Eighty-Five Percent Conservation Reserve Program Acceptance Rate Leads to Nearly 4 Million Acres of Habitat
Pheasants Forever 05.27.12
Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack today announced that the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) will accept 3.9 million acres offered under the 43rd Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) general sign-up. During the extended five-week signup, the Department received nearly 48,000 offers on more than 4.5 million acres of land, demonstrating demand for CRP as our nation’s most successful voluntary program for conserving land and improving our soil, water, air and wildlife habitat resources.
USDA selected offers for enrollment based on an Environmental Benefits Index (EBI) comprised of five environmental factors plus cost. The five environmental factors are: (1) wildlife enhancement, (2) water quality, (3) soil erosion, (4) enduring benefits, and (5) air quality. The minimal acceptable EBI level for this sign-up was 209. The average rental rate per acre for this sign-up is $51.24.
“On one hand, we are pleased to see such a substantial number of offers from this spring’s CRP general signup, considering external factors such as record high land values and commodity prices,” said Dave Nomsen, Pheasants Forever’s Vice President of Governmental Affairs.
Nomsen added, “On the other hand, we are concerned about the significant decline of CRP acres across the Northern Plains states. In total, the Northern Plains will lose in excess of one million acres of CRP through the 2012 re-enrollment process. The continued loss of CRP from this region will have far reaching wildlife and environmental ramifications. These acres represent America’s pheasant and duck factories, as well as the starting point for the Mississippi and Missouri River watersheds impacting water quality all the way to the Gulf of Mexico.”
While Pheasants Forever is concerned about the current status of CRP, Nomsen did address opportunities to work toward in the coming months. “Recent USDA announcements for new CRP initiatives focusing on 750,000 acres of highly erodible, or HEL lands, and for 1 million acres of targeted CRP buffer practices may be very helpful to address resource concerns from areas experiencing loss of overall CRP. In addition, Congress can address these habitat and natural resource concerns by quickly passing a 2012 Farm Bill with a strong overall conservation title including CRP, and new policies like the Sodsaver provisions that will help protect valuable native prairie grasslands.”
CRP is a voluntary program designed to help farmers, ranchers and other agricultural producers protect their environmentally sensitive land. Eligible landowners receive annual rental payments and cost-share assistance to establish long-term, resource conserving covers on eligible farmland throughout the duration of 10 to 15 year contracts.
CRP has a 25-year legacy of successfully protecting the nation’s natural resources through voluntary participation, while providing significant economic and environmental benefits to rural communities across the United States. Under CRP, farmers and ranchers plant grasses and trees in crop fields and along streams or rivers. The plantings prevent soil and nutrients from washing into waterways, reduce soil erosion that may otherwise contribute to poor air and water quality, and provide valuable habitat for wildlife. Plant cover established on the acreage accepted into the CRP will reduce nutrient and sediment runoff in our nation’s rivers and streams. In 2011, as a result of CRP, nitrogen and phosphorous losses from farm fields were reduced by 623 million pounds and 124 million pounds respectively. The CRP has restored more than two million acres of wetlands and associated buffers and reduces soil erosion by more than 300 million tons per year. CRP also provides $1.8 billion annually to landowners—dollars that make their way into local economies, supporting small businesses and creating jobs. In addition, CRP is the largest private lands carbon sequestration program in the country. By placing vulnerable cropland into conservation, CRP sequesters carbon in plants and soil, and reduces both fuel and fertilizer usage. In 2010, CRP resulted in carbon sequestration equal to taking almost 10 million cars off the road.
For more information regarding today’s announcement, please contact Dave Nomsen at (320) 491-9163 or E-mail Dave. For all other inquiries, please contact Rehan Nana, Pheasants Forever and Quail Forever Public Relations Specialist, at (651) 209-4973 or E-mail Rehan.
Pheasants Forever launched Quail Forever in August of 2005 to address the continuing loss of habitat suitable for quail and the subsequent quail population decline. Bobwhite population losses over the last 25 years range from 60 to 90 percent across the country. The reason for the quail population plunge is simple - massive losses of habitat suitable for quail. There are five major factors leading to the losses of quail habitat; intensified farming and forestry practices, succession of grassland ecosystems to forests, overwhelming presence of exotic grasses like fescue that choke out wildlife, and urban sprawl.
