By Jennifer Dorsett
Field Editor
A Texas Panhandle cattleman was recently selected to serve as the chair of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) newly-revived Farm, Ranch, and Rural Communities Advisory Committee.
Hartley County Farm Bureau member Tom McDonald will serve as chair of the 33-member committee.
“I’m sure the goal of every production agriculture representative on the committee is to protect against excessive regulations, but I think the bigger objective in my mind is to put a face to agriculture,” McDonald said in an interview with the Texas Farm Bureau Radio Network.
He wants to show EPA that the agricultural community is a friend, not a foe.
“What I would like for them to see is the way agriculture really is,” he said. “We’re leaders in the world for producing safe, wholesome food at an affordable price, and we take our natural resource management very seriously.”
A key issue he plans to address is the incorrect notion that agriculture contributes greatly to U.S. sources of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. As a longtime leader in the cattle feedyard sector, McDonald said he has faced this issue many times.
But multiple studies, including a recent EPA report, show agriculture only contributes 9.9 percent of all GHG emissions in the U.S. That number is far below transportation, energy and industrial use.
In fact, McDonald noted U.S. agriculture provides many positive impacts on GHG emissions due to plants and row crops removing carbon dioxide from the environment.
“We all know from our high school biology class that plants take up CO2 and give off oxygen, and that CO2 is coming from the greenhouse gas emissions that are in the atmosphere,” he said.
McDonald is the senior vice president of Environmental Affairs & Sustainability at Five Rivers Cattle Feeding Company, which is headquartered in Johnstown, Colorado. His office is at XIT Feeders in Dalhart, one of 11 feedyards owned by Five Rivers.
The committee’s first meeting is set for Sept. 10-11.