"Upstream Practices,
Downstream Effects" was the theme as members of the Penn State
Agricultural Council were updated on developments in agricultural nutrient
management and water quality issues at the council's recent meeting in
Kristen Saacke
Blunk, director of
The center targeted the nutrient
and sediment load that agriculture contributes to the Chesapeake Bay as a
starting point, Saacke Blunk
said, and it initiated several activities to address those topics, starting
with the state's first "Agriculture and Environment: Achieving
Balance" conference.
"The conference surpassed our
expectations for the numbers of participants who attended, representing most of
the major agricultural and environmental arenas," she said. "It
brought together engaged stakeholders to identify genuine problems and possible
solutions. It also shifted the discussion from scientific issues to presenting
a vision of what agriculture in balance would look like for
Several areas of potential emerged
from the conference, including improved calculations of ecosystem benefits that
working lands provide, such as the value of open space, carbon capture
potential, water-quality improvements, habitat and wetland banking and more.
"We're asking what the farm
provides that is not currently counted as a benefit to the community," Saacke Blunk said.
"Generation of water-quality credits, for example, has captured national
interest because it enables nonpoint sources to participate
in watershed protection by being counted for their reduction of pollutants
flowing from working lands, city streets and other sources. Carbon
sequestration is another example: Farmers are increasingly interested in
learning how to improve soil and crop sequestration of carbon -- or capture of
methane from manure storage areas -- to create credits that can be traded on
the Chicago Climate Exchange. We have farmers in the state who are already
doing it, and they're leading the rest of the nation."
Other findings from the conference
include the need for more conscientious land-use planning; improved
communication of what agriculture is already doing to address the state's
nutrient problem; the need for more effective partnerships, from local leadership
to conservation districts and farm groups; and the need to provide statewide
indicators of progress being made in achieving an agriculture sector that is in
balance.
"Economic constraints affect
everyone, so there's a need for more partnerships that can package those
limited resources and funnel them into areas where they can accomplish things
on a broad basis," Saacke Blunk
said. "Many organizations have goals of seeing their watersheds
unimpaired; those goals can provide windows for pulling partners together and
doing more."
Saacke Blunk cited the early success of the Conewago
Creek Watershed Restoration Plan, crafted by a local watershed association and
carried out with the support of three county conservation districts in central
"They’ve set regional and
community-level goals, because it's all about the local waters -- what you see
out back where the kids are fishing," she said. "If we can take that
and use it as a basis for action, we'll be taking steps toward our goal of a
clean