Posted on 12/29/2009 5:38:30 AM PST by FreeInWV
Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack has ordered his staff to revise a computerized forecasting model that showed that climate legislation supported by President Obama would make planting trees more lucrative than producing food. The latest Agriculture Department economic-impact study of the climate bill, which passed the House this summer, found that the legislation would profit farmers in the long term. But those profits would come mostly from higher crop prices as a result of the legislation's incentives to plant more forests and thus reduce the amount of land devoted to food-producing agriculture. According to the economic model used by the department and the Environmental Protection Agency, the legislation would give landowners incentives to convert up to 59 million acres of farmland into forests over the next 40 years. The reason: Trees clean the air of heat-trapping gases better than farming does. Mr. Vilsack, in a little-noticed statement issued with the report earlier this month, said the department's forecasts "have caused considerable concern" among farmers and ranchers. "If landowners plant trees to the extent the model suggests, this would be disruptive to agriculture in some regions of the country," he said. He said the Forest and Agricultural Sector Optimization Model (FASOM), created by researchers at Texas A&M University, does not take into account other provisions in the House-passed bill, which would boost farmers' income while they continue to produce food. Those omissions, he said, cause the model to overestimate the potential for increased forest planting. ... The legislation would give free emissions credits, known as offsets, to farmers and landowners who plant forests and adopt low-carbon farm and ranching practices. Farmers and ranchers could sell the credits to help major emitters of greenhouse gases comply with the legislation. .......p>
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtontimes.com ...
ping
This makes me want to turn my 40 acres of forest into a field.
Complete insanity. My arms are bleeding from pinching myself. Nightmare never ends.
What a crazy idea. Take the most productive segment of society and one where we as a nation have one of our last competitive advantages and put it to rest while we already have 10 percent unemployment and a real jobless rate of 17+ percent.
This ranks right up there with the idiots who want massive farms in Detroit.
According to his bio on the usda webpage http://www.usda.gov/wps/portal/!ut/p/_s.7_0_A/7_0_1OB?contentidonly=true&contentid=bios_vilsack.xml
I see his is a lawyer, no mention of an agricultural science degree. Surely it’s not too much to ask that the head of the USDA at the minimum, have major education and experience in the agricultural field? No wonder we’re up the creek without a paddle
Combine it with the plan to farm Detroit and stand in awe of the stupidity.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2415943/posts
In DC it is all about the process......not the product.
‘Billions of our tax dollars spent to raise our food prices.’
I believe that raising food prices is the exact plan.
Starvation is a great way of controlling and thinning a population.
The left’s primary objective has always been to depopulate the earth.The Gaia worshipers wish to return the planet as it was 1000 years ago with fewer people and untouched nature.
The left is telling the world EXACTLY what their goal is and everyone is getting to caught up in the details rather than listening.
There was a prediction of between 60 million to 100 million acres were be taken out of corn and beans in favor of trees.
We lose how many acres of forests to fire each year...and lose people, animals and plants as well. Take care of the forests we have and create in intelligent reforestation program. And by the way, screw the owls, the woodpeckers, the frogs...This land is our land!!!
Ha Ha What a bunch of idiots we have in DC.
And Iowa fell all over this guy ... couldn’t get enough of him. Glad I am no longer in that state of total dependency. Take that any way you want. Total morons.
I can solve the problem for free. Drop the plan to farm Detroit, (Which will cost billions) and farm the land that’s already cleared. The forests will regrow on the abandoned city lots for free.
This is putting the Conservation Reserve Program on steroids. Perhaps the existing CRP reserved land has been helpful in protecting watersheds and such. Almost tripling the reserve acreage through carbon credits will certainly distort food prices as ethanol production has. When the government motive is to provide a subsidy from one hand against an increased cost the government is going to create with another the result is never good. The only ones truly enriched will be the carbon traders and the government bureaucrats.
To the folks who question Vilsack’s credentials: you don’t need an advanced degree in ag econ to set up an honest cost benefit model on this. I would feel comfortable doing so myself just based on a little bit of life experience.
Oh, I’ve never seen an honest model come from the so-called environmentalists.
They really do want to take us back to the stone age.
We have the most efficient agriculture production system in the world; and they want to tear it down and revert to forests.
Insanity.
I think they want to push us bitter clingers into the cities where we can be more easily controlled.
Ag Dept’s own model shows “climate change” bill would destroy ag - so they look to change the model. Wonderful.
Don’t... you will miss the fiber. Government studies show how important fiber is to the diet.
This government is always thinking about our well being.
Welcome to the great Kenyan express!
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