Submitted by Jan McGinnis (not verified) on Fri, 01/18/2013 - 07:17.
I am concerned about the failure of Iowa to reign in misuse of our important land and water resources. In the last few years, I have seen farmers plow up marginal lands and plant them in corn, spread highly toxic, liquid manure on frozen or saturated ground, and tile farmland so that fertilizers, herbicides, and pesticides go directly into our underground aquifers rather than percolating slowly through filtering layers of soil, sand, rock, and clay.
Voluntary conservation methods are simply not enough. The temptation created by overly generous government subsidies for corn, the market produced through government protection of confined animal feed operations, and the market produced through ethanol subsidies have simply been too much for the average Iowa landowner to resist. We need mandatory soil and water conservation measure, and we need them NOW!
I am concerned about the failure of Iowa to reign in misuse of our important land and water resources. In the last few years, I have seen farmers plow up marginal lands and plant them in corn, spread highly toxic, liquid manure on frozen or saturated ground, and tile farmland so that fertilizers, herbicides, and pesticides go directly into our underground aquifers rather than percolating slowly through filtering layers of soil, sand, rock, and clay.
Voluntary conservation methods are simply not enough. The temptation created by overly generous government subsidies for corn, the market produced through government protection of confined animal feed operations, and the market produced through ethanol subsidies have simply been too much for the average Iowa landowner to resist. We need mandatory soil and water conservation measure, and we need them NOW!