Governor Cuomo Proposes Important Step to Making New York a National Leader in Growing Farm Economy and Ensuring Food Security
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Last week, Governor Cuomo released his proposed 2015-16 State Budget. The Governor’s 2015 Opportunity Agenda is big – literally – more than 550 pages and proposes in excess of $141 billion in state spending.
In it, is big news for the state’s farm and food economy and every New Yorker that cares about their food and where it comes from. Governor Cuomo has proposed to make the state’s largest investment ever in permanently protecting farmland - placing New York in the Top Five in America in state funding for a Farmland Protection Program.
Investing in New York’s Farm and Food Economy
The connection between Governor Cuomo’s proposed capital investment in protecting farmland and New York’s economy is pretty simple. New York is a farm state that is packed with 19 million eaters, and millions more people just beyond our borders. For generations, New York’s economy has been tied with growing, processing, distributing and selling food and other farm products. Farmers hit a record high with nearly $5.7 billion in sales of farm products in 2013.
Ensuring Food Security for All of New York’s Eaters
 But, protecting farmland is good for more than just farmers and New York’s economy – it matters to all New Yorkers that are thinking about their food and food security. Nationally, more than 90% of the fruit grown in the United States, 80% of our vegetables and 70% of our milk is produced in urban edge counties – places where farms are under pressure from real estate development.
These threats to our food production are very real in New York where the equivalent of 4,500 farms have been lost to real estate development since the 1980s. And, according to a Cornell University study, New York’s 7 million acres of land currently in farming can produce only enough food for 6 million people – 30% of the state’s population.
Record State Investment in Protecting Farmland
Governor Cuomo’s budget proposal includes $14 million for New York’s Farmland Protection from the state’s Environmental Protection Fund as well as a special allocation of $20 million for permanently protecting farms in the Hudson Valley and $30 million for farms and agricultural economic development in the state’s Southern Tier. Such state investment would put New York near the top of the nation in farmland conservation funding – along with Maryland, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.
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Friday, January 30, 2015
Making New York a National Leader - From American Farmland Trust
Tuesday, January 13, 2015
Will Congress make our work illegal?- Email from Food and Water Watch
New York's announcement in December to remain frack-free was a game-changer for the movement to protect our drinking water and other precious resources. We give thanks to people like you, because together, we can protect public health and our environment.
However, now our opponents will likely intensify their efforts to silence and discredit our concerns about fracking, and with help from anti-environment members of the new Congress, we can expect radical actions trying to strip away current protections. That's why we need you to send the message right way that we're not going to stand for industry favors.
This week, the new Republican-controlled Congress is rushing to push through the Keystone XL pipeline approval, and we can surely expect more attacks on science like we saw in November when the House passed a bill forbidding scientists from advising the Environmental Protection Agency on their own research.¹
Even worse, paid lobbyists and industry-backed politicians have launched very deliberate and coordinated attacks on groups and individuals that champion environmental protections.² ³ They call us extremists in an attempt to thwart our growing movement. But we're not environmentalists for the sake of the environment. We aim to protect our environment because it has a direct affect on our health. We cannot live without clean drinking water, and we cannot grow healthy food without a healthy ecosystem.
Email your members of Congress to tell them that you support environmental protections, and that it shouldn't be illegal to stand up for safe drinking water and a healthy food system.
Now that Republicans have control of the Senate, a key committee — the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee — will be chaired by James Inhofe (R-Okla.), a notorious climate change denier and an unabashed champion for the fossil fuel industry. It was under his lead last year that, not just one, but two reports were released targeting environmental groups and their funders in an attempt to silence groups working in the public interest. Will you tell your Members of Congress that they shouldn't be using taxpayer dollars to fund attacks on groups trying to protect our environment?
We're being attacked in an attempt to draw attention away from what matters most: our food, our water, our health and our communities. But we won't be silenced. Instead, we'll gather all the support we can to show media and influencers that these attacks lack credibility. Will you stand up for environmental protections for our food and water?
Thanks for all you do,
Wenonah Hauter
Executive Director
Food & Water Watch
act(at)fwwatch(dot)org
However, now our opponents will likely intensify their efforts to silence and discredit our concerns about fracking, and with help from anti-environment members of the new Congress, we can expect radical actions trying to strip away current protections. That's why we need you to send the message right way that we're not going to stand for industry favors.
This week, the new Republican-controlled Congress is rushing to push through the Keystone XL pipeline approval, and we can surely expect more attacks on science like we saw in November when the House passed a bill forbidding scientists from advising the Environmental Protection Agency on their own research.¹
Even worse, paid lobbyists and industry-backed politicians have launched very deliberate and coordinated attacks on groups and individuals that champion environmental protections.² ³ They call us extremists in an attempt to thwart our growing movement. But we're not environmentalists for the sake of the environment. We aim to protect our environment because it has a direct affect on our health. We cannot live without clean drinking water, and we cannot grow healthy food without a healthy ecosystem.
Email your members of Congress to tell them that you support environmental protections, and that it shouldn't be illegal to stand up for safe drinking water and a healthy food system.
Now that Republicans have control of the Senate, a key committee — the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee — will be chaired by James Inhofe (R-Okla.), a notorious climate change denier and an unabashed champion for the fossil fuel industry. It was under his lead last year that, not just one, but two reports were released targeting environmental groups and their funders in an attempt to silence groups working in the public interest. Will you tell your Members of Congress that they shouldn't be using taxpayer dollars to fund attacks on groups trying to protect our environment?
We're being attacked in an attempt to draw attention away from what matters most: our food, our water, our health and our communities. But we won't be silenced. Instead, we'll gather all the support we can to show media and influencers that these attacks lack credibility. Will you stand up for environmental protections for our food and water?
Thanks for all you do,
Wenonah Hauter
Executive Director
Food & Water Watch
act(at)fwwatch(dot)org
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