NSAC Archives for the 'CAFOs' Category
Path to the 2012 Farm Bill: Senate Markup – Conservation Title
Monday, April 30th, 2012
Note to Readers — This is the fourth in a series of posts on the 2012 Farm Bill reported out of the Senate Agriculture Committee on April 26. With respect to conservation issues, previous posts have covered the Conservation Stewardship Program and sodsaver/highly erodible land and wetland conservation. This post covers other conservation title programs. Read the Rest…
Update: Agriculture & Animal Welfare
Thursday, February 2nd, 2012
U.S. Supreme Court Strikes Down California Law on Downed Animals Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court issued an opinion in the case National Meat Association v. Harris that strikes down a California law with requirements for how slaughterhouses handle pigs that cannot walk, referred to in the law as “nonambulatory.” The California law requires slaughterhouses Read the Rest…
EPA Releases Water Pollution Data Tool
Tuesday, January 31st, 2012
The EPA has just released the Discharge Monitoring Report (DMR) Pollutant Loading Tool, an online database system that allows users to track polluters included in the database. Under the Clean Water Act, facilities with National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permits report discharge data to the EPA. The EPA has pooled and classified some of this Read the Rest…
New Regulatory Certainty Program Announced in Minnesota
Wednesday, January 18th, 2012
On Tuesday, January 17, Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Lisa Jackson, Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton, and USDA’s Chief of the Natural Resources Conservation Service Dave White met in Minnesota to announce a new partnership between the State, USDA, and EPA. Through the partnership, producers would receive immunity, also known as Read the Rest…
EPA Extends Comment Period for Proposed CAFO Reporting Rule
Wednesday, December 21st, 2011
On Monday, December 19, the EPA announced that it is extending the comment period on a proposed rule with requirements for Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) to report specific information about the their operations to the agency. Comments are now due January 19, 2012. EPA has issued a fact sheet with information on submitting comments. Read the Rest…
NRCS Updates Nutrient Management Standard
Monday, December 19th, 2011
Last week, USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) released an updated version of its nutrient management standard, also known as conservation practice standard 590 (CPS 590). NRCS practice standards delineate the steps that a producer may or must take in order to receive payments for a particular conservation practice under NRCS conservation programs. According to Read the Rest…
Final FY 2012 Agriculture Funding Levels Agreed Upon
Tuesday, November 15th, 2011
On Tuesday, November 15, House and Senate negotiators reached a compromise deal on a fiscal year (FY) 2012 appropriations “minibus” (H.R. 2112) which includes the FY 2012 agriculture appropriations bill. The minibus will now be sent back to both chambers of Congress for a final vote before being sent to the President for his signature Read the Rest…
EPA Proposed Rule for CAFO Information Reporting Falls Far Short
Friday, November 4th, 2011
In October, EPA issued a proposed rule for obtaining information from Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) under Section 308 of the Clean Water Act. This purposed rule exempts critical information from CAFO reporting requirements, which leaves huge gaps in EPA’s ability to regulate CAFO waste effectively. The proposed rule is required by a settlement between Read the Rest…
USDA and FDA Data on Antibiotic Resistance Is Deficient
Friday, September 16th, 2011
Industrialized livestock and poultry operations are the major users of antibiotics and related drugs in the U.S. A Food & Drug Administration (FDA) assessment estimated that in 2009, 29 million pounds of antibiotics were given to food-producing animals. These drugs are routinely used at low doses in overcrowded Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) to Read the Rest…
United Egg Producers Act to Improve Welfare
Thursday, July 7th, 2011
United Egg Producers (UEP), an industry association representing 80 percent of US egg producers, today announced it will join with NSAC member The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) to urge Congress to enact a law that will require $4 billion in animal welfare improvements to be phased in over the next 15 to Read the Rest…
