I read a lot of Wendell Berry poetry last year. There were many mornings I would sit in my little nook in a corner of my home, before the rest of the house awakened, and take in his words. Many of Berry’s poems celebrate the natural world: the beauty of the land, the rugged hopefulness of the farmer, the peace found among the wild things.
One of the things I appreciate about Berry is how he captures the sacredness of the natural world without deifying it — a balance that seems to escape the environmentalists. Many of them would celebrate having fewer people on this blessed earth if it meant reducing carbon emissions by one-tenth of 1% by the year 2100, despite little proof it would actually make a difference.
I think most farmers understand the world more like Berry does. There is a connection to the land, to the generations of soil their seed grows in, but there’s also a pragmatism about what works. And at the root of every seed that is planted is a belief that farming matters, because people matter.
That concept — that we should work for the benefit of human flourishing — has come under attack in recent years. The environmental left has made “climate justice” its north star in a sky teeming with human potential, resulting in Malthusian proposals by a segment of climate scientists who see carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrates as existential foes. To challenge the net-zero, decarbonization narrative is tantamount to heresy, and you will quickly find yourself with the scarlet letters “CD” affixed to your reputation: climate denier.
One of the most tangible outgrowths of this Environmental Inquisition has been a religious-like fervor surrounding ESG policies and investment in agriculture. ESG stands for Environmental, Social, and Governance and serves as an investing principle that prioritizes a climate-first environmentalist agenda over competing needs, such as…well, food. It has become a noxious weed for farmers and ranchers, affecting everything from their ability to get loans to expand their hog farm operations, to the affordability of their fertilizer that they so desperately need to ensure maximum yield.
I have no doubt that there are some environmental activists who advocate for “climate justice” out of good intentions and sincere heart. Even so, the recommendations championed through ESG initiatives have put farmers and our food supply in jeopardy.
Europe provides a cautionary tale for ESG agricultural policies. Aggressive climate policies in the Netherlands have driven many farmers to the brink of bankruptcy, with the possibly disastrous consequences of food shortages and economic collapse. This should serve as a warning for US policymakers, that ESG regulations could lead to the same dire outcomes.
In the United States, ESG initiatives have captured select financial institutions, investment brokers, and government bureaucrats, creating harmful barriers to farmers who might be interested in expanding their operations and need a loan or need access to affordable fertilizer.
Kelly Lester, of the John Locke Foundation described the problem like this:
Many ESG frameworks pressure banks and investors to avoid financing projects associated with high-carbon activities, such as livestock farming. This diverts capital away from farms, particularly those raising cattle, which ESG activists target for their methane emissions. Without access to capital, farmers can’t modernize operations, invest in sustainable practices, or scale their businesses. Ironically, the lack of funding for modernization undermines the very sustainability goals ESG proponents claim to support.
Furthermore, ESG policies tend to push renewable energy projects, like solar farms, at the expense of agricultural land. Across the country, fertile farmland is being converted into solar farms, shrinking the amount of land available for food production”
Another way the ESG agenda has crept into agriculture has been a push for farms to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions. This preoccupation with reducing emissions hurts small-to-midsize farms who can’t afford the equipment upgrades, energy transitions, and compliance monitoring necessary to meet the requirements. This makes it cost-prohibitive for many farmers to update their technology to achieve the very environmental goals ESG activists claim they care about.
ESG mandates promote “one-size-fits-all” solutions and ignore the complexity and diversity of agriculture. When farmers struggle, the entire economy feels the impact. Agriculture supports a vast network of industries, and ESG policies that harm farmers will have ripple effects throughout the ecosystem, driving up food prices and reducing economic activity.
To pushback against these misguided policies, North Carolina must continue to limit public pensions using ESG criteria in their investment decisions, deny new contracts between state entities and financial institutions that use ESG criteria, and lobby Congress for federal reforms limiting ESG’s impact. Prioritizing climate goals above the needs of human beings will always make for bad policy, but it is especially egregious when those goals don’t even guarantee beneficial outcomes. Policymakers, investors, and businesses need to recognize what the environmental left’s ESG agenda actually stands for: Expensive, Scare, and Government controlled.