The government says it makes no sense to allow much of the country's best soil to liefallow while farmers struggle to squeeze a living from minuscule, dust-blown fields.
Land used to grow biopharmed corn, for example, would have to liefallow for the following season, a requirement that would promote soil erosion and whose expense would discourage many farmers from biopharming.
The idea of the new Brownfields law was this: To encourage redevelopment of the 450, 000 brownfield sites that would otherwise liefallow, the government needed to provide liability protection to developers who took certain reasonable steps before and after buying a property.