Today, the Environmental Working Group released a follow up report to Congress Poised To Cut Conservation Funds That Aided Farm Bill’s Passage that details the proposed conservation program cuts on a state-by-state basis.

The initial report released from the EWG Midwest office in Ames, IA describes the bait and switch tactics used by Democratic lawmakers working behind the scenes to cut the very conservation increases that helped pass the subsidy laden farm bill. After the farm bill vote, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi boasted that the farm bill would represent “historic new investments” in programs to protect water quality and wildlife.

The new EWG State-by-State analysis shows that 14 states are poised to lose more than $6 million each from the Environmental Quality Incentive Program (EQIP) alone. Chesapeake Bay states will lose over $16 million (EQIP), while key Mississippi River Basin states; major contributors to the Gulf ‘Dead Zone’, are set to see cuts near $48 million (EQIP).

In addition, the Congress Poised To Cut Conservation Funds That Aided Farm Bill’s Passage report spurred the Des Moines Register editorial page, in the heart of subsidized corn country, to summarize:

Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin has worked hard to build environmental and soil-conservation measures into the farm bill, so it's sort of odd when his own party comes along and strips them out. This is especially troubling at a time of high commodity prices, when farmers have every incentive to plow and plant every available acre, whether it is environmentally wise or not. Now is the time for Congress to increase incentives for conservation to protect farmland, not reduce them.

“EWG has a long history of steadfast support of domestic nutrition programs. Congress should have added the disclaimer ‘unless we can afford it’ to their promised increases in conservation and nutrition funding that greased the wheels for the bloated farm bill’s passage,” said Craig Cox, EWG Midwest Vice President and author of both reports.

“Congressional leadership has the power to keep the promises they made to increase conservation and nutrition funding,” Cox concluded.

Click here for the state-by-state analysis.

Dan Owens may have stopped writing at the Blog for Rural Affairs, but his new effort, Whiskey Burn, maintains his insightful and often incendiary thoughts on agriculture policy. This post on pending conservation cuts is a must read for anyone concerned about the bait and switch tactics Congress has employed with conservation funding in favor of billions in unfettered dollars to commodity programs.

If we saw even the slightest hint of cutting farm program payments, the vaunted commodity machine would swing into action. There would be no end of press releases, news stories, DC visits, and other strategies mobilized to defeat any potential cut. (Not only that, but anytime the temperature gets above 90 or it doesn’t rain for more than 10 days straight, that machine cranks up, demanding “disaster” assistance. Sometimes I think they do it just to keep the “machine” well oiled. More likely, they’re just laying the groundwork for future greed). Yet time and again, conservation (and other things we care about) get the shaft, and no more than a peep or two is heard from the sustainable agriculture community. What’s going on?

Read the whole post here.

And it should be noted that Brian Depew and CFRA newcomer Steph Larsen are ably filling the void left by Dan's absence.

From today's EWG report release:

More Than 40,000 Farmers Denied Funds to Reduce Pollution From Their Farms

WASHINGTON - September 9, 2008. Behind the thin green gloss Congressional leaders spread across the subsidy-laden 2008 farm bill, the Democratic Congress is now hacking away at pledges to expand conservation and other environmental programs.

Data analyzed by the Environmental Working Group show that Congress is trying to roll back funding increases in critical conservation and environmental programs, funding pledged in the farm law passed just weeks ago.

Today, Craig Cox, EWG Midwest Vice-President, released the report: Congress Poised to Cut Conservation Funds that Aided Farm Bill's Passage, from EWG's new Midwest office in Ames, IA.

When the farm bill became law on June 18, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi boasted that it would represent "historic new investments" in programs to protect water quality and wildlife. Those investments helped mute the opposition of many in Congress and some interest groups, who objected to the bill's continuation of hefty subsidies to large, wealthy farm operators now earning record incomes in the ongoing commodity boom.

But within weeks of the farm bill's passage, the Senate appropriations committee sent to the Senate floor a spending bill (S.3289) that would slash conservation measures by $331 million in fiscal year 2009.

Commodity subsidies that provide billions to the richest farmers each year remained untouched.

For every $10,000 in crop subsidies Congress sends to the most heavily polluting counties in the Corn Belt, just one dollar is spent on conservation. In the 124 counties that cause 40% of spring nitrate fertilizer pollution, the ratio between subsidies and conservation spending is 500 to one.

"With cuts like this year after year, it's no wonder that agriculture is the number one source of water pollution in the nation. Democrats in Congress are using bait and switch tactics with conservation funding. This practice mirrors a longstanding Republican tradition of broken promises where pledges to increase money for environmental programs are followed by systematic and dramatic cuts that have left conservation programs billions short over the past decade," said Craig Cox, EWG Midwest Vice-President.

Go to http://www.ewg.org/reports/conservationcuts for the full report.

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