Landowners must apply for general CRP by Aug. 27
By Janet Kubat Willette
jkubat@agrinews.com
Date Modified: 08/26/2010 9:14 AM
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The first general Conservation Reserve Program signup in four years ends on Aug. 27.
Greg Anderson, agricultural program specialist for USDA Farm Service Agency in Minnesota, said they are not allowed to release signup numbers at this point, but he said there is interest in the 25-year-old conservation program.
Kent Politsch, USDA spokesman, said on the first day of signup, Aug. 2, almost 1,000 participants came into county offices across the country and started the process of submitting an application.
USDA is offering the signup to keep the CRP enrollment as close to the 32 million acre cap as possible, Politsch said. USDA established the 32 million acre in the 2008 farm bill, down from 39 million acres in the 2002 farm bill. At the end of the fiscal year, Sept. 30, the contracts for 4.5 million acres of CRP will expire, Politsch said.
USDA has not yet announced how many acres will be accepted in this general signup, nor has it announced what Environmental Benefits Index score will be necessary to gain enrollment.
The general signup is a competitive process where landowners offer to enroll highly erodible tracts of land in the program for 10 to 15 years. If accepted, landowners receive annual rental payments and a payment of up to 50 percent of the cost of establishing conservation practices. Rental rates are based on the productivity of the soils within the county and average rental rates.
Landowners can enhance their chances of getting into the program by targeting just the highly erodible piece of the land, offering to accept less than the maximum allowed rental rate or enhancing wildlife cover, said Dave Nomsen, vice president of government affairs for Pheasants Forever.
Pheasants Forever held 179 forums in 12 states, including Minnesota, to inform landowners about the Conservation Reserve Program. The meetings wrap up this week with the last Minnesota meeting at 10 a.m. Aug. 19 at the Meeker County USDA Service Center in Litchfield.
One thing staff are talking about is the new pollinator provision. Landowners can increase their EBI score by agreeing to plant pollinator habitat. Pollinator habitat is not only good for bees and the plants that rely on them for reproduction, but also for pheasant and quail.
PF staff have been pretty pleased with the turnout and interest in the CRP, Nomsen said.
The signup process is fairly complex, he said, and PF farm bill biologists are working in conjunction with Farm Service Agency and Natural Resources Conservation District staff to help landowners complete the process.
The Farm Service Agency has indicated that landowners will need to sign an interim conservation plan by Sept. 17, so the turnaround will need to be fairly quick, said Scott McLeod, Ducks Unlimited governmental affairs representative.
Secretary Vilsack wants the contracts handled by the end of the fiscal year, Politsch said. The new contracts are set to begin Oct. 1.