By Rep. Paul Anderson
The committee in the Minnesota House that has control over the agriculture budget held a hearing Oct. 7 to focus on a recent Pollution Control Agency report concern nitrogen loading in the Mississippi and Minnesota Rivers. I told the committee that since October is a very busy time on Minnesota farms with harvest activity in full swing, it may be difficult for ag. interests to break away from fall harvest to testify in St. Paul. It seems to me that nearly any other time of the year would be better to conduct a hearing where the primary focus would be on farming practices.
Committee members were given a summary of the study, and a 60-day comment period was also initiated. Public review and comment will be accepted until Dec. 18, after which the recommendations contained in the report may be altered before finalization. The report will then serve as a guide for the reduction of nutrients in waters throughout the state.
Key findings in the report include research showing that more than 70 percent of nitrates in the two rivers come from cropland, with the rest coming from sources such as wastewater treatment plants, septic and urban runoff, forest and the atmosphere. Municipal wastewater contributes about 9 percent of the statewide nitrate load.
The loss of nitrogen from cropland occurs in two different ways, one being the leaching of nitrates through the soil profile, with the other being the movement of water and nutrients through drainage systems. The study showed that tile drainage accounts for the largest loss of fertilizer.
The highest nitrate-yielding watersheds in the state are the Cedar, Blue Earth, and the Le Sueur in south-central Minnesota.
Among the comments made by other legislators during the hearing was an observation that voluntary conservation practices may not be working well enough, and another that farmers may need to shoulder more of the cost of implementing those practices. Currently, cost-share money is available for many of the conservation practices put into place by farmers.
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Another hearing of the same Environment, Natural Resources, and Ag Finance Committee was held the next day to discuss and take testimony on the conversion of forest land in northern Minnesota into agricultural land for the production of potatoes. A timber and logging company is in the process of selling 60,000 acres of land it owns in the area north and west of Staples in Cass, Wadena, Hubbard, and Becker Counties. Some of the land, about 5,000 acres, has been purchased by a large potato-growing company and they have proposed converting 1,459 of those acres into potato production. According to a company official who testified at the hearing, they have no plans to actually increase their production of potatoes, but would like to move some of their acres from a three-year to a four-year rotation.
Testimony centered on what would happen to the water in the area if farming and irrigation were to be permitted. An official from the Pollution Control Agency testified that streams in the area are currently in “good shape” and have very low levels of nitrates although phosphorus occurs naturally at high levels. Concerns were raised about how irrigation and the application of fertilizers would affect those streams, along with the underground water known as the Pinelands Sands Aquifer.
No action was taken by the committee, and it was pointed out that, in general, land use laws and restrictions are created and administered by local units of government. However, the conversion of at least 640 acres of forest to a different “open space land use” triggers a mandatory Environmental Assessment Worksheet.
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