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<br />O"~;H'l. <br />tJ.L lJ 0 ... <br /> <br />nutrient enrichment, polluted runoff from farmlands, and toxic contamination of fish tissue and <br />sediments--are becoming more evident. <br /> <br />. .. The leading causes of pollution cited by the States in impaired rivers and lakes,are <br />siltation and nutrients. . .. wcultural activities are the most extensively reported source of <br />pollution in rivers and lakes.19 . . <br /> <br />Again in 1988 agriculture is the principal source of "major" pollution impacts--cited as <br /> <br />responsible for nearly eighteen percent (18%) of all impaired river miles, a figure that is more <br /> <br />than double the number attributable to the next source. Agriculture also is cited as having at <br /> <br /> <br />least a "moderate" polluting impact on forty percent (40%) of all impaired river miles.20 <br /> <br />This paper is not the place for a lengthy recitation of facts in support of the general <br /> <br />proposition that agriculture is a major contnbutor of pollutants to water in the United States. <br /> <br /> <br />Suffice it that there is a great deal of factual support available,21 and that agriculture is the <br /> <br /> <br />remaining major unregulated source of water pollutants.22 <br /> <br />19 Office of Water, United States Environmental Protection Agency, National Water' <br />Quality Inventory: 1988 Report to Congress i (EPA 440-4-90-003, April 1990). <br /> <br />20 It!. at 7. <br /> <br />21 Office of Water Program Operations, United States Environmental Protection <br />Agency, "Report to Congress: Nonpoint Source Pollution in the United States" (1984) <br />(hereinafter NPS Report]; P. Thompson, "Poison Runoff: A Guide to State and Local Control <br />of Nonpoint Source Water Pollution" (Natural Resources Defense Council 1989); Gould, <br />"Agriculture, Nonpoint Source Pollution, and Federal Law," 23 u.c. Davis L Rev. 461 (1990); <br />MandeIker, "Controlling Nonpoint Source Water Pollution: Can It Be Done?," 65 Chi.-Kent L <br />Rev. 479 (1989). See 2enerallv V. Novotny & G. Chesters, Handbook of Nonpoinl Pollution <br />(1981). <br /> <br />22 Offutt, "Agriculture's Role in Protecting Water Quality," l. Soil & Water <br />Conservation (Jan.-Feb. 1990). <br /> <br />29 <br />