Producers received two favorable decisions on regulatory matters last week. A federal court ruled earlier, some 63-thousand producers could not be exempted from a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency air emissions reporting requirement.
But the agency still doesn’t know how it will handle the requirement, so National Pork Producers Council spokesman Dave Warner says the D.C. U.S. Court of Appeals granted a delay.
NPPC is working with EPA to see how hog farmers and other livestock producers can more easily comply with air emissions reporting. Meantime, another regulation producers consider onerous— ‘Waters of the US’ or ‘WOTUS’—is likely to be ditched.
The EPA this week extended ‘til September 27th, the public comment period on the Trump Administration’s plans to repeal the much criticized WOTUS rule.
The Obama Administration proposed a sweeping expansion of EPA permitting authority over waterways, including upstream waters and intermittent and ephemeral streams that farmers use for drainage and irrigation. Farmlands adjacent to these waters would also be affected.
Major farm groups, homebuilders, and others spent years fighting the proposal, defended by environmental groups.
From the National Association of Farm Broadcasting News Service.