this quote comes from bartlett durand, water quality partnership director of sand county foundation. he is talking about the agriculture system in the united states and the pressure that large-scale industrial farming puts on agriculture workers.

for decades, it has been the norm for farmers to use practices that can pollute our waterways. now, farmers are facing pressure from government officials to cut their polluting systems, but are under such financial strain that they can’t afford to change their land management practices.

this leaves many farmers stuck, all while officials continue to set more demanding standards and while water all over the country gets more polluted. durand’s job is to be a neutral ground between the city officials that set water quality standards and the farmers that must follow them. 

an excess of nutrients

the major environmental issue driving durand’s work is excessive algae growth, which can cause hypoxic zones, or areas in bodies of water that lack oxygen and are therefore susceptible to toxic algae blooms. all farming requires nutrients, whether through intensive soil management or added nutrients through manure or fertilizer. without careful management or buffering areas to contain the nutrients, rains can cause soil runoff and with that, the transportation of excessive amounts of nitrogen and phosphorus to local waterways.

just like nitrogen and phosphorus help crops grow on a large scale, they will also make the naturally occurring algae in ponds and lakes grow excessively. these overgrown algae can use up all of the oxygen in an area of water and leave none for the entire rest of the ecosystem, killing most living things in the area. the watershed becomes a dead zone.

this can happen small-scale, in local ponds, or large-scale, like in the gulf of mexico. the great lakes, which surround durand’s home state of wisconsin, also suffer from dead zones. in lake erie, for example, the hypoxic zone is sometimes as large as 3,800 square miles.

the nutrient pollution can also get into groundwater, which can be very harmful, even at low levels. nitrogen can percolate through layers of soil all the way down to aquifers. one third of all americans — and 95% of americans living in agricultural areas — get their drinking water from groundwater, so this poses a real threat if left unregulated. 

the role of regulators

officials want to set water quality standards that slow dead zone growth and keep our water clean. but behind the issue of nutrient runoff lies social tension between farmers and officials that must be smoothed over to create any progress.

“the clean water act gives authority to the epa to enforce (water quality standards,) and then the epa gives authority to each state,” durand says. “there are different state agencies, so it varies. the culture of each state is different, and the agriculture community is different.”

the clean water act can directly regulate pollution coming from point sources, meaning they can regulate pollution that comes from a single, identifiable source, like a wastewater pipe. the epa pushes the states to set limits on how much nitrogen and phosphorus pollution is allowed from point sources, and how much certain areas must cut their levels. most water treatment plants were built in the 70s and 80s — before we understood the harms of excess pesticides, says durand — and they aren’t advanced enough to filter out the nitrogen and phosphorus at the level the epa wants. it can be expensive if not impossible for some of these plants to meet the nutrient targets set.

but some states offer the option of partnering with farmers to “trade” nutrient reductions. the responsibility then falls on the farmers to cut their personal nutrient use, asking them to change their farming practices, or to implement ways to manage field runoff. 

“farming is a brutal profession,” durand says. “you’re running a small business with tiny margins, and you do not control your pricing. the pressure on farmers is intense. you can’t make a mistake, you have so much money invested in the equipment… to change a bunch of (equipment) at once is almost impossibly expensive. and then you have to change the management style. they say, ‘i have a rhythm. i know it. i grew up with it.’ so, it’s really a difficult thing (to change).”

farmers come to the table

clean water act administrators and farmers come to the issue of water quality with completely different backgrounds. the issue can get quite contentious, as durand explains.

“right now, you have engineers and regulatory people and the government enforcing a checklist, and you have people who are regulated trying to complete that checklist. every five years they redo it and they all have to sit down and haggle over what those numbers are,” durand says. “i come in and provide a neutral ground to help negotiate. it’s a big deal because it starts breaking down that adversarial relationship.”

substantial progress has been made in madison, wisconsin. the state’s clean water act administrators and the epa allowed a pilot project for adaptive management. the project takes place in dane county, which is predominantly an agricultural landscape. farmland covers over 500,000 acres of the county, more than two-thirds of all the land.

“the concept was, we’re going to give you (the wastewater treatment plant) 20 years to clean up your water, and you, the municipality, are going to take responsibility for your entire watershed. so they (dane county farmers) are committing to stop the pollution that’s happening, with a partnership approach,” durand says. the municipality provides the goals and funding, and the farmers figure out what works best on their farm to help improve water quality overall. 

the partnership approach was a game changer.

“it was irritating farmers that there wasn’t a single farmer on the committee discussing (water pollution). so one farmer leader formed a group called the yahara pride farms, after the yahara chain of lakes,” durand says. “and that gave him the authority to get a seat at the table.”

jeff endres, the founder of yahara pride farms, brought farmers’ voices to the forefront and set the record straight on their practices in the community.

“he started talking, ‘we need to keep nutrients on our land. we’re not just willy-nilly spreading stuff. we’re already doing a lot of sustainable things you don’t think we’re doing. we can probably do better, but you need to understand our costs.’”

most importantly, durand says, farmers can be part of the solution for preventing nitrogen and phosphorus runoff, and shouldn’t be treated like the enemy in water quality conversations. the enemy, durand holds, is the system of large-scale industrial agriculture that puts farmers in this difficult position.

yahara pride farms has been doing incredible work in partnerships with other organizations to reduce their nutrient runoff. the farmers get to choose how to spend the money they’re given from the city for conservation practices together, and share the benefits.

“the first thing they did was hire their own agronomist to work with them. instead of having to rely on the government,” durand says. “it’s been wildly successful. you get a group of farmers together, and ‘why don’t we all buy our cover crop seed in bulk? why don’t we all buy one piece of equipment together that we can share to do our cover cropping?’ once you get the farmers together, it is a huge plus. people can be so inspired by these partnerships.”

durand’s work facilitating partnerships and open conversation is essential going forward in the struggle for clean water and healthy watersheds.

“water is the most immediate system that is dramatically not working and that we have to make changes on,” durand says. “there are ways we can rally around that system to change it. because water is so fundamental to life.”

“mmm… so good,” she said, rolling the leaf around her mouth. “try it,” she insists. 

soft, peach-like fuzz gives way to a tart taste. meusch doesn’t remember what the plant’s called, but it’s high in vitamin c, she said. 

clad in rubber boots and hay-covered yoga pants, meusch was walking across her property to check on goats over the next hill. a kitchen towel framed her face to block the midday sun, while a bright blue sweater and warm smile stood out against a dull brown winter scenery.

meusch doesn’t consider herself revolutionary. “i’m just a farmer,” as she says. but in her days wandering the land, she’s cultivated more than squash and potatoes. the unassuming woman has inadvertently championed locally-grown food in a region dominated by industrial agriculture and redefined what it means to be a midwestern farmer — all while leading with lessons from her grandparents.

her trek was more of a meander. every turn or two she’d halt to point out a new mushroom, or this time, pluck a leaf from a nearby plant.

“my grandma would always say which plant is good for this or that,” she said, reminiscing on her childhood roaming the mountains of laos with her grandparents.  

the petite woman dropped the leaf and continued walking, “bahing” hello as goats popped up over the horizon. 

meusch’s life story is as winding as her walk, taking her from laos rainforests to the missouri ozarks. after falling in love with eric meusch, a peace corps volunteer serving in laos, the pair returned to his hometown in rural missouri to pursue a simple farming life with their two sons.

“i can’t find more happiness than when i was little and would wake up at sunrise to walk to the mountains with my grandparents,” pathoumma meusch said. “i want my kids to have that too.”

meusch farms llc’s humble smattering of grass-fed beef and free-range chickens, chemical-free tomatoes and kale, is an increasingly rare example of small-scale, sustainable agriculture in a state ranked 3rd in the nation for beef cattle production with an agricultural sector worth $88 billion dollars. 

even as her produce grew into a successful family farm, pathoumma meusch said it took longer to establish roots of her own in the u.s.

“when i moved here and everything was new, i felt really small and like what i know is not valuable,” she said. “we are like tree. when you move trees from one state to another, they need time to get used to the temperature.”

down the gravel road from muesch farms, a billboard reads “beef. it’s what’s for dinner” in bold red lettering. the slogan for america’s cattle industry brings to mind images of the country’s industrial agriculture system — one marked by large-scale operations, environmental degradation and predominantly white farm owners.

pathoumma meusch is one of only 0.3% of missouri producers who are asian, according to the 2017 census of agriculture. when she helped start a new farmers market in small-town rolla, missouri, she said she initially received pushback because of her race.

“i am asian, and my language is hard to translate to yours,” she explained. “in the beginning, people judge you because you’re new and what you do is new.”

but pathoumma meusch persisted, returning each saturday with her husband and a table full of fresh greens, determined to share healthy food and empower others in her community. in a few years, the farmers market grew from just her booth into one of the most popular markets in the area with dozens of vendors. 

nowadays, when she waves to customers and greets them by name, pathoumma meusch seems to stand just as tall as her husband beside her. 

“i think when a lot of asian people go to the farmers market they feel small, but i show people that you don’t need to feel small,” she said. “the earth belongs to all people. we are equally valuable.”

pathoumma meusch said her connection to nature motivates her to share healthy food grown on her land. 

“we put in our life and soul to create the food,” she said. “i tell customers, ‘it’s not a business. you just share our food.’ that’s why we’re so famous in the community because we just represent ourselves.”

eric meusch, whose wardrobe consists of plaid shirts and baseball caps, said he’s not trying to promote a larger environmental cause at the farmers market. 

“we’re just a tiny little example of a different way to do things,” he said. “and if that has an impact, that’s great.”

the meusches are a normal family trying to lead a healthy lifestyle, he said. if they break the routine of american consumerism to do so, it’s because they’re authentic — not activists.

back at their home over 8,000 miles from where they met, pathoumma meusch gazed at the mish-mash of vegetable patches and fruit trees in sight of her porch. “it feels perfect,” she said, smiling as a peacock struts past. “i built my dream.”

her innovative act for the planet wasn’t inventing new farming technology or enacting policy reform. she did what seems deceptively simple: learn from those before her and embody her culture’s values in her everyday life. 

she did something radical: love nature, love others, and share her love through food. by staying true to her roots, she disrupted the norm of midwest farming and showed her community the value of new perspectives.

as she climbed up a nearby pile of mulch for a better view, pathoumma meusch’s small frame was illuminated against the sunset. “the day my life is done, in the last minute, i want to feel like i am valuable to this earth,” she said, pink hues washing over her face.

“i am not small, and i am not hiding,” she said, her typically soft, airy voice growing in volume. “i am really big, and i am really lucky.”

once we arrived at forman park, we “gave thanksgiving” to the land we were all standing on and recognized its deeply rooted connection with the people of the haudenosaunee, onondaga nation. 

soon after, people from all walks of life took to the stage to affirm why we were there. from students to local politicians, everyone was energized by their speeches and words of encouragement.

dana balter, 2020 congressional hopeful, preached, “we are not the future, we are now, and we are going to make a change.” 

she later announced her renewed pledge not to accept contributions from the fossil fuel industry in her campaign for new york’s 24th congressional district seat; a powerful political stance in efforts to move away from a society so heavily dependent on fossil fuels.  

one week after the climate strike, i sat down with 19-year-old tamia parsons, a sophomore at syracuse university and one of the leaders of the environmental movement in central new york. here’s our conversation:

q: how are you involved with the environmental movement here on campus?

a: i am one of the hub coordinators for the sunrise movement that organized the protest march.

q: what is the sunrise movement about? 

a: it’s a national organization. it supports the green new deal and pushes politicians to sign a “no fossil fuel” pledge, so they don’t take fossil fuel money and (aims to) get fossil fuels out of politics because there is so much corruption. so here in syracuse, we’re the central new york branch and we started this hub last march. since there are politics associated with the sunrise movement, we’re not an official club on campus. the university did kinda threaten us and told us we couldn’t do any action while on the quad. they said they would remove us. 

(they didn’t.)

q: how has climate change affected your everyday life? 

a: i’m from the san francisco bay area and my town is usually foggy and 60 degrees 80% of the year; seeing that change is very real. we’re actually a huge pumpkin export, no. 1 in the u.s., a strange fact, but seeing all of the crops affected is alarming. i also have a little 10-year-old brother who is the love of my life and thinking about him not having a future, or people his age having to fight for a future, breaks my heart. the people before him didn’t have to do that, why should he? just because he was born during a different time.

q: what specific policies or solutions do you want to emerge from this movement?

a: i feel so strongly about the “no fossil fuel” pledge. i think that getting elected officials at whatever level they’re at onboard is powerful. we have rachel may here, who signed it, dana balter signed it. we want bigger people to sign it, any presidential candidates. we want it to become political poison for candidates not to take the pledge. 

q: how did it feel to be at the strike?

a: i cried. there were so many damn people. we pushed it out on social media, hung up posters, we saw posters being taken down. to see over 500 people there at forman park, even older generations that are not associated with suny esf or su felt so amazing.  they were all there ready to support us. it was energetic and i felt like that’s where i was supposed to be.

q: what is the sunrise movement’s next move?

a: we’re trying to get everyone together in a meeting space to see what our next actions could be. protest-esque things, and possibly do a “die-in.” 

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if you want to join tamia, check out the sunrise movement and find a local hub near you. if you can’t find one, do what tamia did, and create a new chapter in your own community.