EPA tells the world what I'm telling them in my novel

You gotta catch the Associated Press article captioned: EPA: Majority of waterways are in poor biological health. It's in the Wednesday Desert Sun and other papers subscribing to Ass. Press.
My fourth novel is sited on the Platte River, in Nebraska along the Oregon Trail. The protagonists are fighting an old farmer who has come back to change the way farming is done. He is using the last few years of his life to change the use of fertilizers, pesticides, and herbicides on farms along the Platte. 
       What do you think happens to the water, air, and land when you read this stuff?