Tuesday, July 17, 2012

3,000 agricultural groups warn Congress that looming 2013 budget cuts will 'devastate' sciences

About 3,000 agricultural, crop and soil-science organizations have joined forces to warn Congress that any automatic budget cuts set for January of 2013 will have devastating effects on what is called the "nondefense discretionary (NDD) community," especially research and education funding for food, agriculture, and environmental sciences, Agri-Pulse reports today.

The American Society of Agronomy, the Crop Science Society of Americ, and the Soil Science Society of America led the charge. In a letter sent to all members of Congress today, the groups' leaders urged lawmakers to adopt a “balanced approach to deficit reduction that does not include further cuts to NDD programs." NDD programs represent a small and shrinking share of the federal budget and of our overall economy, the groups wrote, equal to just 3.4 percent of the nation’s gross domestic product in 2011. For a copy of the letter, go here.

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