House bill's land use unsettles farming, food costs

Forget the food-vs.-fuel debate for a while. The new issue is carbon vs. food. How this debate plays out could go a long way to deciding the fate of the Obama administration's effort to reduce U.S. greenhouse gas emissions. The debate over a House-passed climate bill has focused on how much it will raise energy costs, including the cost of farming. When the Senate returns this fall to write its version of the bill, attention will turn to the impact on food prices. This became clear at the Senate Agriculture Committee's first hearing on the climate issue. Senators from both parties demanded to know what impact a cap-and-trade system would have on land use and food costs. Economists at the U.S. Department of Agriculture are working to learn the answers. The issue is simple: A cap-and-trade program, such as the one approved by the House, would allow utilities and other polluters to comply with caps on greenhouse gas emissions by purchasing credits from landowners who plant trees on their property. The question is how much land that's now in crops or pasture is likely to be converted to forests. Quite a bit, according to the Environmental Protection Agency's analysis of the House-passed bill. The analysis predicted there would be less cropland as a result of the bill because acreage would be converted to trees to earn carbon credits. Reducing the amount of available cropland likely would raise the price of commodities such as corn and soybeans, increasing feed costs and eventually food prices...DesMoinesRegister