Written by Finley Harckham

It took starting my own vegetable garden during the COVID pandemic for me to realize just how little I really knew about what goes into growing food and caring for plants. With each new obstacle I faced (think swarms of hungry bugs descending like a plague), I developed a newfound appreciation for the complexity of our food systems and the challenge of supporting them in a sustainable way. My vegetable gardening experience and the pandemic-era shocks to global supply chains, led me to the sobering realization that I had been in the dark about the various day-to-day techniques used by farmers in our food production, as well as the public policy debates that both shape the agricultural sector and that are currently impacting public and environmental health. I know I am not alone.

For the last 89 years, the number of farms in the United States and the percentage of the population working in agriculture has declined precipitously. While this is not a bad thing in and of itself, it has distanced tens of millions of Americans like me from the food systems we depend on and allowed too many of us to turn a blind eye to the agricultural sector as it has adopted standard  practices that are putting our planet and our health at risk. According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the agricultural sector in the United States contributes close to 11% of the country’s greenhouse gas emissions, not including the emissions from transporting food to market. Though this number is less than half of the emissions attributed to the energy or transportation sectors, agriculture’s emissions include a staggering 79% of the United States’ nitrous oxide (NO2) emissions and 34% of this country’s methane (CH4) emissions. Though CO2 often gets more attention than other greenhouse gasses, over a 100-year period, nitrous oxide is 300 times more potent than CO2 and methane is 28 times more powerful than that gas.

Agriculture produces GHGs in part through what have been common, accepted farming practices, such as the use of:

• Nitrogen-based petro-chemical fertilizers, which drastically increase the release of nitrous oxide from soil into the atmosphere.
• Toxic pesticides and herbicides, which require a surprisingly large amount of energy to create and then once applied, release volatile organic compounds that can lead to acute health risks to those exposed and are precursor to the creation of ground level ozone.

One of the most tragic impacts of the widespread use of petro-chemical fertilizers, toxic pesticides, and toxic herbicides is that the longer farmers use them on their land, the more degraded the soil microbiome and the land becomes. Overfarming the same fields and widespread techniques like tilling, compound the problem. As the soil microbiome is disrupted and destroyed, farmers lose the benefits of the billions and billions of microbes. These microbes use natural processes to send nutrients to crops, which help them grow strong, and which helps the soil retain more water.

Some farmers have begun shifting from the intense use of chemicals towards what is called “regenerative agriculture.” A growing body of evidence points to the adoption of the techniques of regenerative farming as a means of reducing our nation’s greenhouse gas emissions, limiting human exposure to toxic pesticides, and protecting and improving biodiversity and soil quality.

Transitioning farms and ranches to regenerative agricultural best practices takes education and hard work, and can take up to several years to see an impact. Most of all, it requires recognition that farmers can’t afford the risks and the costs of adopting new practices without support. Recognizing this need, the Biden administration allocated a significant portion of the Inflation Reduction Act to agriculture.

The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022: A Rose By Any Other Name…

Arguably the most significant climate bill ever passed in the United States has a name that quite frankly doesn’t do it justice: the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 (IRA). It provides  $369 billion in climate and clean energy investments. Of this more than $19.5 billion has been allocated for new funding to encourage, “climate-smart agriculture and forestry (CSAF) greenhouse-gas-mitigating and carbon sequestration activities.” Some of the funds that will be made available to farmers via the Department of Agriculture include financial support for adopting regenerative practices like:

• Planting cover crops: Unlike crops planted with the intent of harvesting and selling them, cover crops are planted for the benefits they bring to the soil and by extension the farm. In addition to protecting valuable soil microbes from baking to death in the sun, the cover crops can be used to naturally deposit or extract nutrients like nitrogen, reducing the need for chemical fertilizers. By expanding the root network underground, cover crops help the soil retain water, reduce erosion, and sequester more carbon. These cover crops can be used to attract bugs that will prey on crop eating insects, thereby reducing the need for pesticides. Not only do cover crops help farmers reduce their carbon footprint, and chemical inputs, they also lead to more productive farms.
• No-Till Farming: Instead of the traditional practice of tilling, which uses equipment to churn up the soil before seeds are planted, no till-farming involves using tractor-pulled disks to slice a narrow opening into the soil to minimize soil disruption. This practice releases less CO2 from the soil, combats erosion, and reduces farm GHG emissions as no-till planting requires the tractors to make fewer passes across each field. For example, from 2013 - 2016, no-till planting in the US saved over 763 million gallons of fuel per year, enough energy to power over 2.8 million US households for a year!
• Agroforestry Practices: By growing perennial tree crops in close proximity to rows of annual crops, the farmer is able to foster biodiversity above and below ground, which improves soil health,  reduces the need for pesticides and herbicides, and sequesters carbon in the roots and trunks of trees. Agroforestry also has been shown to reduce erosion and help retain water.

In addition to providing funds to help farmers embrace the practices described above, the IRA allocates $1.4 billion for the Agricultural Conservation Easement Program to restrict development on agricultural lands and to protect and restore wetlands. The IRA also allocates $50 million towards research in conservation innovation and $300 million to go towards better measuring carbon sequestration and agricultural emissions.

Despite this incredible achievement, the general public still remains largely unaware of the Inflation Reduction Act and its potential impact on climate. This is a potentially huge problem. If current polls are to be believed, the upcoming November Presidential election will be a close one, and it will be imperative for all those advocating for serious climate policies to understand the extent to which the Biden-Harris administration and its allies in Congress have passed pro-climate policies.

Former President Trump, on the other hand, has a track record of undermining environmental protections and putting the interests of fossil fuel companies and other big businesses above those of the public good. There is evidence that Trump and his allies are poised to enact his anti-environmental policies with an even greater zeal if he wins a second term. This will certainly include agricultural policy.  

The conservative Heritage Foundation’s “Project 2025” (led by former Trump administration officials) outlines a blueprint for a second Trump term and states that the U.S. Department of Agriculture “should not put ancillary issues, such as environmental issues, ahead of agricultural production itself.” This statement is absurd in that it tries to separate agricultural production from the environment in which agricultural products grow. By referring to environmental issues as “ancillary,”  the authors of Project 2025 demonstrate a shocking ignorance. The report goes on to explicitly call out agricultural programs in the IRA as examples of “disrespect for American farmers and the Biden Administration’s effort to dictate agricultural practices.”

If Trump wins a second term and follows the guidance of Project 2025,  proactive efforts will be taken to reverse the pro-environment agricultural policies of the Biden-Harris Administration. However, a Trump loss would provide continuity and additional support for sustainable, climate conscious agriculture. It is a stark choice.

Environmental activists and like-minded citizens should do their best to make sure their neighbors are aware of the administration’s accomplishments and the importance of the climate-smart, regenerative agricultural programs included in the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act.  During an election that is leaving many voters unmotivated, it is important to highlight major distinctions between the candidates and their policies that might increase voter turnout.

Though the IRA did secure tremendous funding for climate programs, it will take continued political will and citizen pressure to make sure that the country continues in the direction of sustainable food systems. Because the funding for agricultural programs in the IRA only lasts until 2031, we must put pressure on Congress to codify like-minded policies in recurring legislation like the Farm Bill.

Most of us may not be farmers, but we all have a reason to care about how our food is produced and how that production is impacting our climate. We must reject notions that the environmental issues facing agriculture are “ancillary” or something otherwise unworthy of our attention. The stakes are too high.

Finley Harckham is a contributing member of the Grassroots Network Climate Emergency Mobilization team. If you have a suggestion for a future blog topic or are interested in joining the team, please reach out to us at climateemergency[at]sfbaysc[dot]org.