Rominger Outlines USDA’s Climate Role

September 1, 2000

Deputy Secretary of Agriculture Richard Rominger, speaking in Des Moines, says USDA research efforts will be detailed next week in Lyon, France, when U.S. researchers present findings on carbon. It is expected they’ll explain how 300 million tons of carbon from forests were removed from the atmosphere in 1997, equivalent to 17% of total U.S. emissions of greenhouse gases. Crop and grazing lands removed another 20 million tons of carbon that same year.

"Our goal is to use these data to show the world that carbon sequestration in forests and agriculture soils can be measured and should be given credit as a means to reduce greenhouse gases in the atmosphere," Rominger said. "Apart from next week's session in France, the U.S. is now in very difficult negotiations with other countries on how to treat forests and agriculture within the Kyoto Protocol."

He continued, "It's our position that the Kyoto Protocol now addresses only a few limited land management practices, like afforestation and deforestation, and ignores the vast potential of improved forests, crop land, and grazing land management. Because we understand the critical relationship between forests, agriculture and climate change, we want their full inclusion in any agreement. The benefits will go well beyond global change to better soil, water and air quality."

The United States is pressing for comprehensive treatment of emissions and carbon removals from all human sources and sinks. "We're rejecting approaches by other countries that include only a few specific practices," Rominber said. "These approaches leave too many gaps. They ignore the heavy impact of poor land management practices on climate change worldwide. They ignore the beneficial actions of many countries to improve land management. And because they're incomplete, these partial accounting systems will be hard to measure and could well be inaccurate and misleading in measuring net emissions."

USDA also is working to triple the country’s use of bioenergy and bio-based products by 2010, he added. "Realizing this goal would generate as much as $20 billion a year in new income for farmers and rural communities, while cutting greenhouse gas emissions by as much as 100 million tons a year - the equivalent of taking more than 70 million cars off the road." The administration asked for a $46 million increase in our 2001 budget to promote the use of biobased products and bioenergy, up from $72 million this year.