View Topic

Fertile Farmland Protection

A resolution to increase the quality of the world's environment, at the expense of industry.

Category: Environmental
Industry Affected: Agriculture
Proposed by: Luxembourgers

Description: The World Assembly,

NOTING that most -- if not all -- WA States rely heavily on professional farmers to grow crops through agricultural means, and deeming it necessary for agriculture to remain intact having realized the benefits to the farmers, the economy, and international trade, but

REALIZING that when the same crop is planted in the same field too frequently, it rapidly depletes necessary nutrients from the soil, causing the soil to become infertile and unable to continue to produce enough crops to benefit anyone,

RELUCTANTLY AWARE that whenever a fertile field is destroyed by any means, a portion of similarly sized area of forest must be deforested in order to replace that field,

BELIEVING it is necessary for fertile farmland to be protected, this resolution hereby:

1. DEFINES a "professional farmer" as a person who is a farmer, planter, or gardener by profession, and farms at least one acre of farmland,
2. RESTRICTS professional farmers from planting the same crop in the same field in back-to-back growing seasons so that fertile farmland might be preserved,

3. ADVISES professional farmers to alternate crops so that a perfectly good field does not go unused,

4. ESTABLISHES the World Assembly Agricultural Association (WAAA) to oversee a agricultural communities and enforce the given guidelines, and

5. STRONGLY ENCOURAGES the World Assembly Forest Commission (WAFC) to consider creating restrictions on the number of acres that can be deforested for agricultural purposes in a given area.

Sorry for the delay on this one, folks.  The WA Podium hasn't been updated in a while, due to my inactivity.  Anyways, I'm happy to report that, as of post time, we're actually ahead of schedule!  There's currently no resolution pending, but the above proposal has reached quorum, so voting will open at the major update (midnight EST).  Since that's in about 3 hours, I thought I'd open up debate a little early. 

Oh, I almost forgot to post the official debate thread.  Debate away, Wintreath!

"Fertile Farmland Protection" was defeated 6,237 votes to 2,793
Ouch.

One of the biggest things that can ruin a proposal is for the author to have a poor working knowledge of the subject matter they're trying to legislate.  For example, numerous contributors on the NS forums have pointed out that there are many situations in which alternating crops is not necessary to sustain the soil.  There are many agricultural practices that would actually be in grave danger should the farmers be forced to alternate crops when there is no need to do so. 

Another thing that gets proposals shafted quite quickly is breaking the rules.  This proposal is illegal because it legislates the farmers themselves, not the member nations of the WA.  Technically, the WA does not have the authority to legislate upon a nation's citizens.  It can only instruct national governments to comply with its acts.  Therefore, the resolution is illegal, as it doesn't have any instructions for member nations on how to comply. 

On second thought, this might be deleted before the major update...