Washington-USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack on Sept. 24 announced a new initiative to improve water quality and the overall health of the Mississippi River Basin. Vilsack said the Mississippi River Basin Healthy Watersheds Initiative (MRBI) will provide approximately $320 million over the next four years for voluntary projects in priority watersheds located in Arkansas, Kentucky, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Ohio, Tennessee, and Wisconsin. The program’s goal is to help farmers and land owners voluntarily implement conservation practices that will avoid, control, and trap nutrient runoff. Participation in the initiative, which will be managed by USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) and funded by the Cooperative Conservation Partnership Initiative and other Farm Bill Conservation Title programs, will be made available through a competitive process for potential partners at the local, state, and national levels. “The Obama Administration is committed to taking bold steps with our state and local partners to clean up the entire Mississippi River Basin, a critical natural resource that provides drinking water for tens of millions of Americans,” said Vilsack. “Industrial, municipal, residential, and agricultural sources have all contributed pollutants to the waters of the Mississippi River Basin, and the MRBI will provide resources that will help us come together to address this issue.” The National Corn Growers Association said it strongly endorses the new initiative. “Farmers have long been carrying out many of the recommendations listed by the USDA as best practices, and their support will help us promote these efforts and expand their adoption throughout the basin,” said David Ward, chairman of NCGA’s Production and Stewardship Action Team. “We’ve always believed that an approach that values and promotes voluntary efforts works much better than regulatory mandates, which usually come at a much higher cost.” NCGA noted that nitrogen and phosphorus runoff from farms in the Mississippi River basin have long been cited as one factor in the seasonal hypoxic (low-oxygen) area in the Gulf of Mexico. The so-called “Dead Zone” in the Gulf is reportedly 65 percent square miles smaller than originally predicted this year, according to a new report from the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium and Louisiana State University. “This was surprisingly small given the forecast to be among the largest ever and the expanse of the dead zone earlier this summer,” said Dr. Nancy Rabalais, one of the scientists who made the earlier prediction. The study said the zone is smaller this year due in part to decreased water flow to the Gulf in July.
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