The coffee sloshed violently in the mug as I bolted upright in my chair not believing what I saw on my computer screen. “Study shows more corn for biofuels would hurt water,” read the headline on the Purdue news release.

This was the second early morning shock I had received in as many days.

Just the day before, I opened my copy of the Indianapolis Star after retrieving it from the bushes where our carrier had tossed it only to find a front-page story on tuberculosis in Indiana cattle. In both cases, however, when I started investigating the stories and talked directly to some of the sources quoted in them, I found much different stories. In both cases, the headlines and much of the content of the articles were over-sensationalized and grossly biased.

Upon seeing the front-page story on cattle TB, the first question that entered my mind was: Why would a big city newspaper do this story at all, and why put it on the front page?

The answer became clear as I read the piece. It painted a picture of a dangerous disease that was threatening to destroy the Hoosier cattle industry. It also, of course, mentioned that humans could be infected by disease.

The story had quotes from some impressive sources including State Veterinarian Dr. Bret Marsh, Purdue Economist Dr. Chris Hurt, and even Clark Sennett, president of the Indiana Beef Cattle Assoc. But the reality of the situation is far different from that portrayed in the article.

Last November, a single cow at a Pennsylvania packing plant was found to have TB. It was traced back to Indiana to a farm in Franklin County. Since then, the Indiana Board of Animal Health has tested the herd twice and found nothing. Other farms in the area were also tested, and nothing was found.

Three farms that raise non-native deer and elk in nearby Wayne County did have infected animals and all were destroyed.
Since then, the investigation has turned up no other infected animals or likely sources for the disease. Dr. Marsh said that the last reported case of cattle TB in Indiana cattle occurred more than 30 years ago.

The cattle industry is not in danger of decimation, and Hoosiers are not in danger of contracting TB from cattle.

The Star article and its placement on the front page was a shameless attempt to sensationalize a non-story.

The Purdue story was also a misrepresentation of the facts. According to the news story, Purdue researchers’ “study of Indiana water sources found that those near fields that practice continuous-corn rotations had higher levels of nitrogen, fungicides and phosphorous than corn-soybean rotations.”

The story went on to lay the blame for this situation at the feet of biofuels, “More of the fertilizers and pesticides used to grow corn would find their way into nearby water sources if ethanol demands lead to planting more acres in corn.”

The story correctly states that corn acres have increased in the past few years, but failed to mention that many of these new acres were in non-Midwest states where corn had not been previously grown. This was due to a sharp hike in corn prices caused by a variety of factors including increased exports and increased livestock-feed demands, as well as ethanol.

When Hoosier Ag Today interviewed Bernard Engel, one of the researchers, he said tillage practices and chemical management had a bigger impact on water quality than the crop grown or the rotation. This key fact was left out of the Purdue release, although it was prominently mentioned in the actual research abstract.

The incendiary headline on the Purdue story and its slanted conclusions were quickly picked up by forces opposed to biofuels and spread around a number of Internet blogs and news publications. Purdue Ag Communications normally does a good job of interpreting complex research findings into common English, but this was not one of their finer efforts. Unfortunately, this blunder has added to the large amount of misinformation about biofuels that is currently circulating.

Both of these incidents are examples of pushing the panic button. Why is every disease a potential pandemic? Why is every change in our environment a disaster waiting to happen?

Agriculture is not without problems, but the over-emphasis on the negative and the sensationalization of serious issues like disease and the environment do nothing but cloud the real issues and polarize efforts to deal with the problems. I wish those inside and outside of agriculture would keep their hands off the panic button for a while.

The views and opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of Farm World. Readers with questions or comments for Gary Truitt may write to him in care of this publication.

Published on Oct. 7, 2009