The Iowa Corn Growers Association is urging the state legislature to maintain funding for conservation programs.
President Mark Mueller, who farms near Waverly, says water quality is a polarizing topic that’s not going away.
“But at the same time, it’s an expensive thing. I will give one example from my own farm, I had a wetland installed and it is not cheap. My wetland cleans up the water for roughly 400 acres, and yet it cost almost $300,000 to build.”
He tells Brownfield the wetland would not have been built without cost-share dollars from the state.
“And I can say a lot of farmers would be in the same boat as I am. It takes a partnership of county, state, and federal funding, at least it did in my particular case, to get that wetland built. But as a result, the water is cleaner.”
Mueller says Iowa Corn is also seeking support for all efforts to lower the carbon intensity score of corn-based ethanol during this year’s session, which began Monday.
