China and U.S. Farmbelt Push Back on
‘30 by 30’ Green Depopulation Assault

by Robert L. Baker and Kevin Gribbroek

[Print version of this article]

Oct. 29—In Kunming, China, the UN COP15 Biodiversity Summit/Part 1 took place from October 11 to 15, which is the green little-sister event to the infamous UN COP26 Climate Summit meeting in Glasgow, October 31–Nov. 12. Instead of toeing the line of greenie-approved narratives, China, the rotating host, politely pushed back against the key green biodiversity tenet that humans and their activity must be banned from 30% of the Earth’s land and water by 2030—called “30x30,” and maybe even 50% by 2050, in order, it is asserted, to slow the rate of extinction of diverse non-human life (animals, plants, insects, aquatic species).

This puts China in the same camp as another key front of international resistance to this 30x30 scheme—the U.S. Farmbelt and Western states, which have strongly mobilized in opposition to the idea, since it was announced as Executive Order 14008 by President Joe Biden on January 27.

President Xi Jinping, in his address to the UN COP15 event, expressed support for all nations, especially poor nations, to continue economic development, and use their resources for a “harmony of man and nature,” not a conflict. He announced that China will create an integrated national park program out of its disparate animal and nature preserves, and will donate $232 million to poor countries, for them to use in a national park fashion. He stood squarely against any notion of austerity or depopulation to “save nature,” or “save the planet.”

From Greenpeace to the London media, the uproar against China was swift, loud and laughable. We report COP15 details on this below, and also on the latest from the U.S. anti-30x30 mobilization. But the full significance of these anti-Malthusian moves by China and Americans is important to keep in mind. First, they are contributions toward COP26 turning out to be FLOP26, or even NOPE26. That would be good for mankind.

Secondly, given the emergency need for large-scale food aid for Afghanistan, and other points of famine—Yemen, Syria, Haiti, many locations in Africa—the agricultural capacity of China and North America is vital. The issue in the United States is not just to beat back the 30x30 as a land-grab, which it is, but to resume the sovereignty of our nation in every way. We have the farm productivity to prevent mass death from starvation, and it is part of our mobilization to restore independent family farming, and defeat the cartel system, which is backing the green frauds.

First, some essential history, then the reports.

Both of this Fall’s UN summits—biodiversity, and climate—of the “COP” (Conference of the Parties, or participating nations), originated back in 1992 at the Rio de Janeiro UN Earth Summit. There the process was started, based on two maliciously crafted myths: It was asserted that CO₂ and other emissions from humanity’s agro-industrial progress were overheating the planet. It was further asserted that human populations were increasing too much and crowding out non-human life, causing bird and beast species to go extinct. The common premise: population is a menace, and must be cut back.

Therefore, it was promoted over the past 29 years, in the 25 climate summits, that humans must reduce their CO₂ output; and in the 14 summits of the Convention on Biological Diversity, that large parts of the Earth must be set apart from human presence, to reduce the rate of extinction of non-human life, and preserve biodiversity.

Kunming Declaration—Respect for ‘All Life’

In advance of the COP15 Summit on Biological Diversity in Kunming, a pre-summit statement was issued by Beijing on October 8 stating that China has, “Given high priority to the protection of biodiversity by establishing a network of protected areas and national parks.” But it did not commit to the 30x30 concept. This went against some 60 nations which have declared 30x30 as a goal, including, for the U.S., President Biden’s January 2021 Executive Order for 30x30.

Then on October 14, the official Summit statement was released, called “The Kunming Declaration,” and it likewise did not mandate hard dates and goals for banning human activity from 30 to 50 percent of the Earth’s land and oceans. Instead, the document diplomatically takes notice of “the call of many countries to protect and conserve 30% of land and sea areas through well-connected systems of protected areas and other effective area-based conservation measures by 2030.” But there was no order or pledge that this must be done.

Squawks against China came from the core green networks. Greenpeace International for example, issued many complaints against Beijing saying that China should speed up, and give up its “modest diplomatic approach” by setting serious biodiversity measures. An Lambrechts, their Senior Campaign Strategist, said that the Kunming Declaration has only “vague commitments that lack accountability.” Li Shuo, Global Policy Advisor for Greenpeace East Asia said:

The Kunming Declaration gives us a hint on China’s leadership style. The declaration made a reference to the 30x30 target, but did not indicate if Beijing is on board with it or not. That’s a balancing act to recognize the growing momentum behind this goal while not prejudicing the multilateral process. Beijing should make up its mind soon if it wants to lead from the front. The Kunming Declaration has only vague commitments that lack accountability….

Lin Li, the Director of Policy at WWF (Worldwide Fund for Nature), carped that the Declaration’s “impacts will lie in how it is put into action.” She said that Part 2 of the COP15 Biodiversity Summit in 2022 better have an “action plan for nature which not only protects land, freshwater and seas, but also fundamentally addresses our unsustainable agricultural system….”

Biden’s Executive Order 14008 from Hell

President Biden, after announcing on his inauguration day that the U.S. was back in the COP21 Paris Climate Agreement, issued seven days later, on January 27, 2021, Executive Order 14008, containing the 30x30 measures and a raft of other measures, to the glee of the Wall Street and City of London oligarchs. The purpose of EO 14008, titled “Tackling the Climate Crisis at Home and Abroad,” is essentially to submit all U.S. foreign and domestic policy, including military policy, to the oligarchy’s Malthusian, depopulation climate agenda.

Embedded in this document is the infamous Section 216, “Conserving Our Nation’s Lands and Waters,” which is popularly known as the 30x30 land grab. The stated goal of this section is to “conserve” 30% of U.S. lands and waters by the year 2030. With 12% of U.S. land already designated as “protected,” that would mean another 18%, or approximately 400 million acres, must be designated as conservation land over the next eight years, an area significantly larger than the state of Alaska. The question is, where will this land come from?

On May 6, as mandated by Section 216, the Departments of Interior, Agriculture, Commerce and the Council on Environmental Quality issued a report titled, Conserving and Restoring America the Beautiful to serve as a roadmap for achieving the 30x30 goal. Couched in vague, politically correct jargon, the report begins with a section called “Envisioning America the Beautiful,” containing quotes from 15 different environmentalist groups expressing joy at the prospects of turning the United States back into a wilderness area. Typical is a quote from The Nature Conservancy:

To succeed requires better science and large-scale spatial planning to identify, conserve, restore and protect climate-resilient habitats. It must include sustainable resource management backed by robust public policies and funding to address systemic changes in different geographies and communities.

A primary goal is to reduce farmland—crops and livestock. This stands to reason, given the goal of depopulation. Approximately 896 million acres in the United States are classified in use as farmland, and indeed, a section of the report titled, “Incentivize and Reward the Voluntary Conservation Efforts of Fishers, Ranchers, Farmers and Forest Owners,” makes clear that farmland is on the hit list in a big way. According to this section, through both federal agencies and private land trusts, all possible “tools” at their disposal should be used to encourage farmers to “voluntarily” take their land out of use for food production and turn it into conservation land to “protect biodiversity.”

And what are these tools? Money, of course. With thousands of farmers and ranchers on the verge of bankruptcy due to decades of globalized free trade, food cartelization, and Wall Street commodities speculation, the Biden administration is banking on cash incentive schemes to grab up millions of acres of prime farmland in order to meet the 30x30 quota. Various programs are mentioned in the report, such as the Working Lands for Wildlife initiative and Conservation Reserve Program, all geared towards enticing financially desperate farmers into giving up food production for biodiversity protection.

With hundreds of millions of people worldwide going hungry, and millions facing death by starvation, taking farmland out of production supposedly to protect the American burying beetle or the Zayante band-winged grasshopper is in fact a Nuremburg-style crime against humanity.

Fighting Back

Not willing to accept this genocidal scheme, The LaRouche Organization launched a counter offensive in March 2021 with the production of a Special Report titled, The Great Leap Backward; LaRouche Crushes the ‘Green New Deal’ Fraud. One section of the report details how the financial oligarchy intends to cut production of food as a means to reduce population via mass starvation. To date, thousands of copies of this report have gone out to farmers, ranchers, state and local elected officials, and political activists to counter the lies of the mainstream media, academia and other sources.

On July 24 the Schiller Institute hosted an international webcast, “There Is No Climate Emergency—Apply the Science and Economics of Development To Stop Blackouts and Death,” featuring farm leaders, scientists, meteorologists and other experts, all of whom presented facts concerning the true nature of climate change.

Then on October 11, Helga Zepp-LaRouche, President of the Schiller Institute, along with Professor Guus Berkhout, a Dutch geophysicist who initiated and co-founded the leading climate science organization known as Climate Intelligence (CLINTEL), issued a statement titled, “Wake Up! The Danger for Mankind is Not the Climate, but Toleration of a Devious Policy that Uses Climate to Destroy Us” which is now in mass circulation worldwide.

Resistance to the oligarchy’s climate change agenda is coming from other layers as well. At the federal level, on March 16, thirteen Senators and 51 Congressmen sent a letter to President Biden warning that the 30x30 was “setting the stage for potential egregious federal overreach.” Most of these Congressmen and Senators are from Western and Midwestern farm states.

At the state level, Governor Pete Ricketts of Nebraska has been doing an exceptional job organizing resistance to the 30x30 land grab. On April 21, Governor Ricketts penned an Open Letter to President Biden, challenging his Constitutional authority to permanently conserve 30% of all land and water in the United States. This letter was endorsed by the governors of Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Idaho, Iowa, Mississippi, Montana, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas and Utah.

On June 3 Governor Ricketts kicked off a series of town hall meetings traversing the entire state, encouraging county officials to pass resolutions against the 30x30 and on June 25 he signed Executive Order No. 21-08, “Stop 30x30—Protect Our Land and Water,” mandating that action be taken by his administration to resist the 30x30. To date 64 of 93 counties in Nebraska have passed anti-30x30 resolutions.

An important private organization fighting the 30x30 is the American Stewards of Liberty, based in Georgetown, Texas, and led by Executive Director Margaret Byfield, who herself has been speaking at town hall meetings throughout the farm belt states and meeting with county and local officials as well as farm groups to encourage resistance. The American Stewards of Liberty maintains a website, Stop30x30.AmericanStewards.us, which serves as a type of war room for those fighting the 30x30. According to the website, county commissions from 12 different states have signed anti-30x30 resolutions.

Also of significant note is farmer activist Angel Cushing, who has been leading the fight in her home state of Kansas. According to Mrs. Cushing, 10 Kansas counties have passed resolutions against the 30x30, and 49 counties against expanding what are known as national heritage areas, areas designated by Congress and administered by state or private organizations advised by the National Park Service “to protect national heritage.” Zoning regulations can be used in these areas to restrict or ban farming, ranching, or any other type of development. Forty-one counties in Eastern Kansas and Western Missouri totaling 31,021 square miles are currently designated as a national heritage area called Freedom’s Frontier.

Angel Cushing is bringing national attention to this. On October 22, she spoke at an online symposium hosted in New York, by LaRouche Independent candidate for Senate, Diane Sare, who is opposing Chuck Schumer, Senate Majority Leader, who backs Executive Order 14008 all the way. Mrs. Cushing warned, “We know for example that they’re going to use regulations to regulate us out. And those regulations that generally hit the farm are conservation, EPA regulations, endangered species regulations. All of a sudden the mosquito becomes an endangered species to get us off our land.”

R-CALF USA and OCM Conventions

At the annual convention in August of R-CALF USA, the largest U.S. organization of independent cattlemen, the topic of fighting the 30x30 anti-food production scheme was on the agenda, in addition to R-CALF’s ongoing focus against breaking the grip of the transnational meatpackers. Some 400 ranchers and farmers, meeting August 18-20 in Rapid City, South Dakota, heard Margaret Byfield speak on “Peeling Back the Layers of Biden’s 30x30 Land Grab.” Wyoming rancher and attorney Tracy Hunt spoke on the related topic, “The Global Roundtable for Sustainable Beef: They’re Coming for You and Your Ranch.” He outlined the same cartel and conservation operations behind the green assault and transnational control of food production, the nexus of the World Wildlife Fund, the mega-meatpackers, McDonald’s, Walmart, and the like.

On Aug. 21, following the two-day R-CALF conference, the Organization for Competitive Markets (OCM), headquartered in Missouri, also had its annual convention in Rapid City. The OCM passed a resolution that listed five points against the 30x30 measure, and ended with two action points:

• Be it resolved, the Organization for Competitive Markets opposes governmental programs which remove private property, including Federal grazing allotments and permits, from independent family agricultural production.

• Be it resolved, the Organization for Competitive Markets opposes all government mandated programs which minimize our national food independence.

The preservation of private property rights is a main arguing point, but the resolution and discussions do identify upfront that the 30x30 and related anti-production measures in President Biden’s January Executive Order 14008 (Section 216) will cut the food supply.

Produce Food, Save Lives

EIR interviewed farm and ranch leaders from many states, on site in Rapid City, all of whom stressed aspects of the need to restore, defend and expand food production based on independent family farming and food processing. They gave no credence to any of the green propaganda about “nature-smart” farming, or “carbon farming,” or “prairie preserves” or any of the other schemes, especially 30x30. They all warned of food shortages ahead, unless there is a change in course. And they stressed the need for water infrastructure, given the impact of the western continental drought.

Frank Endres from California, a long-time National Board member of the National Farmers Organization and R-CALF USA, warned of the impact of letting the drought and other things just take their course,

I think we are on the verge of a food crisis in the country and worldwide as well. You can say you do believe or not believe the issue of climate change, but [when] something happens to production, unless there is something to reverse this, we’re going to be in severe trouble.

Endres, a cattle rancher and wheat producer in the Sacramento Valley, stressed that his region was, as of this summer, in the worst drought in 127 years.

We are experiencing droughts all over the United States in the major grain producing areas. Severe droughts, not just in California, but all through the Dakotas, then down south, into Colorado and some of those states. And this has really curtailed production....

Endres is a longtime advocate of large-scale infrastructure, the North American Water and Power Alliance in particular, and of reinstating Glass-Steagall to restore sound banking and credit to pay for it. He said:

I do believe NAWAPA would be a tremendous project right now, to build a project to bring water down from Alaska and bring that down into this country and clear down into Mexico. It would be a real benefit for everybody in all three countries.

Mike Schultz, from Kansas, who is on OCM’s Board and is a founding leader in the Kansas Cattlemen’s Association, also spoke of getting the water projects going. On NAWAPA, he said:

[NAWAPA] would be beneficial because the drought issues in the West are big time. A lot of the good water is being sent on down to the ocean. So, we have to utilize that, as it comes through, even from the Mississippi River. I mean, those things are important things for people to survive with. So, let’s hope that maybe something like that would create a fair amount of jobs, and I would be an advocate for that policy, if we can get something done.

Mike Callicrate, a cattleman, entrepreneur, political activist and founding member of several major farm organizations from Kansas and Colorado, spoke against globalist control and outsourcing. He is founder and owner of Ranch Foods Direct. He said:

The third-world countries, many times, become colonized by our big mega-national corporations that search the world for the hungriest people that will work the cheapest. Just look at Haiti, Puerto Rico. Look at Hawaii, it’s a state but the thing is, Hawaii used to feed itself. Now, they’re importing over 90% of the food they consume. Alaska, for example. You can’t buy Alaskan salmon in a restaurant in downtown Anchorage, because they are importing farm-salmon from Canada.

I’m saying, let’s kick out the multi-national corporations, let’s localize our food system and, instead of being colonized, let’s produce it ourselves, and keep the wealth in the community. So, the colonization approach is all about extraction. We need to build a circular economy, not a linear economy that extracts—a circular economy, that builds the wealth in the community and also puts back so there is sustainability and resiliency.

Tracy Hunt, a cattleman and lawyer from Wyoming, who is famous for exposing the World Wildlife Fund control over the Global Roundtable for Sustainable Beef, slammed the World Wildlife Fund and its cohorts. He said:

Prince Bernhard, Prince Philip [who] also founded the Bilderberg group, were all famously eugenicists, that were concerned primarily about population reduction, and, what I’ve found out, is that the World Wildlife Fund is very much interested in disinvesting the ranchers of their property and destroying the ability of the ranchers to raise and produce wholesome beef and meat. The World Wildlife Fund has great appeal to a lot of people, because the image they project, is that the WWF is for conservation. The Global Roundtable is a product of the World Wildlife Fund and the United Nations and international finance. The point is that they have worked to steer investment money away from competition [in meat] and captured the beef supplies.

Marcia Merry Baker contributed to this article.

Bob Baker bb888k@gmail.com

Kevin Gribbroek gkgribbroek@yahoo.com