On February 24, the Northeast Organic Farming Association of New York (NOFA-NY), Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), and the Environmental Working Group (EWG), represented by Earthjustice and the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University, sued the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) for unlawfully removing department webpages focused on climate change.
“Farmers are on the frontlines of climate impacts, we have been reacting to extreme weather and making choices to protect our businesses and our food system for years,” said Marcie Craig, NOFA-NY Executive Director. “We know from experience that that we need every piece of science and intergenerational knowledge to adjust to this new reality.”
NOFA-NY says that USDA’s actions, including the website purge, massive staff layoffs, and a freeze on billions in conservation funding, are damaging food security, leaving farmers and rural communities without essential support, and depriving farmers, researchers, and advocates of the tools they need to push for the restoration of critical resources. NOFA-NY has nearly $700,000 in frozen funding that provides technical assistance and programming to support organic and regenerative agriculture practices and many members and fellow NY farmers could lose dollars set aside to improve and expand farming operations.
This lawsuit asserts that the USDA is violating three federal laws: the Freedom of Information Act, which guarantees public access to important documents; the Paperwork Reduction Act, which requires proper notice before changes to information access; and the Administrative Procedure Act, which forbids arbitrary government actions.
Among the resources removed from USDA websites last month were materials related to climate-smart farming, federal loans, conservation programs, and climate adaptation strategies. The USDA deleted entire sections on climate from the U.S. Forest Service and Natural Resources Conservation Service sites, including information that helps farmers access billions of dollars for conservation projects.
Additionally, the USDA disabled interactive tools like the U.S. Forest Service’s “Climate Risk Viewer” and removed technical guidance on reducing emissions and boosting resilience to extreme weather.
For more information, contact info@nofany.org.
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