|
Traditional
agricultural practices are slowly destroying the Chesapeake Bay
and its estuaries. The conventional "plowing
of the fields" erodes soil and washes tons of
silt into streams and rivers. The industrial-scale
application of fertilizer to croplands feeds tons
of nitrogen and phosphorous into the waterways.
Further, traditional farming requires irrigation during the hot, dry summer
months, stressing water supplies.
But a simple agricultural technique practiced by hundreds of farmers
across the United States can dramatically reduce
this devastation to the Chesapeake Bay. It is no-till farming,
in which fields are cultivated without churning
the soil. Crop production is as good as, or better
than, in plowed fields, less fertilizer is required and
the soil holds moisture longer.
Thanks in part to initial work by the Thomas Jefferson Institute,
Virginia has become an active advocate for the no-till farming technique.
But Virginia can do much more to advance the
practice and help return our Bay and our rivers into the economic and recreation resources they were decades ago. As
Virginia farmers convert more and more land into corn fields to produce ethanol,
threatening more erosion and nutrient run-off, a
shift to no-till farming is an urgent priority.
A widespread shift to state-of-the-art farming
practices can help restore the Chesapeake Bay to
the economic powerhouse it was a few decades ago.
By eliminating the churning of soil, no-till cuts
the movement of silt into the Bay watershed by an
estimated 95 percent. Because no-till doesn't
disturb the soil surface, phosphorous and nitrogen fertilizers,
which reside within the top six inches of the
soil, are not washed into streams, rivers and
eventually the Bay, where they feed algae growth, the dominant cause of the Bay’s “dead zone.” And when crop stalks and organic waste are left to become a part of the soil,
the soil captures and sequesters carbon instead of
releasing the greenhouse gases into the
atmosphere.
There are many ways in which state policy can
encourage a shift to no-till farming, starting
with greater support to the farming
community. Just diverting 25 percent of the $50
million in non-point source water
pollution programs spent annually on
Bay clean-up to no-till farming programs would
achieve dramatically superior results.
Economic incentives could be crafted to
reward farmers who make the switch. Tax credits
would make it more affordable for farmers to buy
expensive, no-till farm equipment.
An Environmental Credit Trading Bank
could create a mechanism for farmers to earn
carbon and nutrient reduction credits from no-till agriculture,
which they could sell in a credit-trading process
similar to that used today in the smokestack industries.
The commonwealth and the Farm Bureau need to explore becoming a member of the Chicago Carbon Exchange.
No-till farming is a winner. It produces greater grain production per acre while reducing fuel and fertilizer costs.
It increases carbon in the soil that makes both the soil and our farming community richer. The reductions in nutrients and sequestration of carbon can also be an additional source of farm revenue. For all these reasons,
no-till makes dollars and sense.
--
April 21, 2008
|
