The Save the Family Farm and Ranch Act was reintroduced in senate by Representative John Salazar, D-Colo. It was first introduced in April 2007 and would defer payment of estate tax on family farms if the land is used for any agriculture or conservation purposes.

According to Salazar many people inherit farms but have to sell them because they cannot afford the taxes. Salazar told Farm Futures, “Our intention is by removing that and utilizing the IRS definition of a family farm; they would then be allowed to defer the death tax until the time the person would decide to sell it for development or something else.”

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) determines land a farm if it derives at least 50 percent of the gross income from farming. The current inheritance tax rate is at 45 percent after $2 million. Land value often easily exceeds $2 million.

The Save the Family Farm and Ranch Act would save farms and some agricultural. It keeps farms in families as well. It prevents farmland from being developed into commercial property.

“I think there’s great interest in doing this,” Salazar said. “There are a lot of people that are very concerned about the open space and our ability to provide food not only for this country but the world.”

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A study at the UK’s Bristol University has found farmers in North American and Europe could help lower global warming by 0.1C just by choosing crops that reflect solar energy back into the atmosphere.

The process is as easy as it sounds. Researchers say that because farming has a global infrastructure already, so it should be easy to use it to benefit the climate. Ultimately farmers need to pick crop varieties that are naturally reflective. Once solar energy hits these plants’ leaves they are sent back into space. The more reflective leaves, the more solar energy that is sent back into space.

The researchers have run successful tests and are trying again to assure the research is accurate.

“But another possibility for the future would be to produce a [leaf] surface that differs in reflectivity at different wavelengths, so it could selectively absorb wavelengths involved in photosynthesis,” Dr. Andy Ridgewell told BBC News.

The only problem with the research is that growing different crops will only work in North America and Europe because in other places the reflection is done by clouds, so the ground’s albedo would have very little impact.

This change is not the perfect answer to the world heatwave, but it will help in smaller areas. For example Europe is expected to have many heatwaves this summer, planting reflective crops will change the climate in that specific area, people in South America will not see a change from this.

Another problem is getting farmers involved. A solution may be to give them carbon credits for making a conscious effort to improve the climate.

“You certainly wouldn’t have to replace food crops, so food production shouldn’t be affected by our idea,” Ridgewell said.

Since the industrial age temperatures rose 0.7C. By the end of the century, at the rate the world is going, The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) predicts the average global temperature will have risen by 1.8-4.0C compared to 1990s levels.