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Sustainability and agricultural production are not mutually exclusive

USDA Chief Economist Rob Johansson says it’s possible to have both environmental and financial performance on a farm.

“It doesn’t have to be a zero sum game, which a lot of times you’ll see when we talk about putting on environmental regulations or requirements on farms to curtail their externality of production, which would be soil runoff, wind erosion, or nitrogen leaching,” he says.  

He says farmers are becoming more productive, which improves their bottom line and the environment.

“US agricultural producers are adopting new technologies all the time to try to help their bottom line and that does also help on the environmental performance side of things and if we look at incentivizing those types of practices, we can help nudge producers in the right direction,” he says.

Johansson says USDA programs like the Conservation Reserve Program and the Environmental Quality Incentive Program’s and Conservation Stewardship’s working lands programs can benefit growers.  

Audio: Rob Johansson, USDA