Rural Issue

Farm Bureau poll calls for Endangered Species Act reform

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The American Farm Bureau says its new poll results show many Americans favor reforming the Endangered Species Act.

Farm Bureau’s congressional relations director Ryan Yates tells Brownfield AFBF has supported Endangered Species Act reform, but real data on how the public feels about the issue has been lacking.

“We wanted to test the waters and see what the public knew on the Endangered Species Act, and see how that data might help advocates (like ourselves) that are looking to make the Act work better.  As well as policy makers, as they look at strategies for moving Endangered Species Act reform legislation.”

The August survey found that 63 percent of the more than 2,000 respondents favored modernizing the Endangered Species Act.

Yates says Farm Bureau views the Act as outdated and ineffective.

“A number of major environmental statutes came out of the 1970’s, the Endangered Species Act being one of them.  I’m looking at results, and when you look at results for recovery of species we’ve seen nearly 1,600 species listed under the Act (that are in need of protection) and less than two percent of them in 42 years have actually been recovered.”

He says while the Act does a good job of listing endangered species, Farm Bureau’s fundamental approach to Endangered Species Act reform would be to prioritize species recovery and delisting.

“The Fish and Wildlife director Dan Nash said it himself in a hearing, they have a statutory responsibility and obligation to list species under the Act.  But they do not have that same statutory obligation to recover, and I think that’s a problem.”

Yates says a modernized Endangered Species Act would better integrate state and local science into the listing, delisting and recovery planning.

He tells Brownfield it would also provide an incentive-based approach for private lands where farmers and ranchers receive incentives for conservation, rather than federal regulatory burdens and restrictions.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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