AgWired

Who knew that there was an “Official Blog of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency”? And who would have imagined that a federal agency would allow contributions to it by government employees who want to promote their particular lifestyle or agenda?

An intern at the Office of Children’s Health Protection (whatever that is) who is a “sophomore studying non-profit management at Indiana University” penned a little missive on the EPA blog today titled “Living Without Meat.” The guest blogger talks about how she “never really enjoyed the taste” of meat, and after seeing “a graphic showing of a pig slaughter” in elementary school she stopped “eating pig” and eventually became a “full-on vegetarian.”

That’s great for her since she doesn’t like the taste of meat or the idea of killing animals. But she then proceeds to give us environmental reasons why no one should eat meat and cites outdated or sketchy sources to back her up. One example, “the British group, VegFarm” (maybe a rock band?) to which she provides no link – and I could not find any in Google searches, although I did find a couple of references to this alleged group. According to our EPA blogger, the authoritative VegFarm says that “a 10-acre piece of land can feed 60 people when used for the production of soybeans, 24 people when used for wheat, 10 people when used for corn, and only a mere 2 people when used for cattle.” She also vaguely cites “a book written by Paul and Anne Ehrlich” – which is probably “The Population Bomb” written in 1968 in which they claimed food production could not keep up with population growth and predicted that “hundreds of millions” of people would starve to death in the 1970’s and 1980’s. Later editions reportedly took out that reference since it never happened.

The EPA blogger/intern concludes that “the easiest way to lessen the environmental impacts is to become a vegetarian or vegan.” What is most astounding about this is that the EPA has a disclaimer on the blog which says, “The opinions and comments expressed in Greenversations are those of the authors alone and do not reflect an Agency policy, endorsement, or action, and EPA does not verify the accuracy of the contents of the blog.”

WTF???!!! That’s like a company having a blog and letting any employee (or intern) write whatever they want on it without supervision, even if it might alienate its customers. And this is paid for with OUR TAX DOLLARS!!!! This is just simply WRONG! No disclaimer can correct that. And this from an administration where officials will hardly give you the time of day, much less an interview, without checking to make sure it’s okay with the higher ups.

Add your comments to the EPA blog post here. And while you’re at it, write your congressman and ask why our tax dollars are being used to fund this.

Jeff Fowle is a northern California farmer with a very diversified operation and he’s also a founding board member of the AgChat Foundation. He’s the next interview in my series with all the board and advisory board members of the newly formed Agvocacy group.

As the fourth generation to farm and ranch at his current location, and raising the fifth, it is extremely important to Jeff that the land remains productive, the environment healthy and the water plentiful. “Engaging in a positive manner through social media and other outlets is essential in order to effectively communicate with the public what, why and how we do what we do. An educated public and consumer, is agriculture’s best insurance policy for future generations to share our passion and commitment to providing the safest, most abundant and affordable food supply in the world. It is an honor and a privilege to be able to work with such a diverse and enthusiastic group of agvocates on what is certain to be a most rewarding endeavor.”

Jeff says that he sees farmers using computers and the internet in three main areas. The first one is for communications and to keep farm records of various kinds. Another one is to make online purchases and he’s seeing more and more of his friends doing so for things like used equipment parts. Then he sees another growing area of new technology being used by farmers to reach out to that part of the population that has questions about what farmers do. He says he definitely falls into this category and is using social media as an avenue to teach and educate. He wants to know things like, “What does the public think about us? What is their perception? What can we do to make sure the proper information is out there for them to base their decisions when they go to the store or to the voting booth?”

Jeff is a very passionate AgChat Foundation board member. He says the mission can be summed up by pointing to the four key program areas: Agvocacy 2.0 training; Agvocacy strategic campaigns; Data Analysis and Technology scholarships. The goal of all these program areas is to assist farmers who want to become advocates for agriculture.

You can listen to my interview with Jeff here.