Welcome

Welcome

Wednesday, March 3, 2021

Hypoxia Task Force Sends Letter to EPA, USDA Leadership

States in the Hypoxia Task Force urge Biden administration leaders to continue partnership and support with the coalition. The task force recently penned a letter to leadership at the Environmental Protection Agency and Department of Agriculture. Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Mike Naig, who serves as the co-chair of the task force, states, "Working together, we can improve our local waters and the Gulf of Mexico." The task force is a partnership of 12 states and five federal agencies that work collaboratively to reduce nutrient-loading throughout the Mississippi River Basin and the size of the hypoxic zone in the northern Gulf of Mexico. The group’s action plan has a near-term target of reducing nutrient-loading to the Gulf from the basin by 20 percent by 2025, and a long-term goal of limiting the Gulf hypoxic zone to an average annual size of less than 5,000-square kilometers by 2035, subject to the availability of resources.