Ecological and Environmental Indicators

Green Payments A new USDA study shows that farmers using combinations of erosion-control and nutrient-management practices on cultivated cropland are reducing losses of sediment, nitrogen, and phosphorous from farm fields and decreasing the movement of these materials to the Great Lakes and their associated waterways. New USDA Report Capitol Hill is a scrum of lobbyists fighting over a shrinking budget these days, and farm subsidies are under attack as never before. Some of those subsidies appear likely to die. But let's talk about one kind of farm subsidy, one that environmentalists are fighting to preserve. Believe it or not, so are the people who run the water systems in American cities. This week, some of these groups wrote a letter to Congress asking lawmakers to keep funding these programs. We're talking about "conservation" subsidies. Some people call them "green payments" and they add up to about $5 billion each year. Under these programs, the govern...