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NCBA Hails Introduction of Bipartisan ACRE Act in U.S. House of Representatives

Bipartisan Bill Backed By 85 Original Co-Sponsors
 
The National Cattlemen's Beef Association (NCBA) today applauded the introduction of bipartisan legislation in the U.S. House of Representatives that would prevent 200,000 farms and ranches from being regulated as if they were toxic Superfund sites.
 
The bill, introduced by U.S. Reps. Billy Long (R-Mo.) and Jim Costa (D-Calif.), is known as the Agricultural Certainty for Reporting Emissions (ACRE) Act and is supported by 85 original co-sponsors.
 
"There's not a lot of bipartisan consensus on Washington, DC, these days, but one thing that a lot of folks on both sides of the aisle can agree on is that the CERCLA law that regulates toxic Superfund sites shouldn't apply to animal agricultural operations," said fifth-generation California rancher and NCBA President Kevin Kester. "CERCLA was never intended to regulate cow manure, and Congress should fix this situation as soon as possible."
 
Similar bipartisan legislation - the Fair Agricultural Reporting Method (FARM) Act - was introduced in the U.S. Senate by U.S. Sen. Deb Fischer (R-Neb.) and Joe Donnelly (D-Ind.) on Feb. 13. That bill currently has 37 co-sponsors and could be marked up by the Senate's Environment and Public Works Committee as soon as next week.
 
The Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) was enacted to provide for cleanup of the worst industrial chemical toxic waste dumps and spills, such as oil spills and chemical tank explosions. CERCLA was never intended to govern agricultural operations, for whom emissions from livestock are a part of everyday life.
 
To make this clear, in 2008, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) finalized a rule to clarify that farms were exempt from CERCLA reporting and small farms, in particular, were exempt from EPCRA reporting, given that low-level livestock emissions are not the kind of "releases" that Congress intended to manage with these laws.
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US Soy: Pig growth is impaired by soybean meal displacement in the diet

Video: US Soy: Pig growth is impaired by soybean meal displacement in the diet

Eric van Heugten, PhD, professor and swine extension specialist at North Carolina State University, recently spoke at the Iowa Swine Day Pre-Conference Symposium, titled Soybean Meal 360°: Expanding our horizons through discoveries and field-proven feeding strategies for improving pork production. The event was sponsored by Iowa State University and U.S. Soy.

Soybean meal offers pig producers a high-value proposition. It’s a high-quality protein source, providing essential and non-essential amino acids to the pig that are highly digestible and palatable. Studies now show that soybean meal provides higher net energy than current National Research Council (NRC) requirements. Plus, soybean meal offers health benefits such as isoflavones and antioxidants as well as benefits with respiratory diseases such as porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome (PRRS).

One of several ingredients that compete with the inclusion of soybean meal in pig diets is dried distillers grains with solubles (DDGS).

“With DDGS, we typically see more variable responses because of the quality differences depending on which plant it comes from,” said Dr. van Heugten. “At very high levels, we often see a reduction in performance especially with feed intake which can have negative consequences on pig performance, especially in the summer months when feed intake is already low and gaining weight is at a premium to get them to market.”

Over the last few decades, the industry has also seen the increased inclusion of crystalline amino acids in pig diets.

“We started with lysine at about 3 lbs. per ton in the diet, and then we added methionine and threonine to go to 6 to 8 lbs. per ton,” he said. “Now we have tryptophan, isoleucine and valine and can go to 12 to 15 lbs. per ton. All of these, when price competitive, are formulated into the diet and are displacing soybean meal which also removes the potential health benefits that soybean meal provides.”