(upbeat music) - Hello and welcome to this episode of Farm Connections.

I'm your host Dan Hoffman.

On today's episode we talk to Jim Nichols to discuss the effects climate change is having on agriculture and what we can do to reverse its effects.

We meet with Stu Lourey, Government Relations Director for the Minnesota Farmers Union, and the University of Minnesota Extension provides us with the new best practices, all here today on farm connections.

(upbeat music) - [Narrator 1] Welcome to Farm Connections with your host Dan Hoffman.

- [Narrator 2] Farm connections made possible in part by.

- [Narrator 1] Absolute Energy, a locally owned facility produces 125 million gallons of ethanol annually, proudly supporting local economies in Iowa and Minnesota.

Absolute Energy, adding value to the neighborhood.

Minnesota Corn Growers Association, working to identify and promote opportunities for corn growers, enhance quality of life, and help others understand the value and importance of corn production to America's economy.

EDP Renewables North America owner-operator of Prairie Star and Pioneer Prairie Wind Farms, Minnesota and Iowa, EDPR wind farms and solar parks provide income to farmers and help power rural economies across the continent.

- Welcome to Farm Connections.

Our guest today is Jim Nichols.

Former Minnesota Department of Ag Commissioner.

Welcome Jim.

- Thank you, glad to be with you, thank you.

- Jim, give us a little background about your time as commissioner.

- Well, I was there for most of the 1980s, took office in '83 and left in '91.

So went through the whole farm crisis as a commissioner and averaged over 1,000 phone calls a week in my office.

Farmers were really struggling and we had 103,000 farmers back then and well one-third of them were facing bankruptcy.

It was a very serious situation.

Farm prices had collapsed.

We had way too much surplus, our grain bins were full on the farm, my bins were full, grain elevators were full.

Corn was piled on the ground and it was so bad that Cargill was storing corn on their barges on the river.

So we had a huge surplus and very low production, and we needed to stop as many bankruptcies as we could and help farmers through that process.

And one of the things we did at the Ag Department with the governor and others is we put into law that before they could file bankruptcy on a farm, they had to first sit down with the farmer and maybe his family and try and work out a solution.

And we were responsible for that at the Ag Department, 10,000 farmers and their bankers went through our program and we worked out a lot of solutions and they were able to stay on the farm - Jim, thank you for that background.

Not only were you commissioner of agriculture, you farmed at that time and still do, correct?

- I farmed all my life, I grew up on a farm.

Bought my farm here in the same township where I was born more than 40 years ago.

So I'm out here planting more than 40 crops right now.

So it's my whole life.

And I continued to farm when I was a commissioner on the weekend and as a state senator I farmed and I enjoy it and some years it ain't so good, but I'm lucky, I bought my land when land was cheap.

Today we wanna talk about climate change.

Can you help us define what this thing called climate change really is?

- Well, thank you and as a farmer, every farmer, we deal with it more than anybody.

I always say we make our living off six inches of topsoil and a good rain, and the climate has to be good.

So I hope everybody understands how serious it is.

First of all, climate change is just carbon dioxide trapped in the atmosphere.

And we now are emitting in the world, 37 billion tons of carbon dioxide, which is twice as much as we can handle.

We need to go back to 18 billion, which is where we were 40 or 50 years ago.

So our problem is carbon dioxide, and when you think about climate change and how serious it is, think about just this year, Dan, you know, on my farm I had a drought, two years ago in 2019 I had floods, last year I had a good crop, but just this year, much of the Western States have had fires, a lot might have burned up.

In the Midwest we had a severe drought through most of the Corn Belt.

On the East Coast they had floods, severe floods, and the Southern States got hit with hurricanes.

So it's hit our whole country very hard and this is all caused by climate change.

- Jim you spoke of the CO2 emissions and you framed a time period of 40 or 50 years.

What's changed in that 40 or 50 years, what's causing it?

- Thank you, well, it's pretty clear what's causing it.

When you look at the climate change graphs, 41% of all carbon dioxide comes from burning coal, and 25% of it comes from burning oil.

So two thirds of all the CO2 in the world comes from coal and oil.

And truthfully the only solution to that is stop burning so much coal and oil, there aren't any other solutions.

50 years ago we didn't have nearly as many coal plants generating electricity because we didn't have that many people in America and we didn't have the huge demands for electricity back then that we do now.

So now we have a lot of coal plants and some of them are being closed, here in Minnesota, you know, Xcel Energy and Otter Tail and Elite, they're all closing coal plants and we really have to commend them for that.

Now we have to replace that with something and I wanna talk about that.

Now let's talk about oil for a little bit, 25% of all the carbon dioxide comes from oil, most of it gasoline.

So gasoline is causing huge problems as is coal and I believe that we have a very good solution on hand with ethanol, and the best thing about living in the Midwest and being a farmer is we can replace the oil, gasoline with ethanol and we can replace the coal with wind turbines.

And if you see the maps of the United States, the NASA map shows that the most productive place on earth to grow anything is the Corn Belt right here in America, that's the world map NASA, and then the world map of wind shows that the most productive place for wind turbines is right here in the Midwest all the way from Canada to Mexico.

So we have the solution right here with us.

It's our own farm land and our own farmers and the crops that we produce, the wind it blows, and of course the sunshine is here too, but we really have the tools here to solve this problem, go a long ways and we need to start working more on that, moving forward with those tools.

- Jim, agriculture's really important for food, fuel, feed and fiber.

How else can we use it, for example with climate change?

- Well, and people don't know this, unfortunately, and I didn't know when I started farming either, so thank you for getting the word out more.

Every acre of corn absorbs 18 tons of carbon dioxide per acre, and because you're bringing in carbon dioxide, CO2, it releases 18 tons of oxygen per acre.

So in my farm with my corn, I absorb 4,500 tons of carbon dioxide every year and release 4,500 tons of oxygen.

So to me, it's the best thing ever.

Now, we always knew the trees absorbed a lot of carbon dioxide, and that's very true and you've seen the pictures of it, the Amazon River Basin, the whole Amazon basin in Brazil and others, they absorb each year, 2.2 billion tons of carbon dioxide and release 2.2 billion tons of oxygen.

It was actually called the lungs of the world.

Now a lot of that land is being farmed.

They burned the trees and plowed up the land.

So the Amazon River Basin is, and they haven't been able to get the latest figures, but it's only absorbing a fraction of the CO2 that it used to.

But now let's go back to corn, at 18 billion tons per acre, we have 100 million acres last year with 97 million acres, 100 million acres would absorb 1.8 billion tons of carbon dioxide and release 1.8 billion tons of oxygen.

We gotta grow our way out of this crisis.

You know, it doesn't work at all to suck the carbon dioxide out of the plants when they burn the coal or anything else, 'cause it's hard to capture it and then what are you gonna do with it?

If you capture that carbon dioxide and you're gonna put it into a liquid form because again, storing it, you couldn't build enough big tanks.

And so they're doing this in Texas and they're building an oil company that will absorb 900 tons of carbon dioxide and they don't know what to do with it so they're forcing it into the ground to pump out more oil.

Well, for me, 4,500 tons that I absorb at farm, I do say 900 tons, that's a small cornfield.

What good is that and it's costing them a fortune to do it.

And the real problem with carbon dioxide is what do you do with it?

There isn't really anything you can do with carbon dioxide.

You have to absorb it in living, growing plants and trees, we need more trees.

But the problem with the tree it takes 40 years to reach full height.

So we need something to grow very quickly and corn does that.

- What are the consequences if we don't turn climate change a different direction?

- Boy, that is very serious.

One of the most serious problems is that it's getting so warm in Alaska and Siberia.

I mean, a couple of years ago it was warmer in Ankeny than it was in Lake Benton in the winter time.

So what that's doing up there it's melting the permafrost and people don't realize that thousands and thousands of years ago, Siberia and Alaska, they were rainforest really.

And as those trees fell down and decayed they were covered over with some soil, but more importantly, a living plant that's out there decaying is like garbage in your house.

As it decades, it's gonna create methane, just cold hard facts of life.

That methane is now trapped down there by the permafrost.

But if you melt the permafrost that methane is gonna come out, and methane stops 30 times more sunlight, more heat than coal and people don't realize that the sun, thank God for the sun, when it keeps us too hot, the earth is too hot if we capture everything so much of our heat actually goes out into space and we don't need it.

It's kind of crazy that that's what to it.

So that's why the earth has become so warm is the carbon dioxide that's up there I always say it's like a greenhouse, you know, you build a greenhouse, put glass over it, you can grow stuff in the wintertime because you're capturing the heat.

Well, that's the greenhouse effect if you will.

It's like having a greenhouse over the entire earth.

So we're capturing the heat and we don't let the heat go out into the atmosphere just as it couldn't be at a greenhouse.

So we're trapping all the heat and that's what's happening to us, it's just too hot.

And you know, hot water in the ocean causes hurricanes, hot water, hot air, hot winds, start a little fire out west and it just keeps on going.

And we're gonna start running out of water.

We got a serious crisis and we have to stop it now.

And the big thing is we have to stop it now because if we start releasing the methane out of Siberia and Alaska and other country, Greenland, I hate to even calculate what it would be that methane would to do, but it'd be a lot worse than carbon dioxide.

- Great point, so if we work with government and farmers, where do we start?

- Well, thank you.

We're gonna start here in Minnesota 'cause that's where we started in 1991.

We need to pass our E15 ethanol right here, and we tried very hard to do it in the last session, but it's, you know, it's funny how politics works.

One of our best supporters is Torrey Westrom, the Chair of the Ag Committee in the Senate Republican, great guy.

And so he got out of his committee right away, but one of our biggest enemies was Rick Hansen in the house, Liberal Democrat and kind of destroyed it in the environment committee.

So Torrey said to me, we got an unholy alliance here, we got the conservatives and the liberals banded together against ethanol.

And we have to get beyond that, I mean, people need to know how good for the environment that ethanol really is.

And we need to pass our E15 law and I hope and pray we do it in the next legislative session.

Then we got to hope that Congress goes on and passes E15 nationwide, and you see with E15 you don't have to change all the pumps and tanks and everything, as you get more concentration of ethanol it gets harder but E15 doesn't really require much at all to do that, you just, and if people don't like it don't put that sticker on the pump, they're just gonna be using every gallon of gasoline, that's the way it works in Minnesota, that's the law, that's they way I wrote it, every gallon of gasoline would be 10% ethanol end of discussion.

And it's all blended in with the big stations where, you know, those huge tank farms, that's where it's blended in and people they don't know and it runs good, runs better, and sometimes you're better off if people don't know and burn E15 ethanol, it's such a cheap, quick and easy solution 'cause ethanol's cheaper than gasoline.

We need to do that and yes, I understand it's a mandate, that's the way I passed the law in '91, but it's the only way to get people to use it and then you automatically blend it at the big tank farms and it comes in a semi-truck to your gas station, that's what you get.

And then diesel, I mean, now most of our diesel is 20% blend of soybean oil.

So we're doing a lot of stuff already.

And thank God we are because Minnesota has always been a leader, but we need to do more, we need to do it quickly and we need to get all the states to do the same as we're doing.

- Jim, Former Commissioner of Minnesota Department of Ag, thank you for joining us today.

- Thank you for having me, and I really like this 'cause you get the word out to the farmers that we are a big part of the solution.

- Stay tuned for more on Farm Connections.

- [Narrator 3] Farm Connections, best practices brought to you by.

(upbeat music) - I am Liz Stahl, Crops Educator at the University of Minnesota Extension, and for today's best practices segment, I'm going to talk about some of the best management practices for seeding a cover crop in the fall.

Number one would be timing, if you're planting an overwintering cover crop like cereal rye, try to see that cover crop as soon as you can in the fall.

The University of Minnesota research has shown that cereal rye biomass was greatest in the fall and the spring when seeding occurred by mid to late September versus later on in the year.

And it's important to have more biomass because the more biomass that you have, the more likely that you'll have soil health benefits, and also other potential benefits like weed control potentially from the cover crop.

And number two would be timing, related to timing, you want to try to see that cover crop when you have adequate moisture or rain in the forecast.

Adequate moisture can be one of the most limiting factors when we are trying to get a cover crop established in the fall.

Number three, drill the cover crop if you can.

We have seen the most consistent establishment with cover crops are drilled, as it can get the best seed to soil contact this way and up the seeding is more controlled the soil as well.

Other options do include aerial seeding or broadcast with a ground rig, but in these cases you probably wanna use a little higher seeding rate, again, just to help get a better establishment.

Number four, you don't need to get too complicated.

For example, if you want an overwintering cover crop, cereal rye has been a go-to cover crop in Minnesota for many reasons, it's been the most reliable species to establish, it overwinters in Minnesota, seeds are usually available at a relatively low cost, research has shown it can provide soil health benefits, and that it's relatively easy to terminate in the spring with a timely herbicide application.

It's also tolerant to many of the herbicides that we do use commonly in a corn soybean system.

Now number five would be to start small.

There'll be a learning curve just as with anything else, and when you're starting with cover crops there's going to be a learning curve.

So it's easier to deal with issues if you're starting small, on a smaller number of acres, than say trying it out on all of your acres.

Number six, watch your herbicide program.

You also don't wanna control your cover crop with whatever herbicide that you used earlier on in the season.

So make sure you're checking those labels to make sure that you can get successful establishment of the cover crop that you're planting.

Also, you wanna make sure that if you're planning to graze that cover crop, that you're following any rotation restrictions.

So again, you're not going to have any issues with grazing that cover crop.

Number seven, make sure you adequately terminate that cover crop.

You don't wanna have competition from the cover crop negatively impact your cash crop the following year.

Number eight would be to make sure that you're being in contact with your crop insurance person as well with your cover crop plans, because you don't wanna have run into any issues or surprises with your crop insurance coverage, just in case, again, make sure that you're all on the same page with your cover crop plans.

And number nine, last but not least, to make sure that you're utilizing any resources and tools that are available.

Check out the University of Minnesota Extension website.

we have one dedicated to cover crops, that's at c.umn.edu/cover-crops, we also have a lot of links to other great resources on this page as well.

So I'm Liz Stahl, Crops Educator with the University of Minnesota Extension, and that was today's best practices segment.

- Welcome back to Farm Connections, we're in Zumbrota, Minnesota with Stu Lourey from Minnesota Farmers Union.

Welcome to Farm Connection.

- Thanks so much, Dan, appreciate you having me.

- Well, it's great to have you and you work for a great organization, but you have a really a great history that brings you to this point, tell us about that.

- Yeah, I like to think, well, first and most importantly, I grew up on a farm and as a Farmers Union member.

So, proud of that fact, my grandparents remember Stu, I grew up in Pine County with Commissioner Thom Petersen, we bookend Pine County and my family we raised beef cattle and sold organic apples to the co-ops there.

So we fit that in among the pine trees up in Northeastern, Minnesota, went to school down in Northfield, worked in politics out of school.

So I worked for then Senator Alan Franken and worked for Senator Tina Smith, had the opportunity to do a lot of work on rural health care, which I am very, very passionate about and then found my way to the team at Farmers Union and here I direct our government relations work.

- And Stu, why is that important?

- Yeah, so, you know, when I'm doing my job well, Dan, I think that I am helping our members who are here at the Covered Bridge Restaurant tonight, they're discussing policy resolutions, which are basically their vision for what would make life on their farm, in their community and agriculture in this state better.

And so they take those ideas, the conversations like this, they debate them and refine them and make them better, both here at county conventions and then at our state convention, that goes into a policy book and I have the honor of taking that book and those ideas to the state legislature and working with partners they're often involved in our members to help drive on those policy priorities and get that stuff done.

So really important and I'm really excited to do it.

- It sounds grassroots.

- Yes, 100% and we take that seriously.

I think, you know, you probably know this talking to me for just a couple of minutes, but if I go to the legislature and say, hey, Stu's got a great idea, who cares, right?

But if I say, hey, our grassroots membership is experiencing this thing on their farm in this particular way, and here's the opportunity to make it better, that legislators listen to, folks in their district coming up with solutions to problems that other constituents are facing, that matters and that's where we have power, and the power of our people and the base that makes our organization.

- Well, we have a very diverse state, diverse in terms of people, geography, soils, and certainly distance, when we look at the Canadian border all the way down to the Iowa border, you referenced Pine County, book ending it, that's a big deal, but think about the entire state, right?

- Yes, absolutely, absolutely.

And I think about that all the time and I think that's why I'm interested in being a member and working as part of Farmers Union is we're a big tent organization.

So of course we're statewide, but we also represent members of all production types, sizes, you know, we have of course members who are doing, you know, conventional rotation of corn and soybeans, but we also have members who are growing four acres of vertically raised vegetables and hoop houses and earning a living off of that, and probably have a really good farm business management instructor in some cases who's helping them figure out those revenue streams, right?

And I think when you bring folks together who are all involved in agriculture, they're all involved in feeding people, clothing people, making sure vehicles run right, but doing it in very diverse ways, I think it makes for some really interesting policy discussions and when I go to the Capitol I'm very rarely able to say, hey everyone at Farmers Union members agrees on this issue.

But what I go say is, hey, we talked about this at conventions, we debated it at state convention and here's the consensus that we came to about what would be best for the state and best for agriculture.

And I think that's what we need more of, is people talking about problems and coming to consensus and it's cool that we have an organization like this that does that.

- Stu, can you talk at all to the farmers contribution to our state economically?

I mean, they pay real estate taxes, they hire people, they pay W2 wages, they pay social security Medicare in for their employees plus themselves, they make a huge contribution, plus all the things they buy, can you elaborate on that at all?

- Yeah, a huge contribution and I always think too, I mean, it is not just that farm, right?

It's the air duct installer who's come in and doing that work in the dairy barn, it's the folks building the pole buildings.

It's the folks pouring concrete.

It's the consultants coming in and help in, you know, farmers try out new practices, like cover crops in some areas, you know, there's really exciting work happening, and the work that's happening is because of the community that surrounds farms and that's what those businesses enable, and I think that that's what makes me really excited.

I always think growing up on a livestock farm we had a small number of beef cattle, but I think growing up in a rural area, sometimes you don't see folks as often, you know, over the summer before I could drive, I can remember being a kid right.

And, you know, if it wasn't family, if there was someone driving down our driveway, who I knew and who we were in relationship with and in community with it was a farrier or a veterinarian, or someone who coming to check out the cows 'cause they wanted to buy, you know, and it was because of the livestock, right?

It built community, it built economic wealth.

And like, we need the need, need, need, need more of that to make sure that our communities continue to be vibrant.

And I think that's what farms bring.

- Sounds like you're talking about sustainability as well.

- Absolutely, absolutely, yes.

It's the central tenants, I mean, I think, you know, if there's one thing that I hear that drives our members and that makes the hard work of being involved in agriculture worth it, it's being able to pass that operation, that generational wealth onto the next generation, or be able to, you know, build it in the first place to pass onto your kids.

And I think that's a core tenant of sustainability, you know, taking care of our land, our water, what sustains us, I think that's part of the ethic that I think, you know, farmers bring to the state.

- Well said Stu, thank you so much.

- Well, thanks, Dan, appreciate it.

- Stay tuned for more on Farm Connections.

When we confront the issues of today, that time and effort is paid forward for the generations of tomorrow.

By being better stewards of land now, we ensure our children will be able to benefit in the future.

I'm Dan Hoffman, thanks for watching Farm Connections.

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