BYRON, Minn. — How do you grapple with a hidden problem? That was a question at the center of a Land Stewardship Project (LSP) “Smarter Nitrogen Policy” discussion involving around two dozen farmers, water quality experts and state legislators at the Martin Larsen farm near Byron Aug. 20.
“We fix what we can see — if you see a gully, people don’t like soil leaving their farm and will fix the erosion problem,” said Justin Watkins, the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency’s southeastern Minnesota watershed unit supervisor, during an opening presentation. He said Minnesota has made great progress in reducing phosphorus pollution of water by helping farmers put in place practices that keep soil in place and enforcing regulations on how much of the nutrient can leave water treatment plants, for example.
“But we haven’t made as much progress on keeping nitrogen out of our water,” he said, explaining that nitrogen tends to leach beneath the root zone of plants in places farmers can’t see, and can be quite mobile, even if good soil conservation practices are being utilized.
“At a base level it’s invisible, and when you’re trying to manage something that’s invisible, it’s a lot harder to manage,” Watkins said.
Keeping nitrogen on cropland and out of water has significant ramifications when it comes to human health: nitrate, a form of nitrogen, has been linked to ailments such as cancer, and the Environmental Protection Agency has set the safe drinking water standard for nitrate at 10 parts per million, although some research shows that exposures at even lower levels pose a threat. Watkins pointed out that both the Minnesota Nutrient Reduction Strategy and the Southeast Minnesota Nitrate Strategies Collaborative Work Group have concluded that implementing best management practices such as cover cropping, no-till and in-season fertilizer applications are helpful in dealing with the nitrogen pollution problem, but to make real progress, widespread “systems changes” are needed, including supporting a transition to alternative crops through market and policy incentives.
A panel of three Minnesota crop farmers spent the rest of the meeting discussing the challenges they face balancing profitable production with keeping water clean. The farmers — Martin Larsen, Lance Petersen and Myron Sylling — are advisers to LSP’s recently launched “Rethinking Nitrogen” campaign (landstewardshipproject.org/nitrogen), which is building a farmer-led movement to show the viability of nitrogen-reducing practices while creating the political momentum needed to pass strong nutrient reduction policies during Minnesota’s 2027 legislative session. Through surveys and one-to-one conversations, LSP is identifying farmers interested in building a movement focused on practical, common-sense solutions, according to Laura Schreiber, LSP’s government relations director.
“It brings together farmers who are passionate about soil health, water quality and what’s best for everybody,” said Sylling, who raises 650 acres of corn and soybeans near Spring Grove utilizing no-till and cover crops.
Four lawmakers — Sen. Gene Dornink (R-Albert Lea), Rep. Rick Hansen (DFL-Saint Paul), Rep. Kristi Pursell (DFL-Northfield) and Rep. Andy Smith (DFL-Rochester) — sat it on the discussion, which also included staffers with various state and local government agencies, along with other area farmers.
Larsen raises 1,450 acres of corn, soybeans and oats. He told the lawmakers that there is a critical need for policy that helps “de-risk” practices that make farms more resilient economically and environmentally. As a staffer with the Olmsted County Soil and Water Conservation District, Larsen helped develop that agency’s Groundwater Protection and Soil Health Program, which since 2022 has paid farmers to plant cover crops, diversify into small grains such as oats, and replace row crops with forages. In southeastern Minnesota’s Rice County, cover cropping alone has been shown to reduce nitrates leaving tile lines by 27%, while saving farmers $15.75 per acre annually in fertilizer costs, and lysimeter monitoring in Olmsted County shows adding oats to a corn-soybean rotation sends nitrate runoff levels plummeting well below the EPA drinking water standard. During the 2026 legislative session, lawmakers provided $2.8 million to expand the Olmsted County initiative to 10 more southeastern Minnesota counties.
Larsen said that’s a good start, but to “move the needle” on nitrate pollution on a wider scale, more resources need to be directed statewide at programs that smooth the transition to soil-friendly practices. Lawmakers need to also find a way to reward major processors for buying soil-friendly crops like oats from local farmers, he said.
The farmer panel discussed how the use of soil-friendly practices like conservation tillage, cover cropping and in-season fertilizer applications by themselves and other farmers proves there are ways to balance profitability with environmental sustainability. But they also conceded that the systems wide changes Watkins talked about are needed to produce consistent, long-term results.
During the discussion, Watkins highlighted a graphic summarizing the results of a Minnesota Department of Agriculture study based on 3,000 nitrate-nitrogen samples taken over five years in southeastern Minnesota. The study showed that when the land was in prairie, forest, pasture, grass or an alfalfa-corn rotation, nitrate levels were consistently well below the EPA’s safe drinking water standard. Even water sampled below lawns and golf courses had low nitrate levels. However, the subsoil of land in continuous corn or a corn-soybean rotation had nitrate levels that were at times more than double the EPA standard.
“This is the first time I’ve ever seen this,” Petersen, who raises 900 acres of corn and soybeans in Chisago County using strip till and in-season applications of nitrogen fertilizer, said as he held up the graphic. “I don’t know why this information isn’t in front of every farm meeting.”
The three farmers admitted that to have a real impact on water quality, some type of regulation may have to play a part.
“We need to look at how well voluntary programs have worked,” said Sylling. “Because we are not hitting nutrient reduction targets with those programs.”
Larsen said no matter what policies are being considered, people like himself, Petersen and Sylling need to be in the room.
“Whatever voluntary policy or regulation is being discussed, farmers are better off sitting at the table, every single time,” he said.
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The Land Stewardship Project (LSP) is a nonprofit organization dedicated to fostering an ethic of stewardship for farmland, promoting sustainable agriculture and developing healthy communities in the food and farming system. LSP has offices in the Minnesota communities of Montevideo, Lewiston and South Minneapolis. More information is available at landstewardshipproject.org.