With the Obama administration firmly in its second term, the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is likely to push for stricter water quality regulations, according to Don Parrish, the American Farm Bureau Fed­eration’s (AFBF) senior director for regulatory relations and outreach. Those added regulations, he said, could be very detrimental for farmers and rural communities.

"The regulators really see this as their last big chance, so there is going to be a big push beginning in 2014," Parrish said last week during an educational seminar at the Iowa Farm Bureau Federation (IFBF) annual meeting in Des Moines. "We have to make sure...