Farm Compliance

The topic of climate change (and in particular the new climate change legislation that recently passed in the House) usually evokes extreme reactions. On the one hand, there is a group of people who believe that climate change is the most important issue to ever face mankind and that unless we act immediately and extremely, we put the very existence of mankind in peril. On the other hand, there is a group that believes that climate change is the biggest boondoggle and hoax ever to be perpetuated on mankind.

One example is a June 28 column by Paul Krugman of The New York Times, in which he talked about the bill’s critics in this way: “And as I watched the deniers make their arguments, I couldn’t help thinking that I was watching a form of treason — treason against the planet.”

On the other side of the fence is a column by Robert Zubrin in the July 1 Roll Call, a top Capitol Hill newspaper. He says the climate bill “could potentially cause not only extensive business failures, unemployment and privation within our borders, but starvation among poorer populations elsewhere.”

These articles are diametrically opposed. Which one, if either, is correct is a very interesting and potentially very significant question.

There are some things that we do know for sure:

• The Supreme Court ruling in April of 2007 on carbon dioxide opened the door for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to regulate greenhouse gases. If the EPA continues to move in that direction – and they likely will -- it will set off the most extensive set of rule making in history. There will be regulation of greenhouse gases, whether under a new law from Congress or by the EPA under current law backstopped by the Supreme Court.
• The Obama Administration has set climate change legislation as one of its top priorities.
• The Democrat-controlled Congress has set climate change legislation as one of its top priorities for 2009.
• The newly empowered environmental community has set climate change legislation as one its top priorities for 2009.,
• Significant international pressure has been brought to bear on the United States to engage in climate change agreements to be discussed in Copenhagen later this year.
• The original version of the Waxman-Markey climate change bill had many negatives for U.S. agriculture, and virtually no positives.
• The U.S. agricultural community agreed on a set of nine principles that must be part of any climate change legislation in order to have support from agriculture.

The art of public policy, in which NCGA has a pretty good track record, requires the ability to compromise and assess positions of strength and weakness. If one does not like a particular piece of proposed legislation, one can choose to oppose and hope to kill, or weigh in and hope to change and make it more palatable. This all depends on the strength of the power behind the legislation and is often a judgment call. In Washington, one often hears the phrase “If you’re not at the table, you’re on the table” with respect to a piece of seemingly onerous legislation that has a head of steam.

After hearing and assessing the facts surrounding the Waxman-Markey bill during its early days, the NCGA Corn Board determined that this piece of legislation had a head of steam and high probability of passage. Note the bullet points made above. The legislation in its early form had nothing in it to make it at all attractive to farmers and U.S. agriculture. In contrast, many of the provisions were extremely problematic. In essence, in this piece of legislation, U.S. agriculture was “on the table.” The Corn Board directed that NCGA should be “at the table” – and we have been.

To the great benefit of U.S. agriculture, Rep. Colin Peterson of Minnesota, chairman of the House Agriculture Committee, made the same determination and championed a very dramatic change in the proposed legislation. In essence, virtually all of the nine principles that U.S. agriculture had laid out for the legislation were amended in to it. NCGA, along with several other ag groups, was there with Chairman Peterson every step of the way. As a result of our being “at the table,” the climate change bill that recently passed in the House is dramatically different and much more favorable than the initial bill.

There are still many provisions in the legislation that concern many in agriculture and the general population. There is still raging debate over the bill’s scope, efficacy, need and ultimate impact on the climate, the environment and the economy and on U.S. agriculture. There are still many unknowns.

The “knowns” are essentially the same. See the list above; but add one more to it. Because NCGA chose to be “at the table”, we will be invited to be “at the table” again as this legislation now moves to the Senate. If we so choose, we will have more opportunity to help shape a final bill that at this point seems likely to pass in some form this year.

This is a very important piece of legislation dealing with a very important issue. It is crucial that NCGA’s membership clearly understand what is at stake and clearly understand the options so they can give clear direction to the Corn Board as we prepare for the next round.