We covered the launch on our website if you’d like to read more.
The thing is the Environmental Working Group is calling our campaign “Greenwashing,” meaning that we’re trying to paint our industry as an environmentally friendly industry even though it’s not. Well, call me old fashioned, but when someone I love is attacked, it ruffles my feathers a bit and this blatant disregard for facts about corn farmers just doesn’t sit well with me.
The FACT is farmers are green.
CFC ads report data like “Thanks to new, innovative fertilization methods, today’s American corn farmers are producing 70% more corn per pound of fertilizer.” That data comes straight from the USDA and that data reflects an industry that is conscious of what they are using and placing on the land in their care. Show me another industry that is so environmentally conscious or has such a great story to tell.
The FACT is farmers are operating family (not corporate) farms.
I’ll speak from experience here; I know a lot of farmers. Every single one of them is just a regular, down home guy – the sort that would wave at a stranger from the cab of their pick-up truck, the sort that would stop and help you if you had car trouble, the sort that jumps from the tractor to the shower and speeds into town to watch their son’s t-ball game or their daughter’s dance recital.
EWG says that “There are thousands of large, plantation-scale corn factories dotting the American landscape, family-owned or not. And family ownership does not necessarily equal small. Agricultural supply giant Cargill is family-owned. So are the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Minnesota Twins.”
To compare the family farm I grew up on to the Minnesota Twins is the most absurd thing I’ve ever heard. My dad farms a lot of acres – some his own, some his brother’s, and some his neighbor’s that retired from farming. To the local farmer’s market consumer, I know he looks like a plantation owner. But he’s the one driving the tractor. He’s the one stressing over marketing decisions. He’s the one dealing with environmental regulations that EPA bureaucrats decide are relevant. He’s the one trying to make his small business work with only the help of a wife at home to support him and his dad at the end of the row to bring him a drink. I doubt Cargill and the Minnesota Twins are operated in the same manner.
And he’s not unique.
The FACT is farmers are using less land, not more.
EWG says that “According to a National Wildlife Federation report this year, the corn ethanol gold rush has been responsible for plowing up thousands of acres of pristine wildlife habitat (and prime carbon sequestration vegetation) and converting it to corn production.”
Well, I suppose that depends on who you feel is the authority.
Our federal government (the USDA), who runs the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) indicated that from 1982 to 2007, cropland acreage declined from about 420 million acres to 357 million acres. CRP, or acres returned their natural state, reflects more than half of that diverted acreage.
There are multiple other facts that EWG has gotten wrong, but you can read those for yourself.
At the end of the day, I’d say the only “greenwashing” we’re trying to accomplish is to make every other industry in the country green with envy at the wholesome, slow-paced, family environment in which we get to work and the fabulous story we have to tell about corn farmers that are conscious stewards of the land.
Eat your heart out, EWG.
Lindsay Mitchell
ICGA/ICMB Project Coordinator
Lindsay–
ReplyDelete“I know a lot of farmers. Every single one of them is just a regular, down home guy – the sort that would wave at a stranger from the cab of their pick-up truck, the sort that would stop and help you if you had car trouble, the sort that jumps from the tractor to the shower and speeds into town to watch their son’s t-ball game or their daughter’s dance recital.”
– Do you know this guy, Maurice Wilder?
http://www.wilderofficebuildings.com/
He’s a corn farmer too. He also lives in Florida and made his $500 million fortune building office and RV parks. He also happens to own thousands of acres of corn across several states for which the government has paid him millions in subsidies:
http://bit.ly/ceLdwo
I know lots of farmers as well, including my grandfather, uncle, cousins….some of the ones I know grow corn conventionally while other farmers are growing crops without pesticides and toxic fertilizers. Many of them receive no government assistance to produce their crop either. It still doesn’t change the fact that massive corn farms — privately owned or not — are engaging in environmentally damaging practices while being bankrolled by the US taxpayer.
“To compare the family farm I grew up on to the Minnesota Twins is the most absurd thing I’ve ever heard.”
– We didn’t make that comparison. We made the point that there are thousands of huge corn factories in America that happened to be privately owned. Just as there are thousands of smaller corn farms like the one owned by your father.
“Well, I suppose that depends on who you feel is the authority. Our federal government (the USDA), who runs the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) indicated that from 1982 to 2007, cropland acreage declined from about 420 million acres to 357 million acres. CRP, or acres returned their natural state, reflects more than half of that diverted acreage.”
– Since 2007 (the last year you conveniently cite), 7 million CRP acres have been lost, and many, including Pheasant Forever reps and DNR reps in IA point the finger at corn ethanol. North Dakota is expected to lose 1.5 million CRP acres in the next two years alone.
“There are multiple other facts that EWG has gotten wrong, but you can read those for yourself.”
–My hope is you can explain to us what those facts are that we got wrong. If we indeed did get the facts and data wrong, we’d like to know that.
Best
Don Carr, Environmental Working Group