CENTER FOR FOOD SAFETY URGES CONGRESS TO ADDRESS IMPACTS OF AGRICULTURE IN CLIMATE CHANGE BILL

Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) released a version of a climate and energy bill, called the Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act, which calls for higher greenhouse gas emission reductions than the Congressional bill passed last July. One notable difference in this new draft version is the inclusion of language that begins to address harmful emissions caused by current agricultural practices.

While The Center for Food Safety applauds this development and the fact that global warming is finally being seriously addressed in Congress, the organization laments that the draft version still does not sufficiently address the significant impact agriculture has on climate change, and the significant potential it could have in reversing current destructive climatic trends.

“Though research unequivocally concludes that industrial agriculture is one of the major contributors to global warming, neither international nor domestic policies adequately take on this issue,” said Debi Barker, Director of the Center for Food Safety’s Climate Change and Agriculture Program.” Barker notes that at least 60 percent of all dangerous nitrous oxide (NO2) emissions and 40 percent of all methane (CH4) emissions are produced by industrial farming, primarily from the use of synthetic nitrogen fertilizer and intensive livestock operations respectively.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, an international consultative body, reports conservatively that industrial agriculture accounts for at least 14 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions. Many scientists maintain that this number is even higher, falling in the 25 to 30 percent range when the total energy backpack of the current food system is taken into account.

“The environmental goals of climate legislation cannot be compromised, but without addressing the impacts of industrial agriculture practices on climate, that is exactly what’s taking place,” added Andrew Kimbrell, Founder and Executive Director of CFS. ” If the United States is serious about creating real environmental change, this piece of legislation must recognize the impacts of industrial agriculture on climate and take steps to reverse trends by requiring a shift to low-impact, sustainable agriculture.”

A Rodale Institute study projected that the planet’s 3.5 billion tillable acres could sequester nearly 40 percent of current CO2 emission if they were converted to “Regenerative” organic agriculture practices. The same ten-year study submits that if U.S. cropland were converted to organic farming methods, we could reduce nearly 25 percent of the nation’s total greenhouse gas emissions.

“We applaud the inclusion of agriculture in this draft bill, but we urge lawmakers to take further decisive steps to stop practices that produce harmful emissions,” Barker concluded. “If we make a U-turn away from harmful industrial agriculture practices toward ecological, organic systems, we could quickly and significantly alter the course of climate change.”

The Center for Food Safety is a national, non-profit, membership organization founded in 1997 to protect human health and the environment by curbing the use of harmful food production technologies and by promoting organic and other forms of sustainable agriculture. CFS currently represents over 85,000 members across the nation. On the web at:http://www.centerforfoodsafety.org