Iowa Water Task Force: Give Farmers Cheap Loans To Incentivize Conservation
January 15, 2016 A task force designated to find solutions to Iowa’s water quality problems says the state should offer low-interest loans or grants for farm improvements tied to conservation efforts that could help clean up waterways, reports Donnelle Eller with The Des Moines Register.
The recommendation is one of several to be released Friday by the task force of business, farm and environmental leaders that will “put us in the needed direction” for improving water quality, said Ralph Rosenberg, executive director of the Iowa Environmental Council. “It provides a sense of urgency that’s been missing.”
Other key recommendations from the Greater Des Moines Partnership water quality task force call for creating:
- Watershed management authorities that would develop plans across the state for improving Iowa’s water and soil. Members could include farmers, landowners, drainage districts, cities, counties and other groups.
- A deadline of 2030 to meet the Iowa Nutrient Reduction Strategy, a plan designed to reduce the nitrogen and phosphorus levels that contribute to the Gulf of Mexico dead zone. The plan, criticized for failing to have a deadline, would mirror the national deadline for improvement. Iowa’s plan seeks to reduce nutrients by 45% from rural and urban sources.
The recommendations come on the heels of Gov. Terry Branstad’s proposal to pump as much as $4.7 billion by 2049 into water quality efforts. Branstad would find the money by extending for another 20 years a 1-cent sales tax that currently funds infrastructure for K-12 public schools and diverting some of the revenue to water quality.
Head on over to The Des Moines Register for the full breakdown from Eller.
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