georgia and how organics can be more
profitable. Can you tell us what makes organic farming more
profitable? And how does the transition to organic farming
affect the bottom line cost of production?
Second question, you stated that industrial agriculture
damaged the local agrarian economy. Do you believe that the
ultimate goal is to replace industrial farming with local
regenerative farms? And if so, will the production of food from
these farms be sufficient to feed the growing population in the
U.S. and across the world? Or do you think the number of
regenerative farms should be increased to build a more
resilient supply?
And finally, you in your testimony discuss the threat that
is posed by the development of agricultural land. And you
mentioned the loss of jobs and farm output. How can existing
programs help and our easement programs a viable way to keep
land in production? Those are three questions. I hope you
caught them.
Mr. Clark. Is that question to me or Mr. Moyer?
Mr. Bishop. It is to Mr. Nygren I think.
Mr. Nygren. Yes, I can answer the economic piece, but I
would yield to Mr. Moyer to talk about the science.
Mr. Bishop. Very good. Very good.
Mr. Nygren. Yes. But if you look at Will Harris in your own
district, I think you would admit that the local merchants and
the local economy, there was a lot of vacant housing that
existed a couple decades ago.
Mr. Bishop. Absolutely.
Mr. Nygren. And it was when he changed his farm practices--
and I don't know the science, I just know the economics of it--
that totally changed the economy for the entire county. I
believe you now have a housing shortage. You have a complete
employment base that is being attracted to your county that did
not exist before Will Harris changed his practices.
Mr. Bishop. Absolutely. Absolutely.
Mr. Nygren. I will yield if possible to Mr. Moyer to talk
about the science of that.
Mr. Bishop. Okay.
Mr. Moyer. I am not sure what the question was about the
science or the economics. I mean, there is really a great
difference in the economics of organic agriculture because what
we are seeing is a marketplace that is supporting farmers at
the point of purchase for the true cost of producing that food.
So many organic farmers, depending on their scale, do not
necessarily avail themselves to government subsidy programs.
They are making money by selling the product at a point of
purchase for the value that it takes to produce that crop. And
that has really been able to change the economic picture of
many farms across the country.
Mr. Bishop. The other question I really would like to
follow up on, and any panelists can chime in on this. Do you
believe that the ultimate goal is to replace industrial farming
with local regenerative farms? And if so, will the regenerative
farms be sufficient to feed the growing U.S. population or do
you think the number of regenerative farms should be an
increase so we have a more resilient supply chain?
Dr. Larson. A meta-analysis that was recently completed
shows that organic agriculture at scale lags behind
conventional farming to a point of 20 percent. And if they were
able to implement best management practices, that yield gap may
increase up to 34 percent compared to conventional farming, and
I will provide those citations.\2\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\2\ Editor's note: the supplementary material referred to located
on p. 98.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The other issue that you face is you can reduce, or you can
increase that--decrease that yield gap between conventional
organic, and at optimum, scientists predict that you could get
between an eight to nine percent yield drag, which, as Mr.
Moyer indicated in his testimony, a ten percent loss of yield
due to soil health degradation would be devastating for climate
change because it would require millions of acres to be
converted. And there is nothing more detrimental to the
protection of climate change and biodiversity than land use
change.
The Chairman. The gentleman's time has expired.
And now I recognize the gentleman from Georgia, Mr. Allen,
for 5 minutes.
Mr. Allen. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you to our
panel for your expertise.
Obviously, innovation is important to this nation. However,
we have been in our districts for the last month, and I have
gotten an earful from the people. My constituents are sick and
tired of this government perpetrating its will on them on what
to drive, what is morally right and wrong, and it is one issue
after the other. And so well, it is just, I don't care if the
policies are terrible. This is just the way it is going to be.
And, I am afraid we are caught up in another one of those
things here where we are talking about changing the way we feed
this country. And obviously, the importance, it is a national
security issue.
And, the best example that that I have is Sri Lanka. I
mean, that government perpetrated on its farmers banning the
use of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides. We are already
having issues with that on our farms today, and it is going to
affect yields this year, I mean, what the EPA is trying to do
to them. The result of this was catastrophic. Yields for rice
fell by 20 percent within the first 6 months of the policy,
driving up food prices and forcing the largely self-sufficient
country to import substantial quantities of rice to feed its
people. We can't have this in this country. Plus the fact that
what our farmers have been able to achieve in yields and other
things has really allowed us to participate in feeding the
whole world. The whole world is using us as an example of the
freedom to innovate and to produce yields and to use the
products available to us to do that.
And there are no better conservationists than our farmers.
This land has been, most of it, been in their families for
generations. They have to protect the land, and we have to
assist them with that, but we don't need these one-size-fits-
all government policies that are creating havoc in the
marketplace out there.
Dr. Larson, you talked about the wholesale elimination of
pesticides and how that is going to affect what we are dealing
with here. You specifically referenced effects on food waste
and land conversion. Any way to predict what is going to
happen? If this is--like I said, we don't want to be another
Sri Lanka.
Dr. Larson. Why don't I give you a personal example of when
mandates have gone wrong in my own life? So I live in Boulder
County, Colorado. The County Commissioners passed a ban on all
GMOs and pesticide usage on Boulder County open space that
encompassed a lot of our sugarbeet acreage because they had
some folks come in and promise them that no-till organic was
possible and would have better environmental and economic
outcomes for our farmers. Well, 10 years later almost and
millions of dollars spent trying to scale that up, there is not
a single organic or conventional farmer that has switched to
that within our geography because it has been too difficult to
amass enough biomass with a spring-planted cover crop. So they
have reverted back to what the farmers had done and come to
their conclusions on their own to promote soil health because
the science never added up and the economics never added up.
Mr. Allen. And with that, without objection, Mr. Chairman,
I would like to submit an article for the record titled, In Sri
Lanka, Organic Farming Went Catastrophically Wrong. This
article was published on March 5, 2022, in Foreign Policy and
dives further into Sri Lanka's organic crisis.
The Chairman. Without objection, Mr. Allen.
[The article referred to is located on p. 78.]
Mr. Allen. Thank you very much.
Dr. Larson and others on the panel--and we have about 50
seconds here--claim organically produced food is more
nutritious because the soil in their system is healthier. What
does the science say on this matter?
Dr. Larson. As I mentioned, I will provide some scientific
literature because I think what is important is to look at the
peer-reviewed literature in terms of scientific consensus on
this matter.\3\ And there isn't any evidence that the food
produced through organic farming methods is more nutritious,
safer, or healthier for people to consume. And in fact,
promoting that misconception that does not agree with
scientific consensus is causing Americans, especially low-
income and marginalized communities, to purchase and consume
fewer fruits, vegetables, and grains that was found from an
Oxford University study.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\3\ Editor's note: the supplementary material referred to located
on p. 98.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mr. Allen. Yes. And for the record, Mr. Chairman, I grew up
on raw milk, and I am still here. So anyway, with that, I yield
back.
The Chairman. Yes, sir. I did, too.
Mr. Allen. And you are still here.
The Chairman. Right from the cow on my grandfather's farm
where I grew up.
Mr. Allen. On my dad's farm.
The Chairman. There you go. All right. And now the
gentlewoman from the U.S. Virgin Islands, Ms. Plaskett, who is
also the Chair of the Subcommittee on Biotechnology,
Horticulture, and Research for 5 minutes.
Ms. Plaskett. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Thank you
so much for convening this hearing and for the Members who have
offered your questions. And this has really been very
informative. I am really appreciative.
I have a question for Mr. Moyer. In your written testimony,
sir, it includes three priorities, funding for cover crop
utilization; two, additional funding for USDA organic
transition initiatives; and three, strategic planning to better
serve farmers adopting regenerative organic models. Why are
these three the most important priorities for Rodale, and to
what extent can existing programs achieve these goals?
Mr. Moyer. Well, thank you very much for the question and
opening up the conversation around support mechanisms for
farmers wishing to make that transition. We have heard
throughout the testimony today that education is clearly
important to farmers. Anytime a farmer is making a transition--
and we are not suggesting we do away with industrial
agriculture. We are suggesting we transition agriculture from
one mode of production to something that is more focused on
soil health.
In order to make that transition, you have farmers--no
matter what the transition is, people need help and guidance,
support, education, consulting, and we want to make those
dollars at the Federal level available for farmers who choose,
not who are mandated, but who choose to make a difference in
their farming operation, whether in whole or in part, by acre
or by crop. The USDA program allows for multiple implementation
strategies. But farmers need that guidance and support in order
to make that change. They need to know that they are not alone
in making that transition and that there are support mechanisms
in place.
Ms. Plaskett. Thank you. In my district of the Virgin
Islands, our farmers are operating on very small farms. And so
they need to really be conscious of soil health because to be
able to pass it throughout generations, this is an important
component. So, as you said, this is not mandated. This is a
choice. And I think it is important for USDA to provide the
support, and so I am grateful to you for sharing with us those
priorities and how that is done.
Mr. Nygren, your written testimony refers to soil health as
the platform to bring our small towns back to life. You
mentioned that you believe value-added production will follow
healthy soil. Do you believe that these are areas where soil
health should be targeted, and how do we do that?
Mr. Nygren. I think one of the important things in the
entire discussion is that we are not suggesting one or the
other. I think this is talking about giving the small farmers,
the farmers that are willing to address the science, an equal
chance and that has not happened with a lot of the policy and
the funds that come out of the past farm bills. And that is one
thing that you can change in this farm bill, to give them
simply an equal chance with the industrial farms.
Ms. Plaskett. Right. Thank you. And I am so glad that both
of the witnesses are pointing this out, that what we are giving
individuals are choices, particularly for small farmers. I know
that often in testimony that I have heard, it plays well to say
that these are absolutes and that the Democrats are forcing you
to do something. That creates a good sound clip. But that is
not what we are talking about here in the farm bill. What we
are talking about is giving those who are interested the
opportunity to do that. And I think that that is what we, as
all Members, used to be interested in doing.
Mr. Clark, thank you as well for your testimony and for
your measured responses. I am really very appreciative of that.
Your testimony mentions the need to build local and regional
processing infrastructure. In the Virgin Islands we are very
interested in how do we bring value added? How do we do that
processing infrastructure? How does that impact soil health in
that?
Mr. Clark. Yes, it is very important that the--one of the
principles of soil health is integrating livestock, and then
you have to be able to have an outlet for those livestock to go
to. So it is very important that we have processing facilities
for small operations, medium-sized operations, and the larger
operations. I see this as a benefit to building soil health
because integrating livestock, we do it on our farm. If you
want to increase soil health the quickest and the most
efficient way, you need to have livestock on your property, and
you need to follow the proper rotational grazing rules.
Ms. Plaskett. Thank you. Thank you so much, again, to the
Chairman, and I yield back.
The Chairman. Thank you very much. And now, ladies and
gentlemen, we have reached the end of this outstanding,
informative, and historic hearing. I want to thank each of you.
Mr. Jeff Moyer, CEO of Rodale Institute, Kutztown,
Pennsylvania, thank you.
My good friend, Mr. Steve Nygren of Georgia, founder and
CEO of Serenbe, Chattahoochee Hills, Georgia, and my
constituent, thank you for your leadership over the years. You
pioneered this area years ago, and you stuck to it. I followed
your career closely through the years jointly with mine, as you
have.
Mr. Ken McCarty, partner of the McCarty Family Farms in
Colby, Kansas, I can't thank you enough for dramatizing and
hitting the critical nature, the crisis that we face for the
future of our food supply. Thank you.
And to Dr. Rebecca Larson, Ph.D., Chief Scientist and Vice
President, Government Affairs, Western Sugar Cooperative of
Denver, excellent, all of you. Thank you.
And we also had--did I miss--oh, Rick Clark, there he is.
Rick, I can't thank you enough. You sound the alarm. Paul
Revere will be very proud of you. As I said, the British might
not be coming, but a food shortage, a crisis is coming if we
fail to act. So I want to thank you, Rick, owner, Farm Green
and Clark Land and Cattle of Williamsport, Indiana. I can't
thank you enough.
And it is so important that we clearly point out how
important our soil it is. It is the earth. The good Lord
created us from there. As he scooped down to the earth, we come
from there. We are a part of it. And so I just want to thank
you because we call it Mother Earth for a reason. It is the
origination of us, our food, our existence, and we have to take
care of it. And you all have helped us here. The nation is
grateful. I think we have opened a light and showed that we are
moving ahead. And this was why it was important for this
Committee to do it. And I want to thank you.
And you heard from both the Republicans and Democrats, who
shared their feelings, individual of our sincere appreciation,
and their top-of-the-line interests to make sure that we never
have a food shortage. In order to do that, we have to take care
of our soil that produces our food and our survival.
So I can't thank you enough. And I just want to say God
bless you and thank you. And Oh, I see. Who seeks recognition?
Mr. Baird. Congressman Baird. Congressman Baird from
Indiana.
The Chairman. Oh, yes, Mr. Baird. Go right ahead.
Mr. Baird. I just wanted to add to what you have said and
welcome and express my appreciation for Mr. Clark from my
district being here and being on the panel. So thank you for
letting me do that.
The Chairman. Amen. And I say to you, thank you for having
Mr. Clark.
Mr. Clark. It was an honor to be here. Thank you.
The Chairman. As I said, I know if he were here, but I said
Paul Revere would be proud of him. He sounded the alarm for us
to get ready, and we are going forward with this.
So under the Rules of the Committee, the record of today's
hearing will remain open for 10 calendar days to receive
additional material and supplementary written responses from
the witnesses to any question posed by a Member.
And with that, this hearing of the Agriculture Committee of
the House of Representatives in Congress is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 12:38 p.m., the Committee was adjourned.]
[Material submitted for inclusion in the record follows:]
Submitted Statement by Hon. Alma S. Adams, a Representative in Congress
from North Carolina; on Behalf of Environmental Working Group
Agriculture is a significant and growing source \1\ of greenhouse
emissions. In particular, nitrous oxide \2\ emissions from fertilizing
crops and animal feed, and methane \3\ emissions from livestock and
their manure, are growing sources of greenhouse gas emissions. Unless
we reduce agricultural emissions of nitrous oxide, carbon dioxide and
methane, we will fail to achieve the greenhouse gas reductions needed
to \4\ avoid the worst impacts of the climate crisis.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ https://cfpub.epa.gov/ghgdata/inventoryexplorer/#agriculture/
entiresector/allgas/category/all.
\2\ https://cfpub.epa.gov/ghgdata/inventoryexplorer/#iallsectors/
allsectors/nitrousoxide/invent
sect/all.
\3\ https://cfpub.epa.gov/ghgdata/inventoryexplorer/#iallsectors/
allsectors/methane/invent
sect/all.
\4\ https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aba7357.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Voluntary conservation programs administered by the Department of
Agriculture could play a significant role in reducing greenhouse gas
emissions and help ensure farms are better able to withstand the
extreme weather caused by climate change. Conservation practices that
reduce greenhouse gas emissions can also improve air and water quality
and provide habitat for wildlife.
But, because of its misplaced spending priorities, USDA turns away
\5\ two out of every three farmers seeking conservation assistance
designed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The historic funding
included in the Inflation Reduction Act for conservation practices
could help reduce this backlog and reduce emissions. But Congress must
reform these programs to fulfill the promise of the IRA funding and
ensure it flows to greenhouse gas reducing practices.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\5\ https://www.ewg.org/news-insights/news/2021/08/growing-farm-
conservation-backlog-shows-need-congress-spend-smarter.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
To accomplish this goal, Congress must:

Reform CSP. Congress should reform the Conservation
Stewardship Program (CSP) \6\ * to make the reduction of
greenhouse gas emissions its primary purpose. Congress should
reward ``early adopters'' by linking CSP eligibility to past
climate stewardship; focusing funding on practices that reduce
emissions; prioritizing contracts to reward those that include
multiple emissions-reduction practices; and prohibiting CSP
spending on practices that increase greenhouse gas emissions.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\6\ https://www.ewg.org/news-insights/news/2022/08/usda-
conservation-stewardship-program-could-do-more-tackle-climate.
* Editor's note: footnotes annotated with are retained in
Committee file.

Reform EQIP. Congress should expand and reform the
Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP) \7\ to make
climate the primary purpose of EQIP incentive contracts; \8\
provide 90 percent cost-share for EQIP practices that reduce
greenhouse gas emissions; reduce Federal cost-sharing for
structural practices that provide few environmental benefits;
create a methane emissions demonstration project; and prohibit
EQIP spending on practices that increase greenhouse gas
emissions.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\7\ https://www.ewg.org/news-insights/news/2022/04/climate-change-
isnt-high-priority-12-billion-usda-farm-stewardship.
\8\ https://www.ewg.org/news-insights/news/2022/05/few-states-are-
prioritizing-climate-usda-incentive-bonus-program-0.

Reform CRP. Congress should expand and reform \9\ the
Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) by increasing program
funding and focusing CRP enrollment on marginal,
environmentally sensitive land through long-term and permanent
\10\ easements. In general, 80 percent of CRP acres should be
enrolled through CLEAR30, Conservation Reserve Enhancement
Program agreements, or continuous enrollment categories.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\9\ https://www.ewg.org/news-insights/news/2022/09/we-must-expand-
and-reform-usdas-conservation-reserve-program-0.
\10\ https://www.ewg.org/news-insights/news/2022/04/its-time-
reform-conservation-reserve-program-not-reason-you-might-think.

Reform ACEP. Reform the Agricultural Conservation Easement
Program (ACEP) by increasing funding for wetland reserve
easements; making past and future climate stewardship a
condition for enrollment in Agricultural Land Easements (ALE);
and prohibiting ALE easements on farmland that increase
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
greenhouse gas emissions.

Practices that reduce greenhouse gas emissions \11\ are not getting
enough support from USDA conservation funding. For example,
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\11\ https://www.ewg.org/sites/default/files/2022-02/
EWG%20Conservation%20Testimony%20-%20Conservation%20Programs%20-%202-2-
22.pdf.

Just 20 percent of EQIP funding \12\ supports practices that
reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and some EQIP funding supports
those practices that increases emissions.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\12\ https://conservation.ewg.org/.

Almost 40 percent of CSP practices offered \13\ between 2017
and 2022 scored poorly for reducing greenhouse gas emissions,
according to USDA.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\13\ https://www.ewg.org/news-insights/news/2022/08/usda-
conservation-stewardship-program-could-do-more-tackle-climate.

Most CRP acres are returned to production after contracts
expire, releasing soil carbon \14\ into the atmosphere, and the
number of acres enrolled in long-term CREP agreements is
falling.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\14\ https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/ab0399.

Farmers enrolled in ALE are not required to take steps to
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Congress should also take steps to prohibit misleading claims about
the benefits of conservation practices, including ``regenerative
agriculture'' claims. Unlike organic claims,\15\ which must meet
Federal standards \16\ and are subject to audits,\17\ assertions that
foods regenerate soil are not tied to Federal standards and do not
require third-party verification. Some private and nonprofit
regenerative standards and auditors \18\ have emerged, but there is not
yet a widely accepted \19\ definition of the term ``regenerative,'' and
farmers and food companies do not have to seek third-party audits when
making these claims. As a result, many food companies make misleading
``regenerative'' claims \20\ that have created significant consumer
confusion.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\15\ https://www.ams.usda.gov/rules-regulations/organic/labeling.
\16\ https://www.ams.usda.gov/rules-regulations/organic/labeling.
\17\ https://www.ams.usda.gov/services/enforcement/organic.
\18\ https://regenorganic.org/#storytime.
\19\ https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/
fsufs.2020.577723/full.
\20\ https://www.ewg.org/news-insights/news/2022/05/beware-
misleading-regenerative-soil-claims-non-organic-foods.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Congress should also support efforts to scale up the production of
plant-based or vegetarian options. USDA has provided $50 billion in
subsidies \21\ to livestock operations since 1995 but just $30 million
to plant-based or vegetarian operations. By investing in plant-based or
vegetarian alternatives, Congress would support not only consumer
choices that reduce greenhouse gas emissions but also farmers' growing
soybeans, wheat, mushrooms, and pulse crops, and more than 50,000 \22\
jobs.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\21\ https://www.ewg.org/news-insights/news/2022/02/usda-livestock-
subsidies-near-50-billion-ewg-analysis-finds.
\22\ https://www.plantbasedfoods.org/wp-content/uploads/PBFA-Jobs-
Report-2019.pdf.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thank you for the opportunity to submit testimony for the record.
______

Submitted Article by Hon. Rick W. Allen, a Representative in Congress
from Georgia
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

[https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/03/05/sri-lanka-organic-farming-crisis/
]

Analysis \1\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ https://foreignpolicy.com/channel/analysis/.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
In Sri Lanka, Organic Farming Went Catastrophically Wrong
A nationwide experiment is abandoned after producing only
misery.

March 5, 2022, 7:00 a.m.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

Tea pickers remove weeds at an organic tea plantation in the
southern district of in Ratnapura, Sri Lanka, on Aug. 3, 2021.
Ishara S. Kodikara/AFP Via Getty Images.

By Ted Nordhaus,\2\ the executive director of the
Breakthrough Institute, and Saloni Shah,\3\ a food and
agriculture analyst at the Breakthrough Institute.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\2\ https://foreignpolicy.com/author/ted-nordhaus/.
\3\ https://foreignpolicy.com/author/saloni-shah/.

Faced with a deepening economic and humanitarian crisis, Sri Lanka
called off an ill-conceived national experiment in organic agriculture
this winter. Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa \4\ promised in
his 2019 election campaign to transition the country's farmers \4\ to
organic agriculture over a period of 10 \4\ years. Last April,
Rajapaksa's government made good on that promise, imposing a nationwide
ban on the importation and use of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides
and ordering the country's two million farmers to go organic.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\4\ https://www.economist.com/asia/2021/10/16/a-rush-to-farm-
organically-has-plunged-sri-lankas-economy-into-crisis.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The result was brutal and swift. Against claims that organic
methods can produce comparable yields to conventional farming, domestic
rice production fell 20 percent in just the first 6 months. Sri Lanka,
long self-sufficient \5\ in rice production, has been forced to import
$450 million worth of rice even as domestic prices for this staple of
the national diet surged by around 50 percent.\6\ The ban also
devastated the nation's tea crop, its primary export and source of
foreign exchange.\7\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\5\ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4815756/.
\6\ https://economynext.com/sri-lanka-seeks-rice-bailout-from-
china-after-fertilizer-ban-89819/.
\7\ https://www.ifad.org/en/web/latest/-/blog/a-second-chance-for-
sri-lankan-tea.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
By November 2021, with tea production falling, the government
partially lifted its fertilizer ban on key export crops, including tea,
rubber, and coconut. Faced with angry protests, soaring inflation, and
the collapse of Sri Lanka's currency,\8\ the government finally
suspended the policy for several key crops--including tea, rubber, and
coconut--last month, although it continues for some others. The
government is also offering $200 million \9\ to farmers as direct
compensation and an additional $149 million in price subsidies to rice
farmers who incurred losses. That hardly made up for the damage and
suffering the ban produced. Farmers have widely criticized \10\ the
payments for being massively insufficient and excluding many farmers,
most notably tea producers, who offer one of the main sources of
employment in rural Sri Lanka. The drop in tea production alone is
estimated to result in economic losses of $425 million.\11\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\8\ https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/sri-lanka-declares-
economic-emergency-contain-food-prices-amid-forex-crisis-2021-08-31/.
\9\ https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/1/26/sri-lanka-200-million-
compensation-farmers-organic-crops-drive.
\10\ https://www.ucanews.com/news/sri-lankan-farmers-reject-govt-
compensation-paddy-price/95903.
\11\ https://apps.fas.usda.gov/newgainapi/api/Report/
DownloadReportByFileName?fileName=
Sri%20Lanka%20Restricts%20and%20Bans%20the%20Import%20of%20Fertilizers%2
0and%20
Agrochemicals_New%20Delhi_Sri%20Lanka_05-14-2021.pdf.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Human costs have been even greater. Prior to the pandemic's
outbreak, the country had proudly achieved upper-middle-income
status.\12\ Today, half a million people \13\ have sunk back into
poverty. Soaring inflation \14\ and a rapidly depreciating currency
\14\ have forced Sri Lankans to cut down on food and fuel purchases as
prices surge. The country's economists have called on the government to
default \15\ on its debt repayments to buy essential supplies for its
people.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\12\ https://blogs.worldbank.org/opendata/new-country-
classifications-income-level-2019-
2020?fbclid=IwAR3gkSoxhIjTSuxJzaLmwI6rMKhLwOY-vT_-
vIVutL1OoW_AQuvcuqw5Dww.
\13\ https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jan/02/covid-crisis-
sri-lanka-bankruptcy-poverty-pandemic-food-prices.
\14\ https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/sri-lanka-declares-
economic-emergency-contain-food-prices-amid-forex-crisis-2021-08-31/.
\15\ https://asia.nikkei.com/Economy/Sri-Lanka-economists-tell-
government-to-default-on-bond-buy-food.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The farrago of magical thinking, technocratic hubris, ideological
delusion, self-dealing, and sheer shortsightedness that produced the
crisis in Sri Lanka implicates both the country's political leadership
and advocates of so-called sustainable agriculture: the former for
seizing on the organic agriculture pledge as a shortsighted measure to
slash fertilizer subsidies and imports and the latter for suggesting
that such a transformation of the nation's agricultural sector could
ever possibly succeed.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

A worker carries leaves at a tea plantation in Ratnapura, Sri
Lanka, on July 31, 2021. Ishara S. Kodikara/AFP Via Getty
Images

Sri Lanka's journey through the organic looking glass and toward
calamity began in 2016, with the formation, at Rajapaksa's behest, of a
new civil society movement called Viyathmaga.\16\ On its website,\17\
Viyathmaga describes its mission as harnessing the ``nascent potential
of the professionals, academics and entrepreneurs to effectively
influence the moral and material development of Sri Lanka.'' Viyathmaga
allowed Rajapaksa to rise to prominence as an election candidate and
facilitated the creation of his election platform. As he prepared his
Presidential run, the movement produced the ``Vistas of Prosperity and
Splendour,'' \18\ a sprawling agenda for the nation that covered
everything from national security to anti-corruption to education
policy, alongside the promise to transition the nation to fully organic
agriculture within a decade.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\16\ https://www.cpalanka.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/CPA-
Report-Technocratic-Populism-and-the-Pandemic-State.pdf.
\17\ http://www.viyathmaga.org/about/.
\18\ http://www.doc.gov.lk/images/pdf/NationalPolicyframeworkEN/
FinalDovVer02-Eng
lish.pdf.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Despite Viyathmaga's claims to technocratic expertise, most of Sri
Lanka's leading agricultural experts were kept out of crafting the
agricultural section of the platform, which included promises to phase
out synthetic fertilizer, develop two million organic home gardens to
help feed the country's population, and turn the country's forests and
wetlands over to the production of biofertilizer.\19\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\19\ https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/
fsufs.2021.606815/full.
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Following his election as President, Rajapaksa appointed a number
of Viyathmaga members to his cabinet, including as minister of
agriculture. Sri Lanka's Ministry of Agriculture, in turn, created a
series of committees to advise it on the implementation of the policy,
again excluding most of the nation's agronomists and agricultural
scientists and instead relying on representatives of the nation's small
organic sector; academic advocates for alternative agriculture; and,
notably, the head of a prominent medical association who had long
promoted dubious claims \20\ about the relationship between
agricultural chemicals and chronic kidney disease \21\ in the country's
northern agricultural provinces.\22\
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\20\ https://island.lk/gmoa-president-misleading-the-public/.
\21\ https://apps.fas.usda.gov/newgainapi/api/Report/
DownloadReportByFileName?fileName=
Sri%20Lanka%20Restricts%20and%20Bans%20the%20Import%20of%20Fertilizers%2
0and%20
Agrochemicals_New%20Delhi_Sri%20Lanka_05-14-2021.pdf.
\22\ https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-19628295.
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Then, just a few months after Rajapaksa's election, COVID-19
arrived. The pandemic devastated the Sri Lankan tourist sector,\23\
which accounted for almost half of the nation's foreign exchange \24\
in 2019. By the early months of 2021, the government's budget and
currency were in crisis, the lack of tourist dollars so depleting
foreign reserves that Sri Lanka was unable to pay its debts to Chinese
creditors \25\ following a binge of infrastructure development over the
previous decade.
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\23\ https://www.trade.gov/country-commercial-guides/sri-lanka-
travel-and-tourism.
\24\ https://economynext.com/sri-lanka-ends-2019-with-us7-6bn-in-
forex-reserves-39859/.
\25\ https://www.wsj.com/articles/deepening-debt-crisis-in-sri-
lanka-stokes-controversy-over-chinese-lending-11642514503.
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Enter Rajapaksa's organic pledge. From the early days of the Green
Revolution in the 1960s, Sri Lanka has subsidized \26\ farmers to use
synthetic fertilizer. The results in Sri Lanka, as across much of South
Asia, were startling: Yields for rice and other crops more than
doubled. Struck by severe food shortages \27\ as recently as the 1970s,
the country became food secure while exports of tea and rubber became
critical sources\28\ of exports and foreign reserves. Rising
agricultural productivity allowed widespread urbanization, and much of
the nation's labor force moved into the formal wage economy,\29\
culminating in Sri Lanka's achievement of official upper-middle-income
status in 2020.
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\26\ https://www.canr.msu.edu/prci/publications/Policy-Research-
Notes/PRCI_PRN_3.pdf.
\27\ https://www.nytimes.com/1974/05/13/archives/sri-lanka-short-
of-food-faces-an-economic-crisis-people-are-well.html.
\28\ https://www.cbsl.gov.lk/sites/default/files/cbslweb_documents/
publications/otherpub/
60th_anniversary_managing_sri_lankas_foreign_reserves.pdf.
\29\ https://blogs.worldbank.org/opendata/new-country-
classifications-income-level-2019-
2020?fbclid=IwAR3gkSoxhIjTSuxJzaLmwI6rMKhLwOY-vT_-
vIVutL1OoW_AQuvcuqw5Dww.
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By 2020, the total cost of fertilizer imports and subsidies was
close to $500 million \30\ each year. With fertilizer prices rising,
the tab was likely to increase further in 2021. Banning synthetic
fertilizers seemingly allowed Rajapaksa to kill two birds with one
stone: improving the nation's foreign exchange situation while also
cutting a massive expenditure on subsidies from the pandemic-hit public
budget.
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\30\ https://apps.fas.usda.gov/newgainapi/api/Report/
DownloadReportByFileName?fileName=
Sri%20Lanka%20Restricts%20and%20Bans%20the%20Import%20of%20Fertilizers%2
0and%20
Agrochemicals_New%20Delhi_Sri%20Lanka_05-14-2021.pdf.
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But when it comes to agricultural practices and yields, there is no
free lunch. Agricultural inputs--chemicals, nutrients, land, labor, and
irrigation--bear a critical relationship to agricultural output. From
the moment the plan was announced, agronomists in Sri Lanka and around
the world warned that agricultural yields \31\ would fall
substantially. The government claimed it would increase the production
of manure and other organic fertilizers in place of imported synthetic
fertilizers. But there was no conceivable way the nation could produce
enough fertilizer domestically to make up for the shortfall.
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\31\ https://www.ft.lk/front-page/Inorganic-fertiliser-ban-could-
harm-production-with-major-implications/44-719325.
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Having handed its agricultural policy over to organic true
believers,\32\ many of them involved in businesses that would stand to
benefit from the fertilizer ban, the false economy of banning imported
fertilizer hurt the Sri Lankan people dearly. The loss of revenue from
tea and other export crops dwarfed the reduction in currency outflows
from banning imported fertilizer. The bottom line turned even more
negative through the increased import of rice and other food stocks.
And the budgetary savings from cutting subsidies were ultimately
outweighed by the cost of compensating farmers and providing public
subsidies for imported food.
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\32\ https://www.pmdnews.lk/presidential-task-force-for-green-
agriculture-established/.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

Workers are seen at a tea plantation in Ratnapura, Sri Lanka,
on July 31, 2021. Ishara S. Kodikara/AFP Via Getty Images.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

A Sri Lankan farmer carries paddy on his head in a field on
the outskirts of Sri Lanka's capital, Colombo, on Sept. 7,
2018. Lakruwan Wanniarachchi/AFP Via Getty Images.

Farming is, at bottom, a fairly straightforward thermodynamic
enterprise. Nutrient and energy output in the form of calories is
determined by nutrient and energy input. For most of recorded human
history, the primary way humans increased agricultural production was
by adding land to the system, which expanded the amount of solar
radiation and soil nutrients available for food production. Human
populations were relatively small, under one billion people in total,
and there was no shortage of arable land to expand onto. For this
reason, the vast majority of anthropogenic changes in global land use
and deforestation has been the result of agricultural extensification--
the process of converting forests and prairie to cropland and pasture.
Against popular notions that pre-industrial agriculture existed in
greater harmony with nature, \3/4\ \33\ of total global deforestation
occurred before the industrial revolution.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\33\ https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-021-22702-2.
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Even so, feeding ourselves required directing virtually all human
labor to food production. As recently as 200 years ago, more than 90
percent of the global population labored in agriculture. The only way
to bring additional energy and nutrients into the system to increase
production was to let land lie fallow, rotate crops, use cover crops,
or add manure from livestock that either shared the land with the crops
or grazed nearby. In almost every case, these practices required
additional land and put caps on yields.
Starting in the 19th century, the expansion of global trade allowed
for the import of guano-mined from ancient deposits on bird-rich
islands--and other nutrient-rich fertilizers from far-flung regions
onto farms in Europe and the United States. This and a series of
technological innovations--better machinery, irrigation, and seeds--
allowed for higher yields and labor productivity on some farms, which
in turn freed up labor and thereby launched the beginning of large-
scale urbanization, one of global modernity's defining features.
But the truly transformative break came with the invention of the
Haber-Bosch process by German scientists in the early 1900s, which uses
high temperature, high pressure, and a chemical catalyst to pull
nitrogen from the air and produce ammonia, the basis for synthetic
fertilizers. Synthetic fertilizer remade global agriculture and, with
it, human society. The widespread adoption of synthetic fertilizers in
most countries has allowed a rapid increase in yields and allowed human
labor to shift from agriculture \34\ to sectors that offer higher
incomes and a better quality of life.
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\34\ https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/
S0304387817300172.
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The widespread application of synthetic fertilizers now allows
global agriculture to feed nearly eight billion people, of whom about
four billion depend on the increased output \35\ that synthetic
fertilizers allow for their sustenance. As a result, the modern food
systems that have allowed global agriculture to feed Earth's population
are far more energy intensive than past food systems, with synthetic
fertilizers accounting for a significant source of the energy for
crops.
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\35\ https://ourworldindata.org/how-many-people-does-synthetic-
fertilizer-feed.
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As synthetic fertilizers became increasingly available globally
after World War II and combined with other innovations, such as modern
plant breeding and large-scale irrigation projects, a remarkable thing
happened: Human populations more than doubled \36\--but thanks to
synthetic fertilizers and other modern technologies, agricultural
output tripled \37\ on only 30 percent more land over the same period.
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\36\ https://ourworldindata.org/yields-vs-land-use-how-has-the-
world-produced-enough-food-for-a-growing-population.
\37\ https://www.pnas.org/content/109/31/12302.
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The benefits of synthetic fertilizers though go far beyond simply
feeding people. It's no exaggeration to say that without synthetic
fertilizers and other agricultural innovations, there is no
urbanization, no industrialization, no global working or middle class,
and no secondary education for most people. This is because fertilizer
and other agricultural chemicals have substituted human labor,
liberating enormous populations from needing to dedicate most of their
lifetime labor to growing food.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

A Sri Lankan farmer applies fertilizer at a vegetable farm in
Horana South, Sri Lanka, on Oct. 25, 2017. Lakruwan
Wanniarachchi/AFP Via Getty Images

Virtually the entirety of organic agriculture production serves two
populations at opposite ends of the global income distribution. At one
end are the 700 million or so people globally who still live in extreme
poverty. Sustainable agriculture proponents fancifully call the
agriculture this population practices ``agroecology.'' \38\ But it is
mostly just old-fashioned subsistence farming, where the world's
poorest eke out their survival from the soil.
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\38\ https://thebreakthrough.org/journal/no-10-winter-2019/after-
agroecology.
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They are the poorest farmers in the world, who dedicate most of
their labor to growing enough food to feed themselves. They forego
synthetic fertilizers and most other modern agricultural technologies
not by choice but because they can't afford them, caught in a poverty
trap where they are unable to produce enough agricultural surplus to
make a living selling food to other people; hence, they can't afford
fertilizer and other technologies that would allow them to raise yields
and produce surplus.
At the other end of the spectrum are the world's richest people,
mostly in the West, for whom consuming organic food is a lifestyle
choice tied up with notions about personal health and environmental
benefits as well as romanticized ideas about agriculture and the
natural world. Almost none of these consumers of organic foods grow the
food themselves. Organic agriculture for these groups is a niche
market--albeit, a lucrative one for many producers--accounting for less
than one percent of global agricultural production.
As a niche within a larger, industrialized, agricultural system,
organic farming works reasonably well. Producers typically see lower
yields.\39\ But they can save money on fertilizer and other chemical
inputs while selling to a niche market for privileged consumers willing
to pay a premium for products labeled organic. Yields are lower--but
not disastrously lower--because there are ample nutrients available to
smuggle into the system via manure. As long as organic food remains
niche, the relationship between lower yields and increased land use
remains manageable.
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\39\ https://www.nature.com/articles/nature11069.
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The ongoing catastrophe in Sri Lanka, though, shows why extending
organic agriculture to the vast middle of the global bell curve,
attempting to feed large urban populations with entirely organic
production, cannot possibly succeed. A sustained shift to organic
production nationally in Sri Lanka would, by most estimates, slash
yields \40\ of every major crop in the country, including drops of 35
percent for rice, 50 percent for tea, 50 percent for corn, and 30
percent for coconut. The economics of such a transition are not just
daunting; they are impossible.
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\40\ https://www.canr.msu.edu/prci/publications/Policy-Research-
Notes/PRCI_PRN_3.pdf.
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Importing fertilizer is expensive, but importing rice is far more
costly.\41\ Sri Lanka, meanwhile, is the world's fourth largest tea
exporter, with tea accounting for a lion's share of the country's
agricultural exports, which in turn account for 70 percent \42\ of
total export earnings.
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\41\ https://island.lk/looming-spectre-of-rice-shortage/.
\42\ https://www.ifad.org/en/web/latest/-/blog/a-second-chance-for-
sri-lankan-tea.
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There is no conceivable way that export sales to the higher value
organic market could possibly make up for sharp falls in production.
The entire global market for organic tea, for example, accounts for
only about 0.5 percent of the global tea market. Sri Lanka's tea
production alone is larger than the entire global organic tea
market.\43\ Flooding the organic market with most or all of Sri Lanka's
tea production, even after output fell by half due to lack of
fertilizer, would almost certainly send global organic tea prices into
a spiral.
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\43\ https://phys.org/news/2021-09-sri-lanka-revolution-threatens-
tea.html.
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The notion that Sri Lanka might ever replace synthetic fertilizers
with domestically produced organic sources without catastrophic effects
on its agricultural sector and environment is more ludicrous still.
Five to seven times more animal manure would be necessary to deliver
the same amount of nitrogen to Sri Lankan farms as was delivered by
synthetic fertilizers in 2019. Even accounting for the overapplication
of synthetic fertilizers, which is clearly a problem, and other
uncertainties, there is almost certainly not enough land in the small
island nation to produce that much organic fertilizer. Any effort to
produce that much manure would require a vast expansion of livestock
holdings, with all the additional environmental damage that would
entail.
Sustaining agriculture in Sri Lanka, for both domestic consumption
and high-value export products, was always going to require importing
energy and nutrients into the system, whether organic or synthetic. And
synthetic fertilizers were always going to be the most economically and
environmentally efficient way to do so.
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

Sri Lankan President Gotabaya Rajapaksa (center) waves to
supporters during a rally ahead of the upcoming parliamentary
elections, near Sri Lanka's capital, Colombo, on July 28, 2020.
Ishara S. Kodikara/AFP Via Getty Images

While the proximate cause of Sri Lanka's humanitarian crisis was a
bungled attempt to manage its economic fallout from the global
pandemic, at the bottom of the political problem was a math problem and
at the bottom of the math problem was an ideological problem--or, more
accurately, a global ideological movement that is innumerate and
unscientific by design, promoting fuzzy and poorly specified claims
about the possibilities of alternative food production methods and
systems to obfuscate the relatively simple biophysical relationships
that govern what goes in; what comes out; and the economic, social, and
political outcomes that any agricultural system can produce, whether on
a regional, national, or global scale.
Rajapaksa continues to insist that his policies have not failed.
Even as Sri Lanka's agricultural production was collapsing, he traveled
to the U.N. climate change summit in Glasgow, Scotland, late last year,
where--when not dodging protests \43\ over his human rights record as
Sri Lankan defense minister--he touted his nation's commitment to an
agricultural revolution \44\ allegedly ``in sync with nature.'' Not
long afterward, he fired two \45\ government officials within weeks of
each other for publicly criticizing the increasingly dire food
situation and fertilizer ban.\46\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\43\ https://declassifieduk.org/greenwashing-genocide-the-uk-
welcomes-sri-lankas-notorious-president/.
\44\ https://slembassyusa.org/new/component/content/article/58-
headline/2409-speech-by-president-gotabaya-rajapaksa-at-the-
rediscovering-nitrogen-solutions-and-synergies-for-climate-change-
health-biodiversity-and-circular-economy-cop26-side-event-scotland-uk-
on-31-october-2021.html?Itemid=101.
\45\ https://www.news18.com/news/world/amid-economic-crisis-sri-
lankan-president-sacks-critical-minister-and-official-issues-gag-order-
for-others-4625522.html.
\46\ https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/sri-lanka-
leader-sacks-minister-criticized-farm-policy-82067841.
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As farmers begin their spring harvest, the fertilizer ban has been
lifted,\47\ but fertilizer subsidies have not been restored. Rajapaksa,
meanwhile, has established yet another committee \48\--this one to
advise the government on how to increase organic fertilizer production
in a further demonstration that he and his agricultural advisors
continue to deny the basic biophysical realities that constrain
agriculture production.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\47\ https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/sri-lanka-rows-
back-organic-farming-goal-removes-ban-chemical-fertilisers-2021-11-24/.
\48\ https://www.pmdnews.lk/presidential-task-force-for-green-
agriculture-established/.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Much of the global sustainable agriculture movement, unfortunately,
has proven no more accountable. As Sri Lankan crop yields have
plummeted, exactly as most mainstream agricultural experts predicted
they would, the fertilizer ban's leading advocates have gone silent.
Vandana Shiva, an Indian activist and ostensible face of anti-modern
agrarianism in the global south, was a booster of the ban but turned
mute as the ban's cruel consequences became clear. Food Tank, an
advocacy group funded by the Rockefeller Foundation that promotes a
phase-out \49\ of chemical fertilizers and subsidies in Sri Lanka, has
had nothing to say now that its favored policies have taken a
disastrous turn.
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\49\ https://foodtank.com/news/2017/12/sri-lankan-food-production/.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Soon enough, advocates will surely argue that the problem was not
with the organic practices they touted but with the precipitous move to
implement them in the midst of a crisis. But although the immediate ban
on fertilizer use was surely ill conceived, there is literally no
example of a major agriculture-producing nation successfully
transitioning to fully organic or agroecological production. The
European Union has, for instance, promised a full-scale transition to
sustainable agriculture for decades. But while it has banned
genetically modified crops \50\ and a variety of pesticides \51\ as
well as has implemented policies to discourage the overuse of synthetic
fertilizers, it still depends heavily \52\ on synthetic fertilizers to
keep yields high, produce affordable, and food-secure. It has also
struggled with the disastrous effects of overfertilizing surface and
ground water with manure from livestock production.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\50\ https://ec.europa.eu/environment/europeangreencapital/
countriesruleoutgmos/.
\51\ https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/
journal.pone.0256719.
\52\ https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/
AG.CON.FERT.ZS?locations=1W-EU.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Boosters of organic agriculture also point to Cuba, which was
forced to abandon synthetic fertilizer when its economy imploded
following the Soviet Union's collapse. They fail to mention that the
average Cuban lost an estimated 10 to 15 pounds \53\ of body weight in
the years that followed. In 2011, Bhutan, another darling of the
sustainability crowd, promised to go 100 percent organic by 2020.\54\
Today, many farmers in the Himalayan kingdom continue to depend \55\ on
agrochemicals.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\53\ https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/cuba-can-teach-america-
farming.
\54\ https://www.reuters.com/article/us-bhutan-emissions-farming/
to-build-a-greener-economy-bhutan-wants-to-go-organic-by-2020-
idUSKCN0RS0DO20150928.
\55\ https://kuenselonline.com/achieving-organic-pledge-not-
possible-agriculture-officials/.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
In Sri Lanka, as elsewhere, there is no shortage of problems
associated with chemical-intensive and large-scale agriculture. But the
solutions to these problems--be they innovations that allow farmers to
deliver fertilizer more precisely to plants when they need it,
bioengineered microbial soil treatments that fix nitrogen in the soil
and reduce the need for both fertilizer and soil disruption, or
genetically modified crops that require fewer pesticides and
herbicides--will be technological, giving farmers new tools instead of
removing old ones that have been proven critical to their livelihoods.
They will allow countries like Sri Lanka to mitigate the environmental
impacts of agriculture without impoverishing farmers or destroying the
economy. Proponents of organic agriculture, by contrast, committed to
naturalistic fallacies and suspicious of modern agricultural science,
can offer no plausible solutions. What they offer, as Sri Lanka's
disaster has laid bare for all to see, is misery.

Ted Nordhaus is the co-founder and executive director of the
Breakthrough Institute and a co-author of An Ecomodernist
Manifesto. Twitter: @TedNordhaus
Saloni Shah is a food and agriculture analyst at the
Breakthrough Institute. Twitter: @SaloniShah101
______

Supplementary Material Submitted by Jeffrey W. Moyer, Chief Executive
Officer, Rodale Institute
Insert 1
Ms. Pingree. . . .
. . . And since that is such a critical topic right now, what
techniques do we use to sequester carbon, can you talk a little
bit more about the studies that have been done there and sort
of the quantification of how much carbon we can sequester?
Mr. Moyer. Yes, thank you very much for the question about
the conversation around carbon and carbon sequestration. We
know that the way we manage soils can have a huge impact on its
ability to sequester carbon. Many of our practices that we
employ, we have already discussed about cover crops, and we may
have discussed about crop rotations. These are all tools that
farmers can implement to sequester carbon. It is becoming more
and more critical. The amount of carbon we can sequester is
certainly dependent upon the relationship between the practices
that we are superimposing on the landscape and the soils innate
ability through clay particles and the different soil types to
sequester carbon.
* * * * *
So yes, our work at Rodale Institute is continually exploring
and expanding the concepts around carbon sequestration, and we
have a tremendous amount of data that we would be more than
happy to share with this Committee and with you in particular.
Ms. Pingree. Thanks so much. We will look forward to
exploring that more.
I. Soil Health and Drought
Enhancement of soil organic carbon (SOC) and soil organic matter
(SOM) is the foundation of soil health improvement. It has been shown
that increasing soil organic carbon and soil organic matter enhances
drought tolerance in agricultural systems. A 1% increase in soil
organic carbon is estimated to result in a 2% to >5% increase in soil
Available Water Holding Capacity depending on the soil texture (Olness
and Archer, 2005). In a review paper, Lal (2020) concluded that
management practices that enhance soil health by restoring SOM content
increase soil water retention and the plant's available water capacity.
Ankenbauer and Loheide (2016) quantified the effect of soil organic
content on soil water retention and water use by plants in the Tuolumne
Meadows, a groundwater-dependent ecosystem in the Sierra Nevada of
California. They reported a substantial dependence of soil water
retention on soil organic content by correlating Van Genuchten soil
water retention parameters with soil organic content, independent of
soil texture. Their results showed that the increased water retention
by soil organic matter contributes as much as 8.8 cm to transpiration,
or 35 additional water-stress free days, during the dry summer when
plants experience increased water stress. Izum and Wagai (2019)
evaluated the extent to which SOC build-up could reduce agricultural
drought risk. Using statistical analysis of spatially-explicit global
crop and soil datasets, they reported that relatively small enhancement
in topsoil (0-30 cm) organic carbon content (OCtop) could increase
drought tolerance of the food production systems operating over 70% of
the global harvested area (particularly drylands). By closing the gap
between current and upper limit of tolerance levels through SOC
addition of 4.87 GtC at the global scale, farmers' economic output in
drought years would increase by 16%. Their findings highlight that
progress towards multiple development goals can be leveraged by SOC
enhancement in carbon (C)-poor soils in drier regions around the world.
Oldfield, et al., (2019) developed a quantitative model exploring how
SOM relates to crop yield potential of maize and wheat in light of co-
varying factors of management, soil type, and climate. They found that
yields of these two crops are on average greater with higher
concentrations of SOC. A survey study by Soil Health Institute showed
that 97 out of 100 farmers have the perception that soil health
management systems improve yield resilience (Bagnall, et al., 2021).
The real-world benefit of increased SOC as a benefit to farmers is
demonstrated by the resilience and long-term yield stability in organic
systems within Rodale Institute's Farming Systems Trial during periods
of drought and low rainfall (Lotter, Seidel, and Liebhardt 2009). Over
a fourteen year period, organic corn yield was 5% higher than
conventional while conventional soybean was 5% higher than organic
(these represent statistically significant differences). During most
low rainfall or drought years during that same time period, the organic
systems out-yielded the conventional system which was attributed to
higher soil water retention due to higher soil organic carbon levels in
the organic system. This yield stability along with price premiums in
organic results in increased economic stability for organic farmers
(Hanson, Lichtenberg, and Peters 2009, Pimentel, et al., 2005).
Concerning flood mitigation, data from the Farming Systems Trial
demonstrate improved hydraulic properties (Alfahham, et al., 2021) and
soil structure that is related to carbon fractions of soil aggregates
(Littrell, et al., 2021) in the organic systems that are expected to
increase water infiltration and retention. Recent yet unpublished data
(currently under review) from the Farming Systems Trial is finding
water infiltration rates in some organic systems are double the
conventional tilled and no-till systems. These results are corroborated
by studies that include long-term systems trials from across the United
States, including the Farming Systems Trial, that conservation
practices that include organic fertility, cover crops, and reduced
tillage result in improved soil hydraulic properties (Bagnall, Morgan,
Bean, et al., 2022) that result in greater food security (Bagnall, et
al., 2021).

References:

Alfahham, Abdelrahman, Matthew T. Amato, Emmanuel Omondi, Daniel
Gimenez, and Alain F. Plante. 2021. ``Assessing the impact of organic
versus conventional agricultural management on soil hydraulic
properties in a long-term experiment.'' Soil Science Society of
America Journal 85 (6): 2135-2148.
Ankenbauer, K.J., & Loheide, S.P. (2017). The effects of soil
organic matter on soil water retention and plant water use in a meadow
of the Sierra Nevada, CA. Hydrological Processes, 31(4), 891-901.
Bagnall, Dianna K., Cristine L.S. Morgan, G. Mac Bean, Daniel
Liptzin, Shannon B. Cappellazzi, Michael Cope, Kelsey L.H. Greub,
Elizabeth L. Rieke, Charlotte E. Norris, and Paul W. Tracy. 2022.
``Selecting soil hydraulic properties as indicators of soil health:
Measurement response to management and site characteristics.'' Soil
Science Society of America Journal.
Bagnall, D.K., Shanahan, J.F., Flanders, A., Morgan, C.L., &
Honeycutt, C.W. (2021). Soil health considerations for global food
security. Agronomy Journal, 113(6), 4581-4589.
Hanson, James C., Erik Lichtenberg, and Steven E. Peters. 2009.
``Organic versus conventional grain production in the mid-Atlantic: An
economic and farming system overview.'' American Journal of Alternative
Agriculture 12 (1): 2-9. doi:10.1017/S0889189300007104.
Iizumi, T., & Wagai, R. (2019). Leveraging drought risk reduction
for sustainable food, soil and climate via soil organic carbon
sequestration. Scientific Reports, 9(1), 1-8.
Lal, R. (2020). Soil organic matter and water retention. Agronomy
Journal, 112(5), 3265-3277.
Littrell, James, Sutie Xu, Emmanuel Omondi, Debasish Saha, Jaehoon
Lee, and Sindhu Jagadamma. 2021. ``Long-term organic management
combined with conservation tillage enhanced soil organic carbon
accumulation and aggregation.'' Soil Science Society of America Journal
85 (5): 1741-1754.
Lotter, D.W., R. Seidel, and W. Liebhardt. 2009. ``The performance
of organic and conventional cropping systems in an extreme climate
year.'' American Journal of Alternative Agriculture 18 (3): 146-154.
doi: 10.1079/AJAA200345.
Oldfield, E.E., Bradford, M.A., and Wood, S.A.: Global meta-analysis
of the relationship between soil organic matter and crop yields, SOIL,
5, 15-32, https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-5-15-2019, 2019.
Olness, A., & Archer, D. (2005). Effect of organic carbon on
available water in soil. Soil Science, 170(2), 90-101.
Pimentel, David, Paul Hepperly, James Hanson, David Douds, and Rita
Seidel. 2005. ``Environmental, Energetic, and Economic Comparisons of
Organic and Conventional Farming Systems.'' BioScience 55 (7): 573-
582. doi: 10.1641/0006-3568(2005)055[0573:EEAECO]2.0.CO;2.

References annotated with are retained in Committee file.

Insert 2
Mr. Baird. . . .
But my first question goes to Dr. Larson. And it has to do
with the idea that others on the panel have claimed that
organically produced food is more nutritious because the soil
in their system is healthier. What does the science say about
that? Any thoughts there?
* * * * *
Mr. Moyer. I would add that Rodale Institute would be more
than happy to supply additional data that showcases the
opposite side of that conversation because science can show
what people want it to show, but there are clear differences in
nutritional quality of crops that are produced in soils that
are farmed differently.
II. Nutritional Quality in Our Food System and Relationship to Soil
Health
The information below is specifically addressing Representative
Baird's request to provide references related to nutritional quality of
food that is grown using different methods and the link between soil
health and nutritional quality. My comment on this topic at the hearing
was in response to Dr. Larson's comment that there is no data to
support the correlation between soil health and nutrition in a plant
and no evidence that organic food is safer or more nutritious than food
grown using conventional ag. Therefore, included here are references
related to food safety as well as nutritional quality.
A. Safety
The largest health concern related to consumption of conventionally
grown foods is the risk of exposure to toxic chemicals from pesticides.
There is an increasing body of evidence indicating high exposure to
pesticides through diet in the United States (Lu, et al., 2008) and
that dietary intervention that includes organic food reduces or
eliminates this health risk (Lu, et al., 2006, Curl, Fenske, and
Elgethun 2003, Hyland, et al., 2019). Using data from three U.S.
sources: The Pesticide Data Program of the U.S. Department of
Agriculture, the Marketplace Surveillance Program of the California
Department of Pesticide Regulation, and private tests conducted by
Consumers Union, Baker, et al. (2002) found statistically higher levels
of pesticide residues on conventional versus organic crops. The USDA
data indicated that 73% to 90% of all conventional crops had pesticide
residues, depending on crop category. Only 23% of organic samples had
pesticide residues. When researchers controlled for persistent, legacy
chemicals that have long been banned the conventional crops dropped
from 73% to 71% but the organic samples dropped to 13%, suggesting that
exposure from organic crops is not from current management but past
practices. Baranski, et al. (2014) has done the most recent and
rigorous analysis of food safety concerning organic and conventional
foods. This meta-analysis included data from 343 comparative studies
and found that the incidence of pesticide residue on conventional crops
to be four times higher than organic crops and that conventional foods
had significantly higher cadmium levels, one of three recognized highly
toxic metals, lead and mercury being the others. Neither of these
studies reported on the toxicity of the chemicals found on food
samples, an area of concern requiring more research.
B. Nutritional Quality
During the past 70 years, grain yields have more than doubled
(Tilman, et al. 2002) and global food production tripled (FAO 2018),
mostly through improved varieties and increased use of pesticides,
fertilizers, and irrigation. While this increase in food production has
reduced worldwide chronic malnourishment it has come at a cost to the
environment, the soil, and potentially human health. More than \1/3\ of
the Earth's soils are now degraded (Cherlet, et al., 2018, Middleton
and Thomas 1997), limiting their potential to adequately provide human
nutrition (Lal 2009). Soils of the United States have also suffered
degradation with significant soil carbon loss (Collins, et al., 2000,
Senthilkumar, et al., 2009, Sanderman, Hengl, and Fiske 2017) through
tillage and conventional practices (Douds, Jr., et al., 1995, Hepperly,
Douds, and Seidel 2006, 2007) that put food security and human
nutrition at risk (Ghimire, Machado, and Bista 2018, Lal 2009). Nearly
one in nine people worldwide suffers from chronic malnourishment and it
is estimated that more than half of all people suffer from ``hidden
hunger'' whereby caloric demands are met but levels of micro-nutrients
are below levels sufficient to maintain proper health (Welch and Graham
2000, Welch 2002). This may be attributed to the decline of the
concentration of minerals, vitamins, and proteins of grains, fruits and
vegetables that has occurred over the past 70 years, coinciding with
the aforementioned soil degradation (Davis 2009, Davis, Epp, and
Riordan 2004, Jarrell and Beverly 1981). Davis, Epp, and Riordan
(2004), using U.S. Department of Agriculture nutritional data in 1950
and 1999 found significant declines in the concentration of protein,
calcium, phosphorus, iron, riboflavin (vitamin B2) and vitamin C for 43
vegetables and fruits measured. Similarly, protein concentrations in
grains in the U.S. and Europe have declined significantly [corn: 8%
(Davis 2009, Scott, et al., 2006), sorghum 18%, rice 18% wheat 30%,
barley 50% (Simmonds 1995)]. The apparent negative relationship
between increased yield and reduced nutrient concentrations in food
that has occurred over the past 70 years has been termed a ``dilution
effect'' (Davis 2009, Jarrell and Beverly 1981) and typically occurs
when fertilization with one or a few macro-nutrients increases crop
yields, resulting in a decline in other micro-nutrients. How this drop
in nutritional quality is linked to soil degradation and has broadly
affected human health is basically unexplored.
We recognize that there is a gap in knowledge in how soil health
impacts crop nutritional quality. This is partly due to the fact that
few studies have concurrently measured soil quality and nutritional
quality and older studies measured only a small set of nutrients such
as macro- and micro-minerals. It is now recognized that macro- and
micro-mineral levels are largely regulated by plant needs and the
inherent property of soils. However, there is a need to look at a
broader suite of important human nutrients in our foods. Considering
that most studies find soil health improved under organic management,
studies comparing nutritional quality of organic and conventional foods
is a starting place to link soil and human health. Several meta-
analysis studies have shown higher mineral, vitamin, protein, or
phytonutrient concentrations in organic foods (Baranski, et al., 2014,
Brandt and M2e per ha per
year) (Poeplau and Don 2015) but including multiple conservation
practices within a good crop rotation (3.14 Mg CO2e per ha
per year) (Drinkwater, Wagoner, and Sarrantonio 1998) and the addition
of compost (8.66 Mg CO2e per ha per year) (Hepperly, et al.,
2009) in temperate regions typical of the majority of U.S. cropping
regions could sequester significantly more carbon in the nations soils.
The potential is even higher in perennial systems and warmer climates
with greater plant biomass production potential (Beer, et al., 1990,
Vicente-Vicente, et al., 2016) but data is limited for these regions,
including the southern parts of the United States. New data in the last
5-10 years has demonstrated the tremendous potential of adaptive
grazing to sequester carbon in the soil (13.7-29.36 Mg CO2e
per ha per year) (Gosnell, Charnley, and Stanley 2020, Rowntree, et
al., 2019, Rowntree, et al., 2020, Stanley, et al., 2018, Machmuller,
et al., 2015). Previous models of livestock systems that ignored soil
carbon may not have captured this potential. These findings become more
profound when we consider a great portion of the global land base is
not suitable for cropping but is suitable as pasture and rangeland for
livestock. Therefore, the global potential to drawdown carbon through
adaptive grazing may be as high as a 77% offset of global greenhouse
gas emissions. If we were to apply conservation practices and
installation of perennial systems across the globe, we start to see the
potential for regenerative organic agriculture to significantly offset
total greenhouse gas emissions. However, the capacity for soils to
store carbon is limited and can approach maximum and diminishing levels
over time so soil carbon sequestration is a short-term solution while
other technologies and strategies work to reduce greenhouse gas
emissions from other sectors in order to bring the climate into
balance.

References:

Beer, J., Arnim Bonnemann, Wilfredo Chavez, Hans Werner Fassbender,
A.C. Imbach, and I. Martel. 1990. ``Modelling agroforestry systems of
cacao (Theobroma cacao) with laurel (Cordia alliodora) or poro
(Erythrina poeppigiana) in Costa Rica.'' Agroforestry Systems 12 (3):
229-249.
Drinkwater, Laurie E., Peggy Wagoner, and Marianne Sarrantonio.
1998. ``Legume-based cropping systems have reduced carbon and nitrogen
losses.'' Nature 396 (6708): 262-265.
Gosnell, Hannah, Susan Charnley, and Paige Stanley. 2020. ``Climate
change mitigation as a co-benefit of regenerative ranching: insights
from Australia and the United States.'' Interface Focus 10 (5):
20200027.
Hepperly, Paul, Don Lotter, Christine Ziegler Ulsh, Rita Seidel, and
Carolyn Reider. 2009. ``Compost, manure and synthetic fertilizer
influences crop yields, soil properties, nitrate leaching and crop
nutrient content.'' Compost Science & Utilization 17 (2): 117-126.
Machmuller, Megan B., Marc G. Kramer, Taylor K. Cyle, Nick Hill,
Dennis Hancock, and Aaron Thompson. 2015. ``Emerging land use practices
rapidly increase soil organic matter.'' Nature Communications 6 (1):
1-5.
Moyer, Jeff, Andrew Smith, Yichao Rui, and Jennifer Hayden. 2020.
Regenerative agriculture and the soil carbon solution. Rodale
Institute.
Poeplau, Christopher, and Axel Don. 2015. ``Carbon sequestration in
agricultural soils via cultivation of cover crops--A meta-analysis.''
Agriculture, Ecosystems & Environment 200: 33-41.
Rowntree, Jason E., Paige L. Stanley, Isabella C.F. Maciel, Mariko
Thorbecke, Steven T. Rosenzweig, Dennis W. Hancock, Aidee Guzman, and
Matt R. Raven. 2020. ``Ecosystem impacts and productive capacity of a
multi-species pastured livestock system.'' Frontiers in Sustainable
Food Systems: 232.
Rowntree, Jason, Paige Stanley, David Beede, Marcia DeLonge, and
Michael Hamm. 2019. ``143 Impacts of soil carbon sequestration on life
cycle greenhouse gas emissions in Midwestern USA beef finishing
systems.'' Journal of Animal Science 97 (Suppl. 3): 147.
Stanley, Paige L., Jason E. Rowntree, David K. Beede, Marcia S.
DeLonge, and Michael W. Hamm. 2018. ``Impacts of soil carbon
sequestration on life cycle greenhouse gas emissions in Midwestern USA
beef finishing systems.'' Agricultural Systems 162: 249-258.
Vicente-Vicente, Jose Luis, Roberto Garcia-Ruiz, Rosa Francaviglia,
Eduardo Aguilera, and Pete Smith. 2016. ``Soil carbon sequestration
rates under Mediterranean woody crops using recommended management
practices: A meta-analysis.'' Agriculture, Ecosystems & Environment
235: 204-214.

References annotated with are retained in Committee file.

IV. Organic Rice Production and Yields
Organic systems are knowledge-based, and farmers work in harmony
with nature. There might be cases whereby organic rice producers failed
to grow crop successfully but there are numerous rice farmers that
transitioned to organic successfully and profitably. A report by Texas
A&M shows that the acreage of organic rice in Texas has steadily
increased over the past decade, driven by increased market demand
(Zhou, et al., 2021). Since 1995, organic rice acreage has increased in
the U.S. by almost six-fold, with a majority of acreage being grown in
the Southern U.S. The acreage in Texas alone reached more than 17,000
acres in 2020. A report by Sullivan (2003) provides additional examples
of successful organic rice producers across the county.
Demand in the U.S. for organic rice exceeds domestic supply
encouraging significant competition from imports. While there is
substantial potential for growth and expansion of the U.S. organic rice
sector, the industry needs insight into the economic opportunities in
the organic rice market to take advantage of this potential.
A study in Bhutan (Tashi and Wangchuck, 2015) compared organic and
conventional rice production within and between three agroecological
zones (AEZ) under farmers' management in Bhutan. There was no
statistically significant difference in grain yields between organic
and conventional rice farms. They found that the production cost from a
hectare of land was significantly higher in organic farms, so without a
price premium conventional rice was more profitable. However, if
organic rice receives a premium price, then the organic system was
similar or more profitable than the conventional system.
Studies comparing organic production to the standard or
conventional form of production have found reduced yields in organic
that are typically 10-18%, yet organic systems are more profitable,
largely due to increased price premiums (Crowder and Reganold 2015). We
also need to emphasize that a small portion of public funds for
agricultural research have been devoted to organic farming (see figure
below). With more investment of public funds in organic farming
research, including more funding for breeding organic varieties, the
farmers in the U.S. could close that yield gap and grow organic rice
and other commodities successfully and benefit from premium prices
currently available across the world.
[Organic funding in Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI)
2011-2015 (%)]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

[Organic Research within Specialty Crop Research Initiative (SCRI)
2010-2014 (%)]
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

Source : https://www.nationalorganiccoalition.org/organic-
research.

In the Farming Systems Trial at Rodale Institute, the diversified
organic system maintains yields over time similar to the conventional
system (Lotter, Seidel, and Liebhardt 2009, Hepperly, Douds, and Seidel
2006, Pimentel, et al., 2005, Pearsons, et al., 2022). Recent economic
analysis that includes twelve years of no-till production indicates
that a diversified organic cropping system is more stable (less risk)
and more profitable than conventional and low-input organic systems
without price premiums (see figure below. Pearsons 2022, under review).
This study also found reduced yields in the no-till conventional
compared to the tilled conventional system which may be a reason more
farmers in the U.S. are not wholly embracing no-till farming.
Figure 5.7. Net returns
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

(Left, without organic price premiums; Right, with organic
price premiums) of each of the systems in the Farming Systems
Trial from 2008-2020. All systems Including Conventional,
Organic Legume, and Organic Manure systems were spit into full-
till (FT) and reduced-till (RT).

References:

Crowder, David W., and John P. Reganold. 2015. ``Financial
competitiveness of organic agriculture on a global scale.''
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 112 (24): 7611-7616.
Hepperly, P.R., David Douds, and Rita Seidel. 2006. ``The Rodale
Institute Farming Systems Trial 1981 to 2005: long-term analysis of
organic and conventional maize and soybean cropping systems.'' Long-
Term Field Experiments in Organic Farming. ISOFAR Scientific Series,
Berlin: 15-32.
Lotter, D.W., R. Seidel, and W. Liebhardt. 2009. ``The performance
of organic and conventional cropping systems in an extreme climate
year.'' American Journal of Alternative Agriculture 18 (3): 146-154.
doi: 10.1079/AJAA200345.
Pearsons, Kirsten Ann, Emmanuel Chiwo Omondi, Brad J Heins, Gladis
Zinati, Andrew Smith, and Yichao Rui. 2022. ``Reducing Tillage Affects
Long-Term Yields but Not Grain Quality of Maize, Soybeans, Oats, and
Wheat Produced in Three Contrasting Farming Systems.'' Sustainability
14 (2): 631.
Pearsons, K., Chase, C., Omondi, E., Zinati, G., Smith, A., Rui, Y.
. 2022. ``Does reducing tillage improve the profitability of organic
and conventional agricultural systems? Results from a long-term field
trial.'' Sustainability (under review).
Pimentel, David, Paul Hepperly, James Hanson, David Douds, and Rita
Seidel. 2005. ``Environmental, Energetic, and Economic Comparisons of
Organic and Conventional Farming Systems.'' BioScience 55 (7): 573-
582. doi: 10.1641/0006-3568(2005)055[0573:EEAECO]2.0.PCO;2.
Sullivan, Preston. 2003. Organic Rice Production. CT143. Appropriate
Technology Transfer for Rural America--National Center for Appropriate
Technology (ATTRA-NCAT).
Tashi, S., & Wangchuk, K. (2016). Organic vs. conventional rice
production: comparative assessment under farmers' condition in Bhutan.
Organic Agriculture, 6(4), 255-265.
Zhou, X.G., Way, M. O., McClung, A., Dou, F. (2021). Texas Organic
Rice Production Guidelines. Texas A&M AgriLife Research. https://
beaumont.tamu.edu/eLibrary/Bulletins/
2021_OrganicRice_Production_Guidelines.pdf.

References annotated with are retained in Committee file.

V. Tillage and Organic Pesticide Use
A. Tillage
Organic crop farming does typically use tillage to control weeds.
Reducing tillage in organic systems has been a major area of research
for Rodale Institute over the past 20 years. Rodale Institute pioneered
the development of the roller-crimper, a tool used in organic and
conventional farming to increase use of cover crops and reduce tillage
(Moyer 2020). Despite tillage in organic systems, the soil health in
the organic systems in the 42 year Farming Systems Trial at Rodale
institute have improved soil health and increased soil organic carbon
levels compared to the conventional system (Hepperly, Douds, and Seidel
2006, Hepperly, et al., 2009, Hepperly, et al., 2007, Littrell, et al.,
2021). This is most pronounced in the diversified organic system that
includes compost and perennial forages. In 2008, reduced tillage
systems were added as a treatment in all of the farming systems, which
is continuous no-till in the conventional system and rotational no-till
in the organic systems since tillage is still used to plant cover crops
and small grains. Recent studies measuring soil organic carbon and
other soil health indicators (Littrell, et al., 2021, Alfahham, et al.,
2021, Sanderman, et al., 2021) find higher soil carbon in the organic
systems, which is more pronounced at deeper depths, while the
conventional no-till system has the lowest soil health amongst all
comparative systems when looking at multiple soil health indicators.
This is due to the combination of cover crops, compost, crop rotation
and reduced tillage in the organic systems. Most studies comparing
tillage systems have been done under conventional management, limited
crop rotation, and without conservation practices such as cover crops,
manures, and compost. If we dig deeper (literally), a recent meta-
analysis of 1061 pairs of published data comparing tilled and no-till
management found increased soil organic carbon at the surface but a
loss of soil organic carbon at deeper layers, resulting in a net carbon
loss from no-till (Cai, et al., 2022). However, the benefits of
conservation practices that are standard in organic production are
corroborated by other studies that include a larger set of studies
across the United States (Bagnall, Morgan, Bean, et al., 2022, Crystal-
Ornelas, Thapa, and Tully 2021, Bagnall, Morgan, Cope, et al., 2022).
B. Pesticides in Organic Systems
Rodale Institute farm and research staff employee an Integrated
Pest Management approach on all organic production that includes
cultural, mechanical, and biological strategies with chemical
strategies as a last resort. Currently the Rodale Institute does not
use any pesticides for management in organic grain or forage cropping
systems. We are using USDA Certified Organic-approved pesticides to
manage insects and disease in vegetable and fruit production. Materials
used include oils, kaolin clay, botanical extracts, hydrogen peroxide,
minerals such as sulfur and copper, and biologicals that target
specific pests. None of the organically approved products fall under
the category of Restricted-Use. Most conventional products fall under
the category of Restricted-Use because they pose a significant health
risk to the applicator, farm workers, the nearby community, and the
environment. They therefore require training and an applicators license
to purchase and apply.

References:

Alfahham, Abdelrahman, Matthew T. Amato, Emmanuel Omondi, Daniel
Gimenez, and Alain F. Plante. 2021. ``Assessing the impact of organic
versus conventional agricultural management on soil hydraulic
properties in a long-term experiment.'' Soil Science Society of
America Journal 85 (6): 2135-2148.
Bagnall, Dianna K., Cristine L.S. Morgan, G. Mac Bean, Daniel
Liptzin, Shannon B. Cappellazzi, Michael Cope, Kelsey L.H. Greub,
Elizabeth L. Rieke, Charlotte E. Norris, and Paul W. Tracy. 2022.
``Selecting soil hydraulic properties as indicators of soil health:
Measurement response to management and site characteristics.'' Soil
Science Society of America Journal.
Bagnall, Dianna K., Cristine L.S. Morgan, Michael Cope, Gregory M.
Bean, Shannon Cappellazzi, Kelsey Greub, Daniel Liptzin, Charlotte L.
Norris, Elizabeth Rieke, and Paul Tracy. 2022. ``Carbon-sensitive
pedotransfer functions for plant available water.'' Soil Science
Society of America Journal 86 (3): 612-629.
Cai, Andong, Tianfu Han, Tianjing Ren, Jonathan Sanderman, Yichao
Rui, Bin Wang, Pete Smith, and Minggang Xu. 2022. ``Declines in soil
carbon storage under no tillage can be alleviated in the long run.''
Geoderma 425: 116028.
Crystal-Ornelas, Robert, Resham Thapa, and Katherine L. Tully. 2021.
``Soil organic carbon is affected by organic amendments, conservation
tillage, and cover cropping in organic farming systems: A meta-
analysis.'' Agriculture, Ecosystems & Environment 312: 107356.
Hepperly, Paul, Don Lotter, Christine Ziegler Ulsh, Rita Seidel, and
Carolyn Reider. 2009. ``Compost, manure and synthetic fertilizer
influences crop yields, soil properties, nitrate leaching and crop
nutrient content.'' Compost Science & Utilization 17 (2): 117-126.
Hepperly, Paul, Rita Seidel, David Pimentel, James Hanson, and David
Douds. 2007. Organic farming enhances soil carbon and its benefits:
CRC Press: Boca Raton, FL, USA.
Hepperly, P.R., David Douds, and Rita Seidel. 2006. ``The Rodale
Institute Farming Systems Trial 1981 to 2005: long-term analysis of
organic and conventional maize and soybean cropping systems.'' Long-
Term Field Experiments in Organic Farming. ISOFAR Scientific Series,
Berlin: 15-32.
Littrell, James, Sutie Xu, Emmanuel Omondi, Debasish Saha, Jaehoon
Lee, and Sindhu Jagadamma. 2021. ``Long-term organic management
combined with conservation tillage enhanced soil organic carbon
accumulation and aggregation.'' Soil Science Society of America Journal
85 (5): 1741-1754.
Moyer, Jeffrey. 2020. Organic No-Till Farming, 2nd Edition. Edited
by Jeffrey Moyer. Greeley, CO: ACRES USA.
Sanderman, Jonathan, Kathleen Savage, Shree R.S. Dangal, Gabriel
Duran, Charlotte Rivard, Michel A. Cavigelli, Hero T. Gollany, Virginia
L. Jin, Mark A. Liebig, and Emmanuel Chiwo Omondi. 2021. ``Can
Agricultural Management Induced Changes in Soil Organic Carbon Be
Detected Using Mid-Infrared Spectroscopy?'' Remote Sensing 13 (12):
2265.

References annotated with are retained in Committee file.

______

Supplementary Material Submitted by Rebecca L. Larson, Ph.D., Chief
Scientist and Vice President, Government Affairs, Western Sugar
Cooperative
Insert
Mr. Baird. . . .
But my first question goes to Dr. Larson. And it has to do
with the idea that others on the panel have claimed that
organically produced food is more nutritious because the soil
in their system is healthier. What does the science say about
that? Any thoughts there?
Dr. Larson. Yes, thank you for the question. I am happy to
provide copious amounts of scientific research from peer-
reviewed journals that shows that there is no correlation
between soil health and nutrition within a plant. I can also
show you that there is no scientifically credible evidence that
suggests that food grown through organic practices is safer or
more nutritious than food grown with conventional ag. Just to
give a couple of examples of where some of that fear-based
marketing can have negative effects, especially for
marginalized and low-income communities, is that when people
are led to believe that one type of production practice is
safer or more nutritious than another, it actually drives down
total consumption of fruits, vegetables, and grains. So there
can be a negative impact from not speaking to the facts of
science and scientific consensus.

There is no credible evidence that organic food is safer, more
nutritious, or healthier than conventionally produced food. Firstly,
the National Organic Program (NOP) is managed under the marketing arm
(Agricultural Marketing Service) of the USDA and nowhere on the website
does the USDA assert that organic production leads to a healthier
product.\1\ Upon creation of the NOP, then Secretary Dan Glickman
stated ``Let me be clear about one thing, the organic label is a
marketing tool. It is not a statement about food safety. Nor is
`organic' a value judgment about nutrition or quality.'' \2\ *
Furthermore, when outlining steps for food safety, the FDA makes no
reference to buying or consuming organic food.\3\ However, consumers
still buy organic based on the perceived superiority of the product in
terms of health, safety, and nutrition.\4\ These false assumptions are
rooted in misleading marketing claims.\5\ The scientific consensus
differs: organically produced food is no safer, healthier, or more
nutritious; it is just more expensive.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ Organic Regulations D Agricultural Marketing Service (usda.gov)
(https://www.ams.usda.gov/rules-regulations/organic).
\2\ Miller, H.I. (2019) Buying `organic' to get `authenticity'? Or
safer and more nutritious food? Think again. And again. Missouri
Medicine. 116 (1): 8-11.
* Editor's note: references annotated with are retained in
Committee file.
\3\ Food Safety at Home D FDA (https://www.fda.gov/consumers/
free-publications-women/food-safety-home).
\4\ Gundala, R.R., Singh, A. (2021) What motivates consumers to buy
organic foods? Results of an empirical study in the United States.
PLOS One. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0257288.
\5\ press_release_distribution_0383762_77592.pdf (24-
7pressrelease.com) (https://www.24-7pressrelease.com/attachments/038/
press_release_distribution_0383762_77592.pdf). Editor's note: the above
link is to a third-party posting site; the origination of the report is
from the Academics Review website blog posting (https://academics-
review.bonuseventus.org/2014/04/why-consumers-pay-more-for-organic-
foods-fear-sells-and-marketers-know-it/) and original link is (https://
academics-review.bonuseventus.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/
AR_Organic-Marketing-Report_Print.pdf).

Stanford University study (2012): Examined results of 240
peer-reviewed studies. There was no clinically relevant
difference between organic and conventional food. There were a
limited number of instances where pesticide levels were
different between the two systems, but of no biological
relevance. Conclusion: there is no strong evidence of a
clinical benefit to organic food consumption.\6\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\6\ Smith-Spangler, C., et al. (2012). Are organic foods safer or
healthier than conventional alternatives? A systemic review. Annals of
Internal Medicine. https://doi.org/10.7326/0003-4819-157-5-201209040-
00007.

The Alliance for Food and Farming, representing organic and
conventional farmers launched a safety calculator to combat the
misinformation of the Environmental Working Group's dirty
dozen. This tool takes USDA market basket data and peer-
reviewed literature to easily illustrate how detection of
pesticide residue does not equal risk (e.g., a child could
ingest thousands of servings a day of blueberries without
negative effects).\7\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\7\ Calculate--Safe Fruits and Veggies (https://
www.safefruitsandveggies.com/calculate/).

A systematic review of the literature conducted by
researchers in Greece (2007) concluded ``. . . what should be
made clear is that `organic' does not automatically equal
`safe.' '' \8\ The same authors published in the University of
Cambridge Press said ``If producers adopt proper agricultural
practices and consumers maintain hygienic conditions, risks
associated with food contaminants can be minimized, regardless
of the food's organic or conventional origin.'' \9\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\8\ Magkos, F., Arvaniti, F, Zampelas, A. (2007) Organic Food:
buying more safety or just peace of mind? A critical review of the
literature. Critical Reviews in Food Science and Nutrition. 46(1):
https://doi.org/10.1080/10408690490911846.
\9\ Putting the safety of organic food into perspective D
Nutrition Research Reviewss D Cambridge Core (https://
www.cambridge.org/core/journals/nutrition-research-reviews/article/
putting-the-safety-of-organic-food-into-perspective/
5C8EC98C76B56852375507CE9B29EE1F).

Health Canada meta-analysis on nutrient composition (2017)
dispels many myths of the ties between soil health and modern
agriculture on reduced nutrient content in fruit, vegetables,
and grains. The comprehensive review of the literature showed
no biologically relevant change in nutrient content over time
and no evidence of a link to soil health (as Mr. Nygren, Mr.
Clark, Mr. Moyer all claimed). However, they did state
``statistically significant decreases in the content of
particular mineral nutrients per dry weight of fruits,
vegetables, or grains . . . were not likely to have any
significant impact on the nutritional health of consumers, a
fact glossed over in some popular press reports citing these
studies.'' The main driver of these differences was dilution
effect. As yield increased, some nutrients decreased without
any biological relevance. A fact that the authors highlight as
critical since ``the benefits from increased yield of crops in
addressing world hunger are significant.'' \10\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\10\ Marles, R.J. (2017) Mineral nutrient composition of
vegetables, fruits and grains: the context of reports and apparent
historical declines. Journal of Food Composition and Analysis. 56: 93-
103.

Despite the lack of evidence in the scientific literature,
Mr. Moyer claimed in oral testimony that I was wrong about my
assertions of the lack of health benefit for organic food. Mr.
Moyer cites Faller and Fialho (2019) in his written testimony
in support of organic food containing more beneficial phenolic
compounds. This is not what the authors concluded. The authors
evaluated the impact of heat on phenolic compound stability and
found organic produce more sensitive to heat processing than
conventional. However, the conclusion was ``polyphenols showed
a positive correlation with antioxidant capacity in raw and
cooked vegetables from both types of agriculture'' meaning
conventional or organic.\11\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\11\ Faller, A.L.K., Fialho, E. (2009) The antioxidant capacity and
polyphenol content of organic and conventional retail vegetables after
domestic cooking. Food Research International. 42(1): 210-215.

Mr. Moyer then cites his own research from Rodale Institute
to justify grains produced with organic methods are superior
nutritionally to conventionally produced grains. However, as
the table excised from that publication demonstrates, there was
no statistical difference between production systems (see table
below).\12\ So this study does not show any superiority of
organic grains.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\12\ Long-term organic and conventional farming effects on nutrient
density of oats D Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems D Cambridge
Core (https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/renewable-agriculture-
and-food-systems/article/abs/longterm-organic-and-conventional-farming-
effects-on-nutrient-density-of-oats/
75F08331A10BACBB3672AA6550493C4F#supplementary-materials).

Supplementary Materials
Supplemental Table 1: Mineral concentration in oat grain under organic and conventional grain cropping systems at the Farming Systems Trial. Key: LEG
(organic legume); MNR (organic manure); CNV (conventional); T or NT (tilled or no-till). Means within a column followed by the same letter are not
significantly different (LSD, a = 0.05)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
B Ba Ca Cu Fe K Ni Cr Vd Pb Cd As Al Str Na
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
mg Kg 1
CNV-NT 5.515a 5.3675a 770.66a 3.7275a 37.593a 3,775.1a 2.175a 3.855a 0.155a 0.0925a 0.07a 0.45a 6.53a 2.1a 41.472
a
CNV-T 5.385a 5.2575a 809.13a 4.1025a 39.45a 3,782.8a 1.995a 3.48a 0.17a 0.075a 0.0725a 0.4575a 6.115a 1.98a 45.308
a
LEG-N5.59a 5.43a 756.11a 3.83a 37.855a 3,770.9a 1.8375a 3.2425a 0.155a 0.06a 0.0675a 0.4625a 5.21a 2.04a 42.297
a
LEG-T5.3775a 5.245a 790.56a 3.835a 40.935a 3,658a 1.7375a 3.46a 0.17a 0.08a 0.0675a 0.4725a 8.1625a 2.01a 40.99a
MNR-NT 5.7575a 5.6025a 812.77a 4.3225a 42.228a 3,832.8a 2.3525a 4.4675a 0.1675a 0.1425a 0.07a 0.475a 5.715a 2.15a 45.057
a
MNR-T 5.52a 5.3925a 804.53a 4.8775a 38.588a 3,942.4a 1.7725a 3.6275a 0.17a 0.0825a 0.0725a 0.495a 6.45a 2.17a 43.98a

Standard Errors
CNV-NT 0.1546 0.1465 23.094 0.1719 0.9628 183.07 0.2688 0.2836 0.002887 0.0149 0 0.0173 1.1784 0.0799 1.0765
CNV-T 0.0656 0.0547 12.505 0.1943 2.2187 71.489 0.1121 0.4233 0.005774 0.0185 0.0025 0.0131 0.6086 0.0261 1.9704
LEG-N0.1257 0.1107 14.924 0.0528 1.5901 44.14 0.12 0.3507 0.005 0.01 0.0025 0.0155 0.2333 0.0819 0.8785
LEG-T0.1063 0.0992 16.185 0.1248 2.3869 98.721 0.1501 0.3711 0.005774 0.005774 0.0025 0.0144 1.7818 0.1125 1.2279
MNR-NT 0.1411 0.1355 28.118 0.6472 1.8566 88.686 0.3057 0.4474 0.004787 0.063 0 0.0126 0.0603 0.1453 0.7725
MNR-T 0.1774 0.1788 18.02 0.7638 0.434 158.33 0.0487 0.0898 0.007071 0.008539 0.0025 0.0202 0.7276 0.0819 0.8987
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Misleading consumers about the benefits of organic food are not
without consequence. This fear-based marketing most directly impacts
low income and marginalized communities, both in terms of health and
prejudice. Hence, calls for FDA and FTC to begin enforcing truth in
labeling laws for organic food.\13\ As the FTC revisits and updates
Green Guides in 2022, it is an excellent opportunity to clamp down on
the unscientific claims of the organic food industry.\14\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\13\ FDA and FTC need to end anti-GMO deception in organic food
advertising D The Hill (https://thehill.com/opinion/technology/
399939-fda-and-ftc-need-to-end-anti-gmo-deception-in-organic-food-
advertising/).
\14\ FTC Guide Revision: Avoiding Misleading Environmental Claims
(natlawreview.com) (https://www.natlawreview.com/article/environmental-
marketing-claims-regulatory-and-litigation-outlook).

False marketing claims affect our psyche. Organic labels
have been proven to trick the brain into thinking something
tastes better.\15\ In a self-fulfilling prophecy of sorts, the
more people consume organic food, the more they believe their
false assumptions that organic food is more healthful, tastier,
and less caloric.\16\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\15\ Apaolaza, V., Hartmann, P., Echebarria, C., Barrutia, J.M.
(2017) Organic label's halo effect on sensory and hedonic experience of
wine: A pilot study. Journal of Sensory Studies. https://doi.org/
10.1111/joss.12243.
\16\ Prada, M., Garrido, M.V., Rodrigues, D. (2017) Lost in
processing? Perceived healthfulness, taste and caloric content of whole
and processed organic food. Appetite. 114: 175-186.

Misinformation promotes bias and discrimination. So much
misinformation has been presented to society, that whether or
not someone consumes organic food now dictates how others view
their honesty, openness and overall disposition.\17\ As
research shows, this bias would unduly affect historically
underserved, low income and marginalized communities.\18\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\17\ Richentin, J., Perugini, M. (2022) The organic diet effect on
person perception. Appetite. 168: 105696.
\18\ Dimitri, C., Dettmann, R.L. (2012) Organic food consumers:
what do we really know about them? British Food Journal. 114(8):
ISSN:0007-070X.

False claims promote obesity. The perceived health of a food
creates a halo which unconsciously drives consumer over-
consumption.^{19, 20} Therefore, false claims around
the ``health'' of organic food can spur weight gain.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\19\ Her, E., Seo, S. (2017) Health halo effects in sequential food
consumption: The moderating roles of health-consciousness and attribute
farming. International Journal of Hospitality Management. 62: 1-10.
\20\ Sundar, A., Kardes, F.R. (2015) The role of perceived
variability and the health halo effect in nutritional inference and
consumption. Psychology and Marketing. https://doi.org/10.1002/
mar.20796.

False claims disproportionately impact low-income families.
Promoting misinformation about organic produce being safer than
conventional produce leads low-income families to consume fewer
fresh fruits and vegetables regardless of production
method.\21\ As Dr. Elizabeth Pivonka, President of Produce for
Better Health Foundation notes ``we have been concerned . . .
for some time, that safety fears may be another barrier to
consumption of these healthy and nutritious foods. The impact
of the fear-based messaging on low-income consumers is
especially troubling since many don't have access or can't
afford organic''[.] \22\ Scientists from John Hopkins found
similar alarming results when interviewing low-income residents
in Baltimore and concluded ``Consumers' perceptions of organic
can swamp or compete with other messages about healthy
eating.'' \23\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\21\ Huang, Y., Edirisinghe, I., Burton-Freeman, B. (2016) Low-
income shoppers and fruit and vegetables. What do they th[i]nk?
Nutrition Today. 51(5): 242-250.
\22\ Fear-Based Messaging Reduces Produce Consumption--Both Organic
and Conventional --California Agriculture News Today
(californiaagtoday.com) (https://californiaagtoday.com/fear-based-
messaging-reduces-produce-consumption/).
\23\ Rodman, S.O., et al. (2014) ``They just say organic food is
healthier'': perceptions of healthy food among supermarket shoppers in
southwest Baltimore. The Journal of Culture and Agriculture. 36(2):
83-92.

As outlined above, presence of minute levels of pesticide in food
has no impact on human health. However, some claim that even if
pesticides are not a risk through food consumption, they negatively
impact soil health. Again, this does not align with the scientific
consensus. We also have not found this to be true as evidence by the
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
data from Western Sugar farms submitted with my written testimony.

One study looking at conventional versus organic farming
impacts on biodiversity concluded conventional systems, even
those using herbicides, can match the ecological benefit of
organic farming. Since implementing the conventional practices
required less expense and maintained high yields, the authors
conclude reducing farm impacts would be better served by
expanding conventional farming's best management practices
rather than switching to organic systems.\24\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\24\ Barre, K., Le Viol, I., Julliard, R., Chiron, F., Kerbiriou,
C. (2018) Tillage and herbicide reduction mitigate the gap between
conventional and organic farming effects on foraging activity of
insectivorous bats. Ecology and Evolution. 8(3): 1496-1506.

Examining long-term effects of glyphosate on the soil
microbiome, one group of scientists showed greater diversity
between sites than between treatments and that ``high taxonomic
and functional microbial diversity was observed in all
treatments''.\25\ This goes against claims of Dr. Kristine
Nichols of the Rodale Institute quoted in Kiss the Ground
stating soils on conventional farms are ``essentially devoid of
life''.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\25\ Babujia, et al. (2016) Impact of long-term cropping of
glyphosate-resistant transgenic soybean on soil microbiome. Transgenic
Research. 25: 425-440.

Yet another study in a sensitive desert environment found
``. . . no evidence of glyphosate effects on the soil
microbiome''[.] 26
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\26\ Gornish, et al. (2020) Buffelgrass invasion and glyphosate
effects on desert soil microbiome communities. Biological Invasions.
22: 2587-2597.

The lack of impact of glyphosate on the soil microbiome
holds true even with repeated, prolonged use. A study in wheat
production using glyphosate for over 20 years found less than
1% of the soil microbiome was impacted and when combined with
no-till provides positive environmental benefits.\27\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\27\ Schlatter, et al. (2017) Impacts of repeated glyphosate use on
wheat-associated bacteria are small and depend on glyphosate use
history. Applied and Environmental Microbiology.

Another study in wheat, found pesticides did not affect the
diversity of the soil microbiome.\28\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\28\ Lupwayi, et al. (2020) Profiles of wheat rhizobacterial
communities in response to repeated glyphosate applications, crop
rotation and tillage. Canadian Journal of Soil Science. https://
doi.org/10.1139/cjss-2020-0008.

The alternative to chemical management of weed species, is tillage.
Less than 3% of the organic crop production acreage in the United
States uses ``no-till'' practices,\29\ therefore tillage is extensively
used in these systems. Tillage has a major, negative impact on soil
health regardless of frequency. Even single tillage events
significantly alter soil chemical, physical and microbial
properties.\30\ Therefore, one can't help but question whether no-till
organic is the ``soil health solution'', since Rodale Institute even
highlights: ``We have found that organic no-till practices year after
year do not yield optimal results, so our organic systems utilize
reduced tillage and the ground is plowed only in alternating years.''
\31\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\29\ https://www.ers.usda.gov/webdocs/publications/90201/eib-
197.pdf.
\30\ Kraut-Cohen, et al. (2020) Effects of tillage practices on
soil microbiome and agricultural parameters. Science of the Total
Environment. 705: 135791.
\31\ Farming Systems Trial--Rodale Institute (https://
rodaleinstitute.org/science/farming-systems-trial/).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The scientific consensus is clear, there is no nutritional, health
(soil or human), or safety advantage for organic production systems.
However, there is a clear risk when organic production is implemented
at scale: loss of productivity. If there is any hope for climate change
mitigation, land conversion must cease. Therefore, we must strive
towards optimizing sustainable intensification from acreage already
dedicated to agriculture. Thankfully, environmental benefit does not
need to come at the cost of productivity.
Organic production cannot compete with conventional production
systems regarding yield, improving soil health, and overall sustainable
agriculture. The preeminent source of information for yield performance
comparison is peer-reviewed, published results from both on-farm and
research-scale data. Even more reliable yield performance comparisons
can be concluded from analyzing all available published data, known as
meta-analysis. Many meta-analyses comparing yields with various
approaches have been published in the last decade and all come to the
same conclusion: yield is roughly 20% lower for organic production
systems than conventional.

University of California-Berkley meta-analysis (2015):
organic yields are 19.2% lower than conventional. Yield gaps
could be reduced to 8-9% through multi-cropping/crop rotation.
However, those conservation practices improved yields in both
conventional and organic systems.\32\ Therefore, as both
systems improve, organic production continues to lag in
productivity.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\32\ Ponsio, L.C., et al. (2015) Diversification practices reduce
organic to conventional yield gap. Proceedings of the Royal Society B.
DOI:10.1098/rspb.2014.1396.

Universidad de Buenos Aires meta-analysis (2021): organic
yields were 25% lower than conventional. When considering lower
use intensity [e.g., organic systems needing to take land out
of food production for year(s)], overall organic productivity
was 29-44% lower than conventional.\33\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\33\ Alvarez, R. (2021) Comparing Productivity of Organic and
Conventional Farming Systems: a Quantitative Review. Archives of
Agronomy and Soil Science, DOI:10.1080/03650340.2021.1946040.

Technical University of Munich meta-analysis (2018): organic
production systems have 15% greater variability in yield
compared to conventional. The authors also highlight reduced
tillage, cover cropping and crop rotation applied in
conventional systems had positive impacts on soil health and
biodiversity.\34\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\34\ Knapp, S., van der Heijden, M.G.A. (2018) A global meta-
analysis of yield stability in organic and conservation agriculture.
[Nature Communications]. 9: 3632.

A meta-analysis published in the prestigious peer-reviewed
journal, Nature (2012): organic yields are 34% lower than
conventional contrasting most comparable production systems.
The authors did note yield gaps vary by scale of the operation,
crop being grown, and cultural practice employed, with certain
legumes and perennials having just 5% lower yield in organic
production. The data led the authors to conclude that the lower
productivity of organic production systems results ``. . . in
more widespread deforestation and biodiversity loss, and thus
undermining the environmental benefits of organic
practices''.\35\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\35\ Seufert, V., Ramankutty, N., Foley, J.A. (2012) Comparing the
yields of organic and conventional agriculture. Nature. 485(7397):
229-232.

Claims made in the hearing of organic yields being superior to
conventional based on the small-plot research generated on Rodale
experimental farms contradict the scientific consensus on the matter.
That data should be considered an experimental outlier unsuitable to
challenge facts presented and reviewed in the scientific literature.
Furthermore, it has been known since at least the 1940s that small
plots bias yield estimates.\36\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\36\ Bias in the Use of Small-size Plots in Sample Surveys for
Yield D Semantic Scholar (https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Bias-
in-the-Use-of-Small-size-Plots-in-Sample-for-Sukhatme/
918d445c37d3e04dc7efd28c89e9497efd94a186). Editor's note: the original
article is from the May 11, 1946 publication of Nature, Vol. 157. p.
630; and is available at (https://www.nature.com/articles/
157630b0.pdf).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The loss of productivity in organic systems has real consequences.
As Mr. Moyer noted in his written testimony: a ``10% [reduction] of
crop yields, [is] the equivalent of removing millions of acres of land
from production''. Further, as noted by the EAT-Lancet Commission \37\
the biggest threat for agricultural contributions to climate change is
unrealized yield potential that forces more native land into
agricultural production. Clearly, from the data presented, a wholesale
switch to organic farming would result in major land conversion,
biodiversity loss, and increases in land-based emissions which further
exacerbates climate change. The mission of regenerative agriculture is
not to maximize profits (e.g., accepting price premiums for lower
productivity systems), but to reduce environmental impact associated
with production. If all farmers ignored yield, we would be facing an
environmental and humanitarian crisis.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\37\ https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-
6736(18)31788-4/fulltext.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Some would argue that a loss in yield is acceptable because of the
overwhelming benefit that organic production has on soil health. But
those assumptions are false. As outlined above, judicious use of
pesticides does not impact soil health, but even more consequential is
the overall best management practices within conventional agriculture
can exceed the soil health benefits of organic production.

Again, as the authors of the meta-analysis published in
Nature noted, the lower productivity of organic production
systems results ``. . . in more widespread deforestation and
biodiversity loss, thus undermining the environmental benefits
of organic practices''.\4\

My fellow panelists at the hearing provided data in their
written testimony that supports the fact conventional
agricultural advances soil health:

Mr. Moyer states ``Critically, research shows that
organic farming has the potential to diminish soil erosion
(Erhart and Hartl 2009).'' This statement references a non-
peer reviewed book chapter in which the authors acknowledge
they never directly measure erosion, but rather infer
erosion through ``measured topsoil thickness''. This is an
inadequate measurement for soil retention, especially in
organic farming that injects high rates of manure and
compost into the system that confound soil physical
measurements.\38\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\38\ Armstrong-Brown, S.M., Cook, H.F., Lee, H.C. (2000) Topsoil
characteristic from a paired farm survey of organic versus conventional
farming in southern England. Biological Agriculture and Horticulture.
1: https://doi.org/10.1080/01448765.2000.9754863.

Mr. Moyer goes on to state ``Soil erosion rates
measured under simulated heavy rainfall in the Swiss
Farming System and Tillage experiment revealed that organic
farming decreased mean sediment delivery compared to
conventional farming by 30% (0.54 t ha^-1
h^-1) (Seitz, et al., 2019).'' However, Mr. Moyer
fails to inform the Committee of the authors overall
conclusion in this study: conventional with no-till is over
three times as effective at erosion reduction than reduced
till organic. To quote the authors of the manuscript:
``This study demonstrated that reduced tillage in organic
farming decreased sediment delivery (0.73 tha^-1
h^-1) compared to intensively tilled organic
plots (1.87 tha^-1 h^-1) by 61%.
Nevertheless, the combination of conventional farming and
no tillage showed the lowest sediment delivery (0.24 t
ha^-1 h^-1)''.\39\ This is not
surprising as even as Mr. Moyer admits in an interview that
``no-till'' organic is a misnomer and is really
``rotational tillage''.\40\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\39\ Seitz, S., et al. (2019). Conservation tillage and organic
farming reduce soil erosion. Agronomy for Sustainable Development. 39:
https://doi.org/10.1007/s13593-018-0545-z.
\40\ ``tillage is limited, and best described as rotational
tillage'' An Introduction to the Organic No-Till Farming Method D
EcoFarming Daily (https://www.ecofarmingdaily.com/build-soil/tillage/
book-week-organic-no-till-farming/).

Mr. Clark cites four farmer success stories in his
testimony. The one with the greatest advancement in soil
health is Mr. David Brandt of Carroll, Ohio. He has vastly
increased soil health as evidenced by an increase in
organic matter from 0.75% to 6.8-8%. Mr. Brandt is a
conventional farmer who uses synthetic fertilizers and
herbicides. This directly contradicts Mr. Clark's and Mr.
Moyer's assertions that regenerative organic is needed to
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
promote soil health.

Further evidence of the power of conventional
agriculture in promoting soil health is provided by Mr.
Clark's citation of the Soil Health Institute's survey.\41\
Mr. Clark did not highlight the fact these farmers'
accomplishments were the result of conventional, not
organic agriculture. As evidenced from the data tables in
the survey, the farmers achieved all these benefits to soil
health, even while using conventional systems (including
GMO seeds, synthetic fertilizer, and pesticides).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\41\ Economics of Soil Health Systems in Midwest Corn and Soy--Soil
Health Institute (https://soilhealthinstitute.org/our-work/initiatives/
economics-of-soil-health-systems/).

The fertilizer savings were due to ``. . . farmers
implementing nutrient
management practices such as grid soil sampling (86%),
variable rate fer-
tilizer application (82%), and split application of
nitrogen (89%) as part of
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
their soil health management system.''

Although not explicitly stated by the authors, it is
inferred a majority of
the farmers in the study used GMO seed and none were
organic producers
from statements like the following: ``Some farmers
planted non-GMO corn
or soybean after adopting a soil health management system
that provided
a price premium'' contained with the document.

Last, during the hearing claims were made of the agricultural
system being ``broken'' \42\ alongside alarmist statements of global
topsoil erosion in the next 60 years.\43\ As noted in the National
Resources Inventory, erosion from U.S. farmland is down 35%.\44\ As Mr.
Moyer notes in his written testimony, ``98 percent of farms practice
conventional agriculture'', so this improvement is directly driven
through advancements in conventional farming. Hence, the system is not
broken; we don't need a replacement for a functional system, we need to
continue to build upon it's demonstrated success.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\42\ ``Given your positions on this esteemed Committee, it's likely
you already know that America's food system is broken.'' Mr. Moyer's
written testimony page 1 of 14. ``While American farmers and ranchers
are at the heart of this country and are some of the most innovative,
successful, and productive farmers in the world, I want to be crystal
clear for a moment to recognize the perilous state of our soils--the
real wealth of our nation, the foundation of American resilience and
prosperity. The situation is urgent and must be considered as such.''
Mr. Clark's written testimony page 2 of 17.
\43\ ``About \1/3\ of the world's soil has already been degraded,
and if the current rate of soil degradation continues, all of the
world's topsoil could be lost within 60 years.'' Mr. Moyer's written
testimony page 3 of 14.
\44\ 2017NRISummary--Final (1).pdf (C:/Users/rlarson/Downloads/
2017NRISummary_Final (1).pdf).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
As One World Data, led by Oxford University scientist Dr. Max
Roser, found claims of ``only 60 harvests left'' is ``overblown'', yet
``repeated over and over''. Despite the fact no reference to this
``fact'' can be found in any scientific literature, just newspaper
headlines.\45\ Through analysis of the data it was determined ``Half of
the soils managed with conservation management had a lifespan greater
than 5,000 years; and 40% exceeded 10,000 years.'' They agree that
improvements are possible and needed, especially in areas with high
amounts of bare soil, but warn these alarmist claims not based in
science ``. . . forces some people towards solutions that are
ineffective or counterproductive. Some blame the decline . . . on the
use of fertilizers and other chemical inputs.'' However, the authors
highlight ``In some contexts organic farming can play a role, but it's
not the ultimate solution. Misleading headlines convince people that it
is.''
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\45\ Do we only have 60 harvests left?--Our World in Data (https://
ourworldindata.org/soil-lifespans).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
______

Submitted Questions
Questions Submitted by Hon. Salud O. Carbajal, a Representative in
Congress from California
Response from Jeffrey W. Moyer, Chief Executive Officer, Rodale
Institute
Question. Mr. Moyer, it seems some hesitancy in implementing
regenerative practices comes from concerns that farmers may see their
yield decrease, hurting their bottom line.
How can Congress help educate growers across the country on the
benefits of implementing the regenerative practices you've outlined
today?
Answer. We must understand that farmers take on a fair bit of risk
every year in their operations based on uncertain markets, shifts in
weather patterns, unstable supply chains and fluctuating costs. To add
in an additional risk of ``changes in production models'' can often be
more than the system can bare, even if those changes lead to positive
farm (soil health and economics) and global outcomes.
Congress can help by instituting language in the farm bill that
works to mitigate this risk through: enhanced EQIP regulations that
encourage practices, based on science, that improve soil health;
restructure crop insurance programs that reduce premiums for farmers/
ranchers/producers that are attempting to implement regenerative
organic practices; adjust tax structures or cost supports designed to
help farmers/ranchers/producers during the USDA mandated 3 year
transition period where the farmer/rancher/producer is required to
produce farm commodities or products using organic or regenerative
organic certification standards but due to regulatory statues and
labeling regulations, must market their commodities or products as
conventional.
Response from Rick Clark, Owner, Farm Green & Clark Land and Cattle; on
behalf of Regenerate America
Question 1. I am encouraged to hear about the successes of your
regenerative farming practices. It is possible to grow food for our
nation and the world while also benefiting the environment. You are
proof of that.
Mr. Clark, you have clearly found success in your regenerative
practices and could very well serve as a model for other farmers across
the country.
How did you implement regenerative farming? Was it trial and error
or research? And how can Congress help take the lessons you and others
have learned and use that knowledge to help other farmers successfully
transition to regenerative farming?
Answer. Our old farming practices created a lot of erosion. All it
took for me was a 1" rain event to realize something had to change, and
so we started looking at no-till practices and at adding cover crops.
At the time, I had no idea what regenerative was and what it could do
for the soil. This was originally a defensive reaction to a problem,
but when I began to understand the power that cover crop species have,
I was then able to turn our system into an offensive juggernaut.
The number one driver for me in my quest to maximize regenerative
practices was Mother Nature. She created situations that I had no idea
how to combat. My willingness to stay the course and test and learn on
our own farm has gotten us to where we are today.
That is how we began implementing the principles of soil health and
getting our soil ready for the reduction of inputs--it was all trial
and error, because there were not many or any organizations or
educators teaching this at the time, and I didn't know other farmers
trying this. We have since taken our farm to the summit of soil health
practices and eliminated all inputs. This makes us very solid for the
future generations coming on board.
What Congress must recognize is that funding for soil health
practices and conservation programs are an essential step to help
farmers improve soil health, but these funds alone don't guarantee
success for the farmer. Education, research, and technical support are
necessary for successful implementation at scale. In order to see the
results I have had on my farm across the country, America's producers
urgently need access to updated education and peer-to-peer support
systems, based on the latest science and context-based principles for
building soil and climate adaptation. That means we need to include a
focus on regenerative agriculture and soil health in Title VII of the
farm bill which increases funding for regenerative agriculture
research, education, and technical assistance. We need train-the-
trainer programs for Extension personnel so that they can help farmers
with this needed transition. We also need to foster a feedback loop
between the research, education, and Extension technical service
providers so that the latest research on regenerative agriculture and
soil health are being shared with farmers and ranchers across the
country.

Question 1a. How did you determine what combination of cover crops
would best benefit your fields and how should other farmers make this
determination? Is this an area where USDA could offer assistance to
help growers make better informed decisions?
Answer. There were not a lot of people to talk to about cover crops
at that time, so I made the decision that we would test on our farm and
see what works and does not work. Today, there are so many outlets for
farmers to find information about regenerative practices like cover
cropping, but we still have to remember that change is hard and there
needs to be a solid support group available to help these farmers in
real-time. The farmer needs to be supported to have success when they
are trying new practices for the first time; if they are not, they may
be discouraged from trying new practices in the future.
This is an area that the USDA can and should be offering assistance
in, but to do so, we must first ensure that USDA agents are educated in
the principles of soil health. Successful applications of cover crops
depend upon a deep understanding of the context of the region, and what
would work best for the soil type, the production system, and the
climatic region.
Learning how to effectively use cover crops can take some time, and
it's imperative that producers receive both technical assistance and
financial incentives over a period of time. We have seen producers try
cover crops one year and if not immediately successful, abandon the
practice. This is especially true in drier areas of the county, and
once this happens, farmers share with other farmers ``it does not work
here.'' This is unfortunate, because we have seen tremendous success
with cover crops in these areas, but it can take a few years to see the
economic and ecological benefits. Farmers must receive the proper
support to get them over the learning curve to reap the incredible
benefits of cover crops.
The farmer cannot be expected to jeopardize the livelihood of their
farm to implement a concept they are not familiar with--that is why
education and consistent support are necessary to the success of any
planned programs in the future.

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