25 years of CRP
Farm and Ranch January 3, 2011 The Conservation Reserve Program just celebrated its 25th birthday. Lynn Tjeersdma with the national Farm Service Agency says the popular conservation program dates back to the 1985 Farm Bill. Tjeersdma: “On December 23rd 1985 the 1985 Farm Bill was signed into law and part of that farm bill was the Conservation Reserve Program which at that time was established to take care of some grain surpluses and protect highly erodible land. And over the past 25 years from a brand new program it has evolved into a many-faceted program that covers everything from protecting wetlands, its got some forest practices, continuous practices, filter strips. It has enhanced water quality along with its initial purpose of protecting highly erodible and marginal land. So it has been a real success story going from zero acres to over 31 million acres right now.” In the Pacific Northwest there are 665-thousand acres in CRP in Idaho, about 550-thousand in Oregon and 1.4 million acres in CRP in Washington. CRP is a voluntary program that encourages agricultural landowners to convert highly erodible cropland or other environmentally sensitive acreage to vegetative cover. Landowners receive annual rental payments and cost-share assistance to establish long-term conservation practices on eligible farmland. I’m Bob Hoff and that’s the Northwest Farm and Ranch Report on Northwest Aginfo Net. ? ? ?
