“Our big goal, essentially, is a 45% reduction in the amount of nitrogen and phosphorus lost from our lands in the state of Iowa,” said Secretary of Agriculture Mike Naig.

Back in 1997, The Mississippi River/Gulf of Mexico Watershed Nutrient Task Force was established to coordinate activities to reduce the size, severity and duration of hypoxia in the Gulf.

It was later in 2008, the Hypoxia Task Force produced an action plan calling upon 12 states along the Mississippi River to develop their own nutrient reduction strategy. As a result, five years later the INRS was launched.

“Iowa was first among the 12 to have a strategy finalized and launched and we were also the first to have a science assessment,” said Naig. “We looked at all the practices that now make up the nutrient reduction strategy — like cover crops, wetlands and those types of things — and did some research.”

-Submitted photo
More and more wetlands are being restored throughout the countryside. They not only help to improve water quality downstream, but aid in wildlife habitat and can be used for recreation.

In that research, Naig said they looked at what the science actually tells about the nutrient reduction capabilities of those practices and that became the basis of the strategy. Since then, other states have modeled their strategies after Iowa’s.

Iowa is well known for its work with soil conservation.

“Going back to the Dust Bowl era, we formed up the Soil and Water Conservation Districts. Iowa had become the first state in the nation to use state appropriation for soil conservation cost share back in the 1970s. We’ve always been the leader,” Naig said.

Traditionally the focus has been on soil erosion prevention, but the strategy brings into play looking at nitrogen and how it tends to move with water.

“It is a bit of a shift in our mindset,” Naig said. “We have to continue to do all of those things that make sense from soil erosion prevention, but now we need to layer on top of that how do we manage water? How do we denitrify water as it leaves our landscape? That is really what the strategy brought — an additional focus on nitrogen.”

-Submitted photo
More and more wetlands are being restored throughout the countryside. They not only help to improve water quality downstream, but aid in wildlife habitat and can be used for recreation.

Several of the demonstration projects that were launched in 2013 that targeted watersheds across the state, Naig said, are still in use today.

Several years later, we have the expertise of those practices and it’s time to move forward.

“We needed to learn about those new practices — bring in local partners, work with landowners and farmers in specific areas and really push to see adoption so farmers from all over the state could come and see what happened in those demonstration areas and learn from that,” said Naig. “But I think we’ve now shifted gears from a demonstration mentality to an implementation mentality.”

But how do we scale up?

“We need to make sure we are doing what we can to educate folks to make resources available and to accelerate the adoptions of practices,” he said.

This can be done, Naig said, by continuing to work with farmers, landowners, cities, and everyone in urban and rural areas.

“I am very proud of the work that has been done,” said Naig. “I am pleased with the progress we have made, but we have a lot of work to do. We are an incredibly productive landscape and we have a significant number of agricultural acres in the state. We have a lot of opportunity to implement change across those acres.”

Something Naig said he will always push for is the understanding the INRS cannot be approached as a one-size-fits-all strategy.

“We must recognize that an acre of ground in Fremont County versus Calhoun County is different and that they need to be managed differently, that conservation practices that might make sense on those particular acres are different,” he said.

To help with this, Naig said they continue to offer a large menu of practices to give producers and landowners a choice, including options to utilize cover crops, wetlands, bioreactors, terraces or no-till.

“We want to make sure that we are trying to build what I like to call a ‘culture of conservation’ versus a culture of regulation where you have someone in Des Moines or Washington, D.C. telling you what you are supposed to do on your acres,” he said.

In order to keep from being regulated, Naig said it is important to recognize that protecting soil and water is important.

“We have the responsibility to reduce nutrient loss when it comes to the hypoxia zone in the Gulf of Mexico and we also have a responsibility to take care of our local waters,” he said. “I would argue that protecting our soil and water is an economic imperative for the state of Iowa. It is our core natural resource. If we can protect our soil and water, we can continue to be productive, hopefully profitable, in agriculture and that is the backbone of Iowa’s economy.”

Partnerships

Naig said the goal of the INRS cannot be accomplished with just the state of Iowa or the just the USDA or even just those two government entities working together.

“We have over 300 different partners that are engaged in implementations of projects across the state. Cities are working with us on urban conservation. There are literally hundreds of partners that have come to the table and are working to help us achieve these goals and it would absolutely not be possible without those public/private partnerships and we’ll continue to build on those,” he said.

Looking ahead

Naig said he feels there is an opportunity to connect conversation of conservation around carbon sequestration.

“The good news is many of the practices that we use are also practices that sequester carbon,” he said. “We are looking for ways on how we can incorporate carbon sequestration in a way it can also help generate some revenue for farmers.”

Cover crops and no-till, Naig said, are good examples of practices that sequester carbon.

“We would like to see farmers benefit from that, but we think it can also help us achieve our nutrient reduction goals if we can combine all of those different drivers and these market incentives — hopefully we can see that contribute to an increase as well,” he said.