What Does Vilsack's Appointment Mean for the Future of Organic Food and Public Lands?

By Ari LeVaux, AlterNet. Posted December 18, 2008.

According to Matthew Koehler, executive director of the WildWest Institute in Missoula, Mont., "I'd have a hard time believing that the former governor of Iowa has much experience with the myriad of issues facing public lands management. Hopefully, he realizes that forest ecosystems are very different from agriculture crops."

In an interview last May, then candidate Barack Obama told me: "As president, I would direct the Environmental Protection Agency to strictly monitor and regulate pollution from large factory farms, with tough fines for those that violate environmental standards.  I also support efforts to provide more meaningful local control over these factory farms."

Where Vilsack stands on these points is not entirely clear. According to Tom Philpott of Grist, concentrated animal confinement operations (CAFOs) "expanded dramatically" in Iowa while Vilsack was governor. In addition to driving smaller operations out of business, CAFO's are known as some of the worst polluters of any industry.

On the other hand, in 2004 Vilsack vetoed a bill that would have expanded the ability of CAFO's to pollute the air, and in 2006 he vetoed a bill that would have limited the Iowa Department of Natural Resources' authority in granting permits to CAFOs.  

Perhaps it's safe to say that if Vilsack won't work against factory farms, he'll at least clean them up.

This kind of centrism has earned Vilsack lukewarm endorsements from some of the larger mainstream environmental organizations like Sierra Club, League of Conservation Voters, and the Environmental Defense Fund. Off the record, employees of such groups have made statements to me along the lines of "Obama could have picked worse."

The Organic Consumers Association, meanwhile, is back on the warpath, having launched StopVilsack.org in hopes of mobilizing opposition to Vilsack's Senate confirmation through an online petition.

Koehler, of WildWest, sees the divide among activist groups, with regard to Vilsack's appointment, as a case of the "'haves' (well funded, politically connected groups that have forfeited their voices for the sake of politics and money) and the ‘have nots' (small, grassroots groups, unbeholden, who speak their minds)."

The Center for Rural Affairs in Lyons, Nebraska, is opting for the pragmatic approach.  "We will work with Vilsack to keep rural entrepreneurship, agricultural conservation, and family farming and ranching at the forefront of these critical debates," Steph Larsen, Rural Policy Organizer, told me.

The CFRA is collecting signatures for an open letter to Mr. Vilsack, urging others to add comments about their priorities here.

"Many of the decisions about the day to day operations of USDA are made by other political appointments besides the Secretary of Agriculture, and we need good partners there too," Larson adds. "We are especially interested in the allies to fill Under Secretary of Rural Development; USDA General Counsel; Under Secretary of Research, Education and Economics; Natural Resource Conservation Service Chief; and Under Secretary of Marketing and Regulatory Affairs."

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Ari LeVaux writes a syndicated weekly food column.

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