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Here is a high-level list of policies that the incoming administration could implement at HHS to advance soil health as a foundational vehicle in the pursuit of human health. The policies are streamlined to highlight key initiatives and combined actions across agencies for maximum effectiveness. 

Soil health is the foundation for national food security. It is the bedrock of American public health and the key to the integrity and reliability of our country’s food system. Healthy soils are a vital path to resilience and prosperity for American producers.  

The following recommendations have been designed to provide specific guidance to the incoming presidential administration and focuses on high-level, actionable priorities for key agencies across the federal government to advance soil health.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Agricultural Statistics Services (NASS) recently requested information for content requests for the 2027 Census of Agriculture.

Land Core submitted comments and recommendations, building on the organization’s leadership around the importance of soil health practices and their ability to provide subsequent risk reduction, economic, and environmental benefits.

While there hasn’t been as much Farm Bill activity recently, the House and Senate Ag-FDA Appropriations bills both passed and await floor time — we’ve added these to our Federal Bill Tracker and outlined below. We’ve also continued to track Core Soil Health bills introduced since the beginning of the summer.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture recently sought public input on “Procedures for Quantification, Reporting, and Verification of Greenhouse Gas Emissions Associated With the Production of Domestic Agricultural Commodities Used as Biofuel Feedstocks.” Land Core submitted comments and recommendations, building on the organization’s leadership around the importance of consistent outcomes verification protocols in soil health (and related GHG) measurement, monitoring and reporting. The recommendations also weigh in on the diversity of crops that can be used for biofuels feedstocks while building soil health, and soil health practices that should be considered by USDA.

Land Core commends the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) for building upon the Growing Climate Solutions Act (GCSA) of 2021. The Department’s leadership on this topic sends an important signal to the agricultural community. We appreciated the opportunity to provide input on the proposed framework.

The last few months have seen a flurry of activity, as the House Agriculture Committee released their full Farm Bill text, and the Senate Agriculture Majority and Minority leaders both released summaries of their Farm Bill proposals.

By supporting voluntary financial incentives that complement existing conservation programs, farmers can be encouraged to adopt practices that prioritize soil health and long-term sustainability… We urge Congress to prioritize the following report language and program requests for the U.S. Department of Agriculture in FY25.

We're thrilled to share that our team’s first academic manuscript, titled “Diversified crop rotations mitigate agricultural losses from dry weather,” has been submitted for peer review! In the meantime, the "pre-print" manuscript is available on agriRxiv.

In the past month, little movement has occurred on the Farm Bill. In the Senate, Senators Debbie Stabenow (chair) and John Boozman (ranking member) have publicly expressed that they are still negotiating key aspects of the Farm Bill and don’t expect to release a draft until after the 2024 Presidential Election in November.

We added 9 bills in October and 14 in November to the Soil Health Bill Tracker. For bills introduced prior to October, 39 bills added at least one co-sponsor, showing that those bills have traction and support as we near the introduction of the Farm Bill.

The Land Core Risk Model is quantifying the economic risk-mitigation value of specific soil health practices by examining the correlation between the implementation of these practices over time and their impact on yield.

Despite the August recess, we still added 30 “Core” soil health marker bills to the Bill Tracker and dozens more “Secondary” bills.

With the Farm Bill fast-approaching (and the FY24 Appropriations and Senate Ag Committee Farm Bill request deadlines just behind us), members of the 118th Congress have been hard at work introducing in the last few weeks.

Land Core commends the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) for proposing a framework for measurement, monitoring, reporting, and verification (MMRV) of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions for the agriculture and forest sectors.

Explore the archive of our bill tracker alerts, which provide regular updates on soil health legislation in Congress.

With the Farm Bill fast-approaching (and the FY24 Appropriations and Senate Ag Committee Farm Bill request deadlines just behind us), members of the 118th Congress have been hard at work introducing in the last few weeks.

Land Core is pleased to provide input on the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) proposed Conservation and Landscape Health rule. Our comments elaborate on how and why the BLM might acknowledge and incentivize the opportunity to use the best standards for well-managed grazing for landscape restoration in partnership with ranchers, creating not only a win-win for the agency, ranchers, and national food security, but also a blueprint for the future of public-private partnerships in the pursuit of economically beneficial conservation.

Today, Land Core, along with a diverse group of 170 farms, businesses, and organizations, submitted a letter to Congressional Agriculture Committee leadership in support of the DEFER Act and its inclusion in the 2023 Farm Bill.

As lawmakers consider the array of new federal policies, programs, and incentives aimed at facilitating these new efficiency-focused technologies, we must address a crucial concern regarding the potential conflation of “economic efficiency” and “conservation efficiency”.