Research

The 13-state Mississippi River Critical Conservation Area, or MRCCA, has millions of environmentally sensitive acres that are full of opportunity to adopt conservation practices that can improve water...

Farmers received almost $7.4 billion in payments from two of the largest federal agricultural conservation programs between 2017 and 2020, but only a small proportion of these payments went to...

A new EWG analysis has identified and mapped more than 2,500 animal feeding operations in the Western Lake Erie Basin, a watershed encompassing nearly 6 million acres in Indiana, Michigan and Ohio...

Farmers both contribute to the climate crisis – they’re responsible for producing at least 10 percent of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions – and they can also be devastated by its harmful effects, with...

The almost $1.5 billion in federal crop insurance indemnities sent to farmers in the Mississippi River Critical Conservation Area for flooding damage between 2001 and 2020 could have instead taken...

A new interactive EWG map highlights county “hot spots” that received disproportionately large and frequent crop insurance payments in the Mississippi River Critical Conservation Area, or MRCCA. The...

EWG has developed a mapping tool to track the effectiveness of U.S. Department of Agriculture programs and identify opportunities for county-level efforts to improve water quality, climate resiliency...

The Environmental Working Group presents an innovative “water atlas” tracking phosphorous and nitrate pollution in four Upper Mississippi River Basin states.

Taxpayer-funded farm subsidies have long been skewed in favor of the richest farmers and landowners. But under the Trump administration, even more money went to the largest and wealthiest farms...

The Pineland Sands is a 770-square-mile area in northern Minnesota, home to globally threatened jack pine forests and abundant wetlands. The entire region is underlain by a critical, shallow and...

In the past eight years, three predominantly Black, Native American and Latino counties in North Carolina – already home to most of the state's industrial hog operations – added 30 million chickens...

In much of America's farm country, nitrate contamination of drinking water, largely caused by polluted runoff from crop fields, poses a serious health risk – and the problem is getting worse...

In almost all of Minnesota's farm counties, the combination of manure plus commercial fertilizer is likely to load too much nitrogen or phosphorus or both onto crop fields, threatening drinking water...

The number of large concentrated animal feeding operations, or large CAFOs, in Iowa increased nearly fivefold in the past two decades, a new study from Environmental Working Group reveals, with almost...

In the summer, millions of lush green acres of corn and soybeans blanket the Midwest. Come fall, many harvesters scrape crop fields until they are black and barren, exposing large swaths of vulnerable...

Des Moines Water Works has struggled for years to provide safe drinking water to its customers, battling nitrate contamination from upstream farms. But contamination from agricultural practices may be...

The Maumee River, overloaded with fertilizer and manure, is the single largest source of the phosphorus that triggers blooms of toxic algae in Lake Erie. Over half of the manure in the Maumee River...

America has a serious problem with nitrate contamination of drinking water – and it is most severe in the small communities that can least afford to fix it.

The 1985 federal farm bill created a conservation compact between farmers and taxpayers. In return for generous farm subsidies, farmers agreed to take steps to cut erosion and polluted runoff from...

In December 2015, the 1,500 residents of Erie, Ill., received a warning that the community's tap water should not be given to babies under 6 months old, or used to mix formula or juice for those...

The Raccoon River in central Iowa runs through one of the most intensely farmed regions of the nation. Agriculture is vital to the area's economy, but polluted runoff from farms poses an acute threat...

After a decline in crop prices in 2014 and 2015, the U.S. Department of Agriculture boosted farmers' income by more than $13 billion through two newly enacted subsidy programs. But during the same...

Mapping Cover Crops on Corn and Soybeans in Illinois, Indiana and Iowa, 2015-2016

The key to ending world hunger while protecting the environment is to help small farmers in the developing world increase their productivity and income.