Moving forward with a devout faith in science.  This is the direction in which the Iowa AgriBusiness Association seems to be moving.  We had a chance to meet with Joel Brinkmeyer, the President of the association and talk about some of the issues that his organization is facing in its lobbying efforts.  President Brinkmeyer conveyed to us that the association’s focus at this time is on clean water and making sure that Iowa farmers are doing their part to reduce nitrogen run-off.  This effort echoes a familiar theme to that of the movie we viewed, Ocean Frontiers, which highlighted the specific efforts of voluntary stewardship programs within Iowa that are devoted to reducing the effects of the state’s agriculture practices on the hypoxia zone in the Gulf of Mexico.  The nitrogen fertilizers that farms use in their soil is often washed away due to rain and erosion where it ends up traveling down the Mississippi river and out into the Gulf.  The high amount nitrogen (and phosphorous present in the eroded soil) encourages an abnormally high amount of algae growth in turn lowering the oxygen content of the water at the mouth of the Mississippi.  This lower oxygen content in the water creates a dead zone in which little to no fish life can be supported.  The stewardship programs encourage farmers to use techniques such as cover crops to reduce soil erosion and nutrient run off.  They also fund projects in which farmlands are converted into wetland wildlife preserve areas.  These wetland areas help filter out some of the nutrients of the fertilizers as well as pesticides that are common in runoff water.  The voluntary programs are an attempt to prove that Iowa farmers can be relied on as responsible caretakers of the earth and soil that they depend on for their livelihood.  If programs such as these prove not to be effective, it is likely that future government mandates could force farmers to better adhere to conservation efforts.  But referring back to the opening comment about the direction that the AgriBusiness Association is taking–it is clear that a reliance on scientific innovation and the advancement of technology are the methods that this association believes will be the most beneficial and effective in terms of addressing our country’s agriculture needs.  They see precision agriculture and the use of genetically modified crops as the way to increase production to a level that will sustain the world’s population in addition to using those technologies to boost environmental conservation efforts.  This view is in direct contrast to those who believe that our agricultural system should return to the methods of the past and adopt smaller scale operation in a push for local food by which we could possibly lower our total carbon footprint with less dependability on technological advances.  Whichever model will be the best operation or if a combination of the two will be most beneficial is unknown, but the Iowa AgriBusiness Association has chosen its side.