Good morning, and welcome to Earth Day 2024.
President Biden and members of his cabinet, including Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack, are fanning out across the country to promote the administration’s environmental record.
One of the issues the administration is celebrating is Biden’s progress in meeting his 30x30 goal to conserve at least 30% of U.S. land and fresh water by 2030. “We’re on track to meet that goal,” says Brenda Mallory, who chairs the White House Council on Environmental Quality. She told reporters on an Earth Day briefing that the administration has extended conservation to 41 million acres of land so far.
Take note: The administration is also launching a new website – Conservation.gov – as a one-stop shop for information on federal conservation efforts. The website is a partnership between USDA, the Interior Department, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and the Council on Environmental Quality.
Meanwhile: Vilsack will be in his native state of Pennsylvania, a key swing state in the 2024 election, today and Tuesday.
Today in Pittsburgh, he’ll be at an event highlighting how Biden “is supporting urban tree planting, advancing environmental justice, generating economic opportunity, and building a clean energy economy nationwide,” according to a White House advisory. Tuesday in Erie, he’ll announce a series of clean energy projects.
Farm bill impasse seems to deepen
House Ag Committee Chairman Glenn “GT” Thompson, R-Pa., continues to insist he’ll move a farm bill through the panel before Memorial Day, but there was no sign of a bipartisan breakthrough this week as House members finished work on a foreign aid bill before heading back to their districts for the week.
“It’s looking very difficult.” That’s how the committee’s top Democrat, David Scott of Georgia, described the situation to Agri-Pulse on Saturday. He declined to say whether Democrats might offer a counter-proposal.
Scott published an op-ed in Agri-Pulse on Friday that accused committee Republicans of “abandoning bipartisanship” by pushing cuts in the nutrition title and restrictions on USDA’s Commodity Credit Corporation spending authority.
He said it. “Hope springs eternal.” – House Ag member Jim Costa, D-Calif., when asked about the possibility of a bipartisan farm bill.
FTC chair hears from farmers about potential purchase of fertilizer plant
Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan was in Iowa Saturday to hear from farmers about the proposed purchase of OCI Global’s Iowa Fertilizer Co. by Koch Industries.
At a listening session hosted in part by the Iowa Farmers Union and attended by state lawmakers and about 100 people, Khan heard concerns that the proposed $3.6 billion purchase would increase consolidation and drive fertilizer prices higher, according to reports on the session in Nevada, Iowa, from Iowa journalists.
Eighteen advocacy groups opposed to the purchase wrote to Khan and the head of the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division in January seeking an investigation of the proposed purchase. Netherlands-based OCI announced the sale in December.
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CoverCress advances through APHIS regulatory process
Two new versions of gene-edited pennycress have been approved for cultivation by the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, which found they are unlikely to pose a plant pest risk.
Applications came from CoverCress Inc. and Hjelle Advisors – on behalf of CoverCress – for the plants, altered to have reduced fiber and erucic acid. CoverCress is seen as a promising rotational tool for growers as a cover crop, but also has high oil levels that make it an attractive candidate for low-carbon fuels such as sustainable aviation fuel.
APHIS also issued “not subject to regulation” determinations on a Bayer sugarbeet engineered with resistance to gluofosinate and a Moolec Science soybean with meat protein in the seeds and antibiotic resistance.
Lawmakers seek more wildfire research
Sens. Ben Ray Luján, D-N.M., and Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska, want to create regional research centers focused on studying wildland fire and creating technology to help manage it.
Their bill — the Regional Leadership in Wildland Fire Research Act — would establish these centers at U.S. universities and create a National Center Coordination Board to coordinate their work. The centers would work on fire and vegetation modeling and develop wildland fire technologies.
Take note: The lawmakers, in a one-pager, say “current wildfire models are failing to adequately predict fire behavior under extreme conditions and in more complex environments.”
He said it: “Summer E15 is a good step forward, and now we need full year-round sales and a move toward higher level blends of ethanol, such as E30, which greatly improves air quality.”
National Farmers Union President Rob Larew, on EPA’s announcement it would allow use of E15 this summer.
