Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack says the Environmental Protection Agency’s work to redefine what constitutes a “water of the U.S.” should make the regulation easier to understand in farm country, an opinion that runs contrary to the opinion of many ag groups.
Vilsack said the latest rule, rolled out on Tuesday, gives producers “the predictability and stability” they have been seeking from WOTUS regulations and that the agency has “responded to some of the concerns that were most top of mind by farmers.”
But American Farm Bureau Federation Zippy Duvall, who chatted with Vilsack shortly after the secretary finished speaking to reporters Wednesday on the Farm Progress Show grounds, said just the opposite, arguing the new rule still has “broad language” and gives the EPA “the latitude to claim a lot of land.”
Asked by a reporter if Congress should act to address the definition after a lack of ag industry support for the EPA’s latest rulemaking, Duvall said the “next step may be in that direction.”
“[Legislative action] would be helpful, but we have a tremendous ruling from the Supreme Court. … they ignored a lot of what came out of that,” Duvall said.
Vilsack teases upcoming diesel announcements
Vilsack also says the Department of Agriculture plans to roll out more domestic fertilizer production funding “in the near term.”
At Farm Progress, Vilsack said USDA has a “significant number” of new projects to announce soon, to go along with the 21 announced earlier this year. The effort – dubbed the Fertilizer Production Expansion Program – was announced last year as the industry grappled with shortages due in part to the loss of Ukrainian and Russian supplies.
Vilsack also used his comments to reporters to press for maintaining the congressional intent of Inflation Reduction Act funding. USDA still needs to invest much of the money allocated in the law for conservation, rural electric cooperatives, and more, which Vilsack warned could be threatened if the funding is reallocated.
“There's still a significant number and amount of opportunity over the course of the next two to three years of just IRA,” he said. “The challenge is making sure that nobody decides to redirect those resources away from the use that they were intended under the IRA, because that is what's going to continue to support climate smart-agriculture.”
Georgia farmers assessing hurricane damage
Assessments are underway as Georgia farmers account for damages from Hurricane Idalia, which tore through the state Wednesday, according to local Farm Bureau officials.
A wide variety of operations, including peanut, vegetable and cotton farms as well as poultry facilities were in the path of Idalia, the officials said. The storm on Wednesday was heading toward South Carolina after tearing through Florida and Georgia.
Lawmakers introduce new forestry carbon market bill
Two House members are aiming to create a new Agriculture Department lending program focused on private forest owners who want to create and sell carbon credits.
The Rural Forest Markets Act, introduced Wednesday by Reps. Chellie Pingree, D-Maine, and William Timmons, R-S.C., would allow USDA to provide loans, bonds or “other investment vehicles” of up to $150 million for forest owners looking to create and sell carbon credits.
The bill has support from the National Alliance of Forest Owners, American Forests, the Society of American Foresters and 21 other forestry organizations.
Hope for an ombudsman in FDA’s Human Foods Program
The Food and Drug Administration’s chief ombudsman, Laurie Lenkel, has been advocating for an ombudsman in FDA’s Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition for over 20 years. FDA’s Office of the Ombudsman handles dispute resolution of complaints and settles disagreements between companies or individuals and FDA offices.
While speaking on an Alliance for Stronger FDA webinar, Lenkel says she’s excited about the creation of the Human Foods Program under FDA’s proposed reorganization efforts, and she’s hopeful an ombudsman will be established within that new division. She says stakeholders should encourage the newly named deputy commissioner Jim Jones to establish an ombudsman under his purview.
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American Frozen Food Institute President and CEO Alison Bodor, who co-moderated the webinar, says there’s an opportunity with the establishment of the Human Foods Program to have improved communication with stakeholders. “Hopefully an Office of Ombudsman will help spur that forward,” Bodor says.
Interagency focus on STEC and Campylobacter
The Interagency Food Safety Analytics Collaboration has laid out new five-year priorities plans to focus on sources of foodborne illnesses caused by Campylobacter and a particularly dangerous variety of E. coli – STEC.
IFSAC also plans to “consider incorporating data on non-foodborne sources of priority pathogens, such as animal and environmental sources, into IFSAC’s annual Foodborne Illness Source Attribution estimates to better refine and contextualize foodborne illness source attribution estimates.”
USDA scientists say citrus greening remedy may be in sight
Scientists with USDA’s Agricultural Research Service say they believe they’ve found a way to make citrus trees impenetrable to the citrus greening disease that has devastated groves in Florida and spread to other states.
The remedy, ARS says in a new report, lies in scientists’ new ability to “augment the tree’s natural resistance” to citrus greening, also known as huanglongbing, or HLB. They say they can now do that by cloning DNA from plants that have a natural resistance to the disease and then incorporating that into citrus trees.
“I see HLB-fighting technology being deployed in the next several years,” said James Thomson, a scientist at ARS’ Crop Improvement and Genetics Research unit in California. “There are already a series of genes that can detect and fight HLB. The biggest problem is how to distribute the solution. This project has made strides in identifying genes from other plants that activate defense responses in the presence of HLB.”
Spencer Chase, Jacqui Fatka and Noah Wicks contributed to this report. Questions, comments, tips? Email bill@agri-pulse.com
