Eight Reasons For Getting A Conservation Plan Now LEES PORT If jipu plan to farm highly erodible cropland after December 31, 1989 and retain your eligibility for USDA benefits, there arc at least eight good reasons why you should get your conservation plan prepared and approved as early this year as possible. Robert Heidecker, state resour ce conservationist for the USDA Soil Conservation Service in Pennsylvania, said the Food Sec urity Act of 1985 requires conser vation plans for highly erodible cropland by the end of 1989 to maintain USDA farm program benefits. “What every fanner needs to realize is that they need to start actively applying the plan with the 1990 crop,” Heidecker said. “You have until December 31,1994 to complete the planned practices.” “Wait until January 1, 1990 or later to get a plan approved and you could find yourself having to get the entire plan completely installed before producing the next agricultural commodity crop and have USDA program bene fits.” added Heidecker. Since a conservation plan usually takes five or more years to apply, the farmer could be without USDA program benefits for a period of time if he waits until 1990 or later to get his plan. Heidecker explained these rea sons for getting a conservation plan immediately: 1. USDA cost share assistance will probably become short during the early 1990 s because of the demands created by recent planning. The sooner you get your plan and app ly for cost share, the better. 2. If your plan calls for a crop rotation of high residue crops every few years, any such crops grown in 1989 in accordance with a plan, count as a part of your rota tion for the same years. Wait until after December 31 to get your conservation plan and the crops you grow this year may not count. 3. If you lease or rent land to others or from others, both the ten ant and the landlord need to know well in advance the conservation treatment needed for staying eligi ble for farm program benefits. If the needed treatments are expen sive and the landlord is not willing to pay part of the cost, some ren ters wiU not be fanning that land after 1990. 4. If the practices needed are expensive, you might prefer to bid the land into the Conservation Reserve program. By putting the land in continuous grass or trees, an annual rental payment would be received from USDA for 10 years. S. Serious soil erosion problenfS may require detailed engineering surveys before conservation treat ment needs can be determined. Some of this expertise may be located in regional offices miles from the county. Scheduling of this type assistance is already backlogged in some counties. The longer that planning is delayed, the greater the prospect of further delays in the planning and appli cation process. Farmers who wait until late 1989 will probably find it impossible to get assistance before the December 31, 1989 deadline. 6. If the plan you choose includes a crop rotation with a high residue crop for which you have no base acreage, you may need to ask the local Agricultural Stabilization and Conservation Service office to let you exchange one base crop for another. The exchange could require the approval of more than one USDA agency, which can take several weeks. Farmers who wait lose again! 7. In some counties the Soil Conservation Service does not have enough personnel to handle the present workload. Those who wait until mid-summer will find many farmers ahead of them wait ing for planning help. Farmers who do not get their plan prepared and approved before December 31, 1989, will probably lose at least one or two years of USDA program eligibility. 8. Conservation plans need to be approved by county conserva tion districts. Most districts meet once per month. Waiting past the November conservation district meeting is risky. Goodling Schedules Hearing On Vocational Education Lancaster Fwmtng Saturday, March 11, 1989-D3l Under the sodbuster provision of the Act, farmers who plow out highly erodible grassland and plant it to a crop lose all program benefits unless the land is pro tected Grom excessive erosion the year the first crop is produced. Under swampbuster provisions, farmers lose the same benefits if they alter or plant wetlands to a crop. At the present time, conserva tion planning is complete on 68 percent of the highly erodible cropland in Pennsylvania, states Heidecker. Out of 1.68 million acres of highly erodible cropland, plans have been prepared and approved for about one million acres. If you are one of the farmers whose highly erodible cropland is not under a conservation plan, it is to your advantage to contact the USDA Soil Conservation Service office before Spring and request planning assistance. WASHINGTON. DC Con gressman Bill Goodling (PA-19) and Chairman Augustus Hawkins will lead the House of Representa tives’ Education and Labor Com mittee to southcentral Pennsylva nia to hold a Congressional hear ing on federal vocational education programs Monday, March 13, at 9:30 a.m. at the York Area Vocational Technical School. “This hearing will give Con gress an opportunity to hear from the people who deal with these programs on a daily basis and to leant more about vocational edu cation in a real-life setting,” Goodling said. “By holding the hearing in York, we are giving southcentral Pennsylvania a voice in federal voc-ed programs. This is an opportunity for local educa tors, businessmen and others interested in vocational education to tell us what’s working, what isn’t and what improvements they would like to see. They can help us restructure the program to best serve students and the workforce now and into the next decade.” During the hearings, members of the Education and Labor Com mittee will hear testimony from local educators, representatives of business and labor, and state and local officials. Afterwards, Com mittee members will tour York Vo-Tech. “Vocational education is a vital opportunity for our students and a tremendous resource for our eco nomy,” Goodling noted. “Ameri can business can not afford to live in the past, and neither can Ameri can vocational education. Our voc-ed programs must keep pace with the realities of today's stu dents and the demands of today’s workplace.” Federal vocational education programs are aimed at providing funding and direction to the states in an effort to help them improve their vocational education pro grams and to help ensure access to quality programs for all individuals. Goodling and Hawkins arc Ranking Minority Member and Chairman, respectively, of the House Education and Labor Com mittee.
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