Can American soil be brought back to life?

[acbytesla]

Good, then scroll down and see the grass growing between corn rows? That's primary productivity going to waste unless there is a chicken pig or preferably a ruminant to come along and recycle the grass and also any usable residues from the crop. The land right off the bat jumps in productivity efficiency and profitability from that single move, and low and behold the inputs cost drops and the soil recovers.



Less inputs means even more soil life building more fertile soils supporting even more primary productivity, which used efficiently continues the cycle in a positive reinforcing feedback curve. We all benefit from this.

Completely the opposite of the highly inefficient industrial models with their negative feedbacks. And it is all directly due to government interference in the marketplace. It's by design that we are destroying our country.

I think you're missing my point. I understand what the problem is in terms of land erosion. What i want to know are policy ideas that will change things. How do we create the most efficient and sustainable agricultural environment that will support farmers and consumers? What changes in the regulations should we make? Such as price supports? Should we end farm subsidies? Or modify them? And if so, how?

 

[Red Baron Farms]

So as a progressive city folk, how can we help address the problem? I understand what the purpose of price supports and subsidies were in the 1930s and how overproduction led to the dustbowl in say in Oklahoma.

Have you ever thought that say the culture wars between city and rural Americans is a side show designed to divide and conquer? Although I'm not big on conspiracy theories. But frankly as someone who has spent a lot of time in both environments, I find it absurd.

Nothing so cloak and dagger as a conspiracy. Stated public policy is not exactly what I would call "conspiracy" and Earl Butz did say plow fence-row to fence-row and plant all the corn the farmers possibly could, and told anyone who objected, "get big or get out", while he purposely destabilized the small family farm financially with odious regulatory burden designed to drive most out of business and off their family farms.

Earl Butz

His mantra to farmers was "get big or get out,"[6][7] and he urged farmers to plant commodity crops like corn "from fencerow to fencerow." These policy shifts coincided with the rise of major agribusiness corporations, and the declining financial stability of the small family farm.[8]

A reflection on the lasting legacy of 1970s USDA Secretary Earl Butz
Then, in the 1980s, the bubble burst. By that time, farms were cranking out much more than the market could bear, and prices fell accordingly. Meanwhile, interest rates had spiked, making all of those loans farmers had taken out in the ’70s into a paralyzing burden. Farm incomes plunged and tens of thousands of farms went under. Butz’s great policy change had given rise to the deepest rural crisis since the Depression.

...

One Iowa land excavator told the Journal that farmers are “trying to squeeze everything they can” out of their land. Butz has passed on, but fence-row-to-fence-row agriculture — and its vast environmental footprint — lives.

 

[Minoosh]

What I wonder is how to remedy soil that's depleted of minerals. Spinach can't be rich in iron if the soil isn't.

 

[Red Baron Farms]

The OP link makes dozens of assertions, and while it names names (Robert Myers, a professor of soil sciences at the University of Missouri & David Montgomery, a professor of geology at the University of Washington who has written three books on soil health & Ron Nichols, a spokesman for USDA’s Natural Resource Conservation Service), there is no link to their research. It makes it hard to evaluate the claims. Obviously modern farming has allowed major increases in food production. That has not been without drawbacks I doubt I need list here.

It's an interesting premise that the soil becomes dust vs clumping. I would have thought that had more to do with water content so it is a new concept for me. I don't think one needs all the rest of the back to nature/government is bad hype to have this discussion.

Personally I have switched to mostly organic for a couple reasons. One, to avoid the main pesticide used in corn which has had the science of the dangers of that pesticide attacked with manufactured doubt, something we've seen time and time again with tobacco, climate change, and with aspirin causing Reyes Syndrome (in the years between when we knew kids should not be getting aspirin until a public campaign and labeling took place, about 500 kids died of preventable Reyes Syndrome).

Second reason is of course to stop the use of antibiotics in farmed animals and eggs. And third, to address the US corn subsidies which are harmful in multiple ways, I avoid products with corn syrup. I also avoid animals fed heavy diets of corn so I look for 100% grass-fed beef.

These are the little things I believe if enough consumers do, will have an impact. But I digress.... about that clumpy vs dry soil: There is fodder for a decent discussion here but the OP seems to have a more muddled topic in mind. Perhaps if someone could tease the science out and provide some links to some of the research...

Of course we can discuss the science. I have in fact written extensively on it in the science forum here and also on other websites like QUORA and others. But this is the politics forum so there is the political portion of the debate to be weaseled out from the biophysical portion of the debate. I had not really discussed the political portion of the debate much here at ISF except in general principles. So I thought to start that here.

 

[Red Baron Farms]

What I wonder is how to remedy soil that's depleted of minerals. Spinach can't be rich in iron if the soil isn't.

Turnips and AMF

 

[John Jones]

Turnips and AMF

AMF?

ETA: Nevermind. I looked it up.

 

[acbytesla]

Nothing so cloak and dagger as a conspiracy. Stated public policy is not exactly what I would call "conspiracy" and Earl Butz did say plow fence-row to fence-row and plant all the corn the farmers possibly could, and told anyone who objected, "get big or get out", while he purposely destabilized the small family farm financially with odious regulatory burden designed to drive most out of business and off their family farms.

You've posted this about Butz before. But I'm not really interested in the cause, but the solutions. We need more information. And I'm afraid from a political perspective, farmers need to stop turning progressives into the bad guys. I doubt we are your enemies. At most, there is simply a failure of farmers putting these issues front and center.

 

[Red Baron Farms]

You've posted this about Butz before. But I'm not really interested in the cause, but the solutions. We need more information. And I'm afraid from a political perspective, farmers need to stop turning progressives into the bad guys. I doubt we are your enemies. At most, there is simply a failure of farmers putting these issues front and center.

"progessives" can mean a whole lot of things. Removing a tax redistribution of wealth subsidy and removing odious regulatory burden is basically conservative policy, while the results might be considered progressive in so much as it allows to markets to brings a solution that brings progress to the country economically and socially.

Is that what you mean by progressive?

Usually I hear progressive in terms of making regulations and tax and spend schemes. This is the opposite. We need the government out so farmers can make the changes needed to make agriculture sustainable and profitable again.

 

[acbytesla]

"progessives" can mean a whole lot of things. Removing a tax redistribution of wealth subsidy and removing odious regulatory burden is basically conservative policy, while the results might be considered progressive in so much as it allows to markets to brings a solution that brings progress to the country economically and socially.

Is that what you mean by progressive?

Usually I hear progressive in terms of making regulations and tax and spend schemes. This is the opposite. We need the government out so farmers can make the changes needed to make agriculture sustainable.

Let's start with farm subsidies. As much as people think that laissez fairer free markets is the panacea solution to solving all economic problems they would discover no that really isn't true. Take for example when farm subsidies were introduced and some farmers were paid NOT to grow crops. This was the government's response to farmers overproducing resulting in plummeting crop prices that further resulted in losses that caused farms to go bankrupt. That without some sort of management, the markets were susceptible to wild swings which wasn't good for farmers or consumers.

I'm all in favor of reducing regulations that serve little purpose and offer no benefits but it frightens me when one suggests the elimination of all regulations as I am sure that some regulations are very sensible without which the results would be harmful. All I ask is specificity as opposed to wholesale elimination.

 

[Red Baron Farms]

Let's start with farm subsidies. As much as people think that laissez fairer free markets is the panacea solution to solving all economic problems they would discover no that really isn't true. Take for example when farm subsidies were introduced and some farmers were paid NOT to grow crops. This was the government's response to farmers overproducing resulting in plummeting crop prices that further resulted in losses that caused farms to go bankrupt. That without some sort of management, the markets were susceptible to wild swings which wasn't good for farmers or consumers.

I'm all in favor of reducing regulations that serve little purpose and offer no benefits but it frightens me when one suggests the elimination of all regulations as I am sure that some regulations are very sensible without which the results would be harmful. All I ask is specificity as opposed to wholesale elimination.

If you love subsidies so much, then subsidize the replanting of the great tallgrass prairies of the cornbelt.

We actually don't need the subsidy to make a ridiculously higher profit than growing corn, but hey if you are so tied to your tax and spend government model, by all means..free money is always welcome.

Or even better yet, pay a dividend to increasing soil carbon and leave it to farmers to find the fastest way to do that. Watch global warming vanish in a couple decades. At least you would be paying for a needed service.

But to do it requires there to be a reasonable capacity for localized scale-able processing. Something not allowed currently.

 

[acbytesla]

If you love subsidies so much, then subsidize the replanting of the great tallgrass prairies of the cornbelt.

We actually don't need the subsidy to make a ridiculously higher profit than growing corn, but hey if you are so tied to your tax and spend government model, by all means..free money is always welcome.

Or even better yet, pay a dividend to increasing soil carbon and leave it to farmers to find the fastest way to do that. Watch global warming vanish in a couple decades. At least you would be paying for a needed service.

But to do it requires there to be a reasonable capacity for localized scale-able processing. Something not allowed currently.

You keep missing my point. I DON'T have an answer for whether we should end farm subsidies. My guess is most Democrats are not attached to them at all. From my view, it is red state Republicans that are protecting them not the Democrats. I was just pointing out why there are subsidies in the first place. I see what the purposes were and it seems as if that at one time they served a purpose but perhaps we have outgrown them. I really don't know. What i don't see is a bunch of farmers demanding that farm subsidies be ended.

Here's what I care about.
1. I'd love to save the taxpayers billions of dollars by ending farm subsidies
2. I'm not interested in hurting farmers by ending subsidies.
3. I'd like to end ethanol subsidies as well as I think they were and are counterproductive.
4. I want to protect streams and wetlands because they are habitats for wildlife and fisheries.
5. I'm concerned with farmers making long term decisions based on short term information. ( If the whole world plants a specific crop today because the prices are high, aren't they like to take a bath at harvest time because of over-production? )

I admit to being ignorant of what the farmers need. Thanks for telling me.

 

[Spindrift]

But to do it requires there to be a reasonable capacity for localized scale-able processing. Something not allowed currently.

IANAF

Why is 'localized scale-able processing' not allowed and what are its benefits?

 

[Red Baron Farms]

IANAF

Why is 'localized scale-able processing' not allowed and what are its benefits?

For example A friend of mine in Bismark ND started raising pasture raised chickens to follow his rotations of cows. There is an awesome synergy there that requires not a single acre more land and makes chicken both more nutritious and profitable and efficient. Total calorie yields off the land explode. But there was not one single slaughterhouse for poultry certified by the USDA in the entire state of ND.


Why? 97% of the total poultry processing capacity of the United States is owned by just 4 major players, Tyson, Pilgrim, Sanderson farms, Perdue.....

They have a lock. They do not process other peoples poultry. In fact they don't even allow their supporting farmers to own the chickens they raise. Complete lockdown by these guys. So that means my friend can at maximum process 999 chickens in a year on exemption before the government comes in and shuts him down. Bad as that is, he couldn't even process a single cow before the swat teams arrive. But at least a few independent beef slaughterhouses survive. But 999 chickens is nothing, and if he can't get them processed, then the odds of actually selling meaningful numbers of live chickens is diminishingly small. Butchers are no longer allowed to process meat. That whole field is almost completely extinct due to odious regulatory burden that was designed to limit the abuses by the major players like Tyson, but actually had the opposite effect of shutting down the butchers and independent abattoirs and giving the likes of Tyson virtual monopoly.

In the end he was forced to build a processing plant himself simply because none existed in the entire state. Luckily this type of farming is vastly more profitable, so he was able to do that. Believe me though. That roadblock will stop most farmers.

 

[Red Baron Farms]

You keep missing my point. I DON'T have an answer for whether we should end farm subsidies. My guess is most Democrats are not attached to them at all. From my view, it is red state Republicans that are protecting them not the Democrats. I was just pointing out why there are subsidies in the first place. I see what the purposes were and it seems as if that at one time they served a purpose but perhaps we have outgrown them. I really don't know. What i don't see is a bunch of farmers demanding that farm subsidies be ended.

Here's what I care about.
1. I'd love to save the taxpayers billions of dollars by ending farm subsidies
2. I'm not interested in hurting farmers by ending subsidies.
3. I'd like to end ethanol subsidies as well as I think they were and are counterproductive.
4. I want to protect streams and wetlands because they are habitats for wildlife and fisheries.
5. I'm concerned with farmers making long term decisions based on short term information. ( If the whole world plants a specific crop today because the prices are high, aren't they like to take a bath at harvest time because of over-production? )

I admit to being ignorant of what the farmers need. Thanks for telling me.

It's not conservative red state Republicans in control any longer. It not Main Street USA, It's Wall Street USA. It's not conservatives, it's neoliberals. Conservatism died a long time ago when the conservative red state base was completely crushed by NY Wall Street neoliberals who hijacked the Republican party. This is exactly how they did it too, ag policy.

But Democrats are no better, they are just as beholden to liberal NY ideology as the Republicans are beholden to neoliberal NY ideology. They pump on the subsidies equally as much as any Republican administration. Same with the regulatory burden preventing the market from fixing the problem. They are equal in this regard.

Ag voting blocks are too small to sway either party. Both are run by NY and Wall Street, to the detriment of the country. It is a clear and present danger.

Now since Wall Street is in control, I have proposed using soil carbon as a proxy for ecosystem function. It's not perfect but all life on the planet is carbon based, so it does roughly correspond to ecosystem function. And carbon can be traded on a commodities market. This would allow the market to determine the value of the subsidies farmers recieve and the % of that pie they recieve would be directly based on how much they benefit society by sequestering carbon in the soil. This would balance the carbon cycle amazingly fast IMHO.

"If all farmland was a net sink rather than a net source for CO2, atmospheric CO2 levels would fall at the same time as farm productivity and watershed function improved. This would solve the vast majority of our food production, environmental and human health ‘problems’." Dr. Christine Jones

If a farmer is solving all those intractable wicked problems in one fell swoop, then he ought to be paid for that service. The welfare system as designed now actually encourages the opposite, ecosystem destruction, and pollution of land and sea and reduction of ecosystem services.

 

[Minoosh]

Turnips and AMF

What about selenium? Not how to maximize absorption; what to do if there is none to absorb.

 

[Red Baron Farms]

What about selenium? Not how to maximize absorption; what to do if there is none to absorb.

What if the sun didn't shine? What if a black hole ate the entire solar system? What if...?

The problem with endless what ifs being that there is plenty of minerals in soil. Pretty much ALL soil has all those minerals in the the sand clay silt mineral substrate. The difference being the minerals that are bioavailable. That's where biology and a fully functioning soil food web can make bioavailable all the nutrients the plants need and lock them in the soil profile so they don't leach away. Most so called "weathering" of minerals is actually a biological function performed by bacteria and fungi. Those bacteria and fungi when decomposing release those nutrients in a process called "mineralization"

The number of soils that are so devoid of any mineral needed for plant growth is so tiny as to be insignificant to this discussion. But bioavailable? That's the opposite. The current system makes vast amounts of minerals chelated and unavailable to plants, and leaches away and erodes even more, so that the farmer is locked into purchasing these inputs or face crop failure.

It is not an issue in healthy soil.

 

[Spindrift]

For example A friend of mine in Bismark ND started raising pasture raised chickens to follow his rotations of cows. There is an awesome synergy there that requires not a single acre more land and makes chicken both more nutritious and profitable and efficient. Total calorie yields off the land explode. But there was not one single slaughterhouse for poultry certified by the USDA in the entire state of ND.


Why? 97% of the total poultry processing capacity of the United States is owned by just 4 major players, Tyson, Pilgrim, Sanderson farms, Perdue.....

They have a lock. They do not process other peoples poultry. In fact they don't even allow their supporting farmers to own the chickens they raise. Complete lockdown by these guys. So that means my friend can at maximum process 999 chickens in a year on exemption before the government comes in and shuts him down. Bad as that is, he couldn't even process a single cow before the swat teams arrive. But at least a few independent beef slaughterhouses survive. But 999 chickens is nothing, and if he can't get them processed, then the odds of actually selling meaningful numbers of live chickens is diminishingly small. Butchers are no longer allowed to process meat. That whole field is almost completely extinct due to odious regulatory burden that was designed to limit the abuses by the major players like Tyson, but actually had the opposite effect of shutting down the butchers and independent abattoirs and giving the likes of Tyson virtual monopoly.

In the end he was forced to build a processing plant himself simply because none existed in the entire state. Luckily this type of farming is vastly more profitable, so he was able to do that. Believe me though. That roadblock will stop most farmers.

So the Republican backing Tyson's of the world have stacked the deck. Any examples of the odious regulatory burden? Apparently it can't be that odious if the farmer in your example was able to build a processing plant.

 

[Red Baron Farms]

So the Republican backing Tyson's of the world have stacked the deck. Any examples of the odious regulatory burden? Apparently it can't be that odious if the farmer in your example was able to build a processing plant.

No these guys are not beholden to either the Republicans nor the Democrats. They have bought both. We rebelled against an English aristocratic oligarchy combined with the East India Company to form this country, but now we have fallen into the exact same trap.

In 1858 Britain sealed their colonization of India, creating the British Raj and fully occupying the great nation in the wake of the rebellion which had been directed against the EIC which was, it would seem, considered too large to fail or be threatened: to attack them was to incur British royal and military repercussions[1]

Sound familiar? Have we now our own mega-corporations "too big to fail"?

Why do you suppose the farmer subsidies are actually paid to financial institutions and not the actual farmers? Maybe to prevent farmers from actually profiting from a subsidy? Instead the financial institutions will gain that profit.

As for my friends processing plant, he certainly never wanted to build it or own it and only did so when forced. It's a huge risk that might open him up to bankruptcy. He is a farmer. Not the first farmer attempting to get past that roadblock. Most loose that bet. I wish him the best. It's not a risk I personally would take though.

 

[acbytesla]

It's not conservative red state Republicans in control any longer. It not Main Street USA, It's Wall Street USA. It's not conservatives, it's neoliberals. Conservatism died a long time ago when the conservative red state base was completely crushed by NY Wall Street neoliberals who hijacked the Republican party. This is exactly how they did it too, ag policy.

But Democrats are no better, they are just as beholden to liberal NY ideology as the Republicans are beholden to neoliberal NY ideology. They pump on the subsidies equally as much as any Republican administration. Same with the regulatory burden preventing the market from fixing the problem. They are equal in this regard.

Ag voting blocks are too small to sway either party. Both are run by NY and Wall Street, to the detriment of the country. It is a clear and present danger.

Now since Wall Street is in control, I have proposed using soil carbon as a proxy for ecosystem function. It's not perfect but all life on the planet is carbon based, so it does roughly correspond to ecosystem function. And carbon can be traded on a commodities market. This would allow the market to determine the value of the subsidies farmers recieve and the % of that pie they recieve would be directly based on how much they benefit society by sequestering carbon in the soil. This would balance the carbon cycle amazingly fast IMHO.



If a farmer is solving all those intractable wicked problems in one fell swoop, then he ought to be paid for that service. The welfare system as designed now actually encourages the opposite, ecosystem destruction, and pollution of land and sea and reduction of ecosystem services.

No offense intended, but I think a lot of this is nonsense. If you want to say that corporate interests are vested in maintaining present policies and representatives from both parties are beholden to them then ok. But I think that is all it is.

That said, if there is to be reform in agricultural policies they have to start with the farmers. And I am sorry, but it can't start out by promoting war with progressives. And the policies must include specific proposals and the benefits of those proposals. It also must explain clearly the issues with the status quo.

 

[dudalb]

I suspect that Red Baron Farms really wants to bring back the good old days of Jefferson's
"Yeoman Farmer".

It just ain't going to happen.....