How Big Ag Lobbyists Perpetuate Climate Inequity
In May 2024, the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) issued a report analyzing the lobbying efforts of agribusiness ahead of anticipated debate over a farm bill. That farm bill remains in limbo, but lobbyists have been active on Capitol Hill in recent weeks, as members of Congress debate the food and agriculture policy shifts contained in Trump’s “big, beautiful” budget reconciliation bill.
Money and lobbyists—a term coined for people who once waited in lobbies to speak to members of Congress—are intertwined in U.S. politics. Lobbyists act as influencers on behalf of special-interest groups. They help finance political campaigns and attend fundraisers for a chance to have their positions heard by legislators over breakfast, lunch, or drinks. The more money a lobbyist spends, the more face time he or she tends to get with a lawmaker (so long as the Supreme Court continues to protect money as free speech).
That leaves many Americans with little say in political decision-making and, according to Pew Research, “widespread dissatisfaction with the role of money in American politics.”
“This system also creates challenges for underserved producers, beginning farmers, and farmers of color in particular to enter the profession and start small farms, which are some of the most diversified operations.”
None of this is news to people who follow policy. However, what surprised UCS Food and Environment Program Scientist Omanjana Goswami, who co-authored the 2024 study with Karen Perry Stillerman, deputy director of the program, was the rise in these lobbying efforts by agribusiness.
Though Big Ag’s activities are often overshadowed by the massive influence of the oil and gas industry, the UCS analysis showed that these two entities are interconnected. The hundreds of millions of dollars they collectively spend on lobbying efforts create a democratic inequality wherein most people living in the United States have little say over the laws that dictate how we grow our food and what impact that has on the climate.
Industrial agriculture creates water scarcity, chemical pollution, soil degradation, and biodiversity loss, and it is a major driver of climate change through greenhouse gas emissions. The UCS report found that the “pay-to-play” lobbying system minimizes, in particular, the voices and the needs of small and midsize farms, diverse farmers, food workers, and farmworkers and prioritizes corporations, all while adding to the climate crisis.
Goswami recently spoke to Civil Eats to help explain the connection of agribusiness with oil and gas and what needs to be done to change a system that perpetuates climate inequality.
What is the relationship between agribusiness and the fossil fuel industry, and how does it impact climate change?
If you look at who the major lobbyists are, they represent big [agricultural] manufacturers that make fertilizers, chemicals, herbicides, pesticides, and insecticides, which need inputs of energy, in particular nitrogen fertilizer. There is this circularity and kind of quid pro quo between agribusiness and the oil and gas industry.