Biden Administration Pledges Fight To Keep Climate-Friendly Farming Funds

May 05, 2023

By Leah Douglas

The Biden administration will defend funding for climate-smart farming in the $430 billion U.S. Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) if Republican lawmakers seek to cut it during negotiations for the next farm bill, an official said Tuesday.

The IRA, which aims to cut emissions across the U.S. economy, includes $20 billion to support farmers in implementing carbon-sequestering conservation practices on their land.

As negotiations begin over the next farm bill, which funds farm commodity, conservation, and nutrition programs, some Republicans have raised concerns about how the IRA funds would be spent and floated reallocating some of the money.

The Biden administration would resist any effort to reallocate the funds, said White House deputy chief of staff John Podesta in a conversation with Reuters reporters on Tuesday.

“The program is popular,” Podesta said. “We’ll fight for it and I think we’ll be successful in the upcoming farm bill negotiations.”

Podesta said President Joe Biden’s administration has heard supp

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Regulations help markets and industry exist on level playing fields, keeping consumers safe and innovation from going too far. However, incredibly strict regulations can stunt innovation and cause entire industries to wither away. Dr. Peter James Facchini brings his perspective on how existing regulations have slowed the advancement of medical developments within Canada. Given the international concern of opium poppy’s illicit potential, Health Canada must abide by this global policy. But with modern technology pushing the development of many pharmaceuticals to being grown via fermentation, is it time to reconsider the rules?

Dr. Peter James Facchini leads research into the metabolic biochemistry in opium poppy at the University of Calgary. For more than 30 years, his work has contributed to the increased availability of benzylisoquinoline alkaloid biosynthetic genes to assist in the creation of morphine for pharmaceutical use. Dr. Facchini completed his B.Sc. and Ph.D. in Biological Sciences at the University of Toronto before completing Postdoctoral Fellowships in Biochemistry at the University of Kentucky in 1992 & Université de Montréal in 1995.