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Up, up and awayLast week the buzz was about Proposition 2 from California and how the animal rights community is truly making an impact on food policy. This week everyone is talking about the "cow tax." First of all, let me start by saying what a mistake it is to refer to this permitting process as a tax on cows. In July the Environmental Protection Agency proposed that any entity that generates more than 100 tons of greenhouse gases annually would be required to get a permit. For those of us that do own cows, it would amount to $87 per beef cow and $176 per dairy cow. However, your church, lawnmower, snowmobile, hospital, coal-fired energy plant and drug store fall under the same regulations; so, to call it a "cow tax" does not tell the whole story. And we need to make sure that all American citizens understand how this will affect them. This is not just another tax on someone else for example--cattlemen, we refer to it as a cow tax but it is a law that will be imposed on all of us. Since I became aware of this proposal I have learned more about these greenhouse gases (GHGs) than I thought even existed. By the way, there are three gases that seem to be the focus of what are considered GHG and they are carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide. Since the Industrial Revolution, greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere have increased significantly: carbon dioxide (CO2) by 30 percent, methane (CH4) has doubled and nitrous oxide (N2O) is up by 16 percent. In an interesting phenomenon, wetlands contribute to global methane release by 25 percent but they also sequester carbon. Yes, wetlands are a major contributor to GHGs. Interestingly, as the government, including the current Bush administration, has attempted to increase the acres of wetlands in our nation, experts continually tout the ability of these protected areas to sequester carbon but they never mention the fact that they also produce methane. Methane is about 25 times more potent than carbon dioxide as a greenhouse gas; however, it survives for a shorter time in the atmosphere before being broken down by natural chemical processes. In fiscal year 2005, President Bush called for $4.4 billion to go toward conservation programs including the development and conservation of wetlands. How can you justify providing government incentives for every wetland when they are a major contributor of GHGs? The real thrust behind the government's desire to support the wetlands is the fact that during the colonial era of our nation, the area that now constitutes the 50 United States contained an estimated 392 million acres of wetlands. What were the GHG emissions then? Well, evidently Christopher Columbus didn't measure it or maybe he just forgot to record it for history. Once again we are looking back and thinking they were the "good, old days" instead of accepting the changing of the times. Earlier this year, scientists at Ohio State University released information from an ongoing research study that is designed to compare pulsing vs. steady-flow conditions in two experimental wetlands on the Columbus campus. "Pulsing refers to a number of different conditions in wetlands - river pulses that happen on a seasonal basis, two-per-day coastal tides, and the rare but huge ones, like hurricanes or tsunamis," said William Mitsch, the study's senior author and director of the Wilma H. Schiermeier Olentangy River Wetland Research Park at Ohio State. "Our point is that the healthiest systems and the ones with the lowest emissions of greenhouse gases are those that have these pulses and that are able to adapt to the pulses." Yet, our wise government has an entire division called the Army Corps of Engineers that works to create obstacles for Mother Nature that prevent her from doing what she needs to do through flooding by building dams and levies. Yes, I understand that much of what they do is aimed at protecting the personal property of the citizens of our nation but at some point common sense should prevail and we need to recognize that it really doesn't make sense to build a city below sea level and then spend billions of tax-payer dollars trying to keep it dry from now until forever. Yes, I am saying that the actions of our government have led to the creation of more GHG in our atmosphere than they have reduced. But once again they are trying to "fix" the situation they have created. Today's American bovine animal population stands just short of 100 million head. There are scientists that estimate that at one time the population of the North American buffalo herd in 1840 was as high as 80 million. Were the GHGs generated from the buffalo of yesterday different from those of the ruminant animals of today? Not likely. Furthermore, the government now owns 5,000 buffalo, 60,000 horses and 34 million deer not to mention all of the elk, moose, and big horn sheep that contribute to the level of GHGs. But perhaps I shouldn't even bring that up because as taxpayers, we will probably be charged a permit fee to pay Uncle Sam's portion of the proposed tax. The bottom line is that we are compiling more information than we as humans have the ability to rationally sort through. Yes, living things do create gases, but Mother Nature has a tremendous way of correcting all things. Furthermore, with the world population at 6.7 billion and growing, we need an ever-increasing amount of food. If officials in the United States choose to over-regulate us out of the food business, I am sure other countries would gladly pick up the slack and produce it for us. Oh, wait. Hasn't that happened before with clothes, steel and, of course, OIL? The best part of all of this is that these taxes are being proposed in the name of preventing Global Warming, when evidence shows that the temperature on earth has been cooling for the past 10 years. Editor's note: Trent Loos is a sixth generation United States farmer, host of the daily radio show, Loos Tales, and founder of Faces of Agriculture, a non-profit organization putting the human element back into the production of food. Get more information at www.FacesOfAg.com, or e-mail Trent at trent@loostales.com. 12/1/08 Date: 11/26/08
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