A3O-Lancaster Farming, Saturday, September 6, 2003
CREP Doubles In Size
(Continued from Page A 1)
proved CREP will mean big im
provements in water quality as
well as significant dollar returns
for the state’s farmers and land
owners.
“We got off to a slow start, and
had some rocky areas for a
while,” said Robin Heard, state
conservationist with the Natural
Resources Conservation Service.
“We haven’t even begun to real
ize all those water quality benefits
yet.”
CREP is a voluntary program
that pays participants to plant
hardwood trees or establish grass
filter strips, riparian forest buf
fers, vegetation, streambank fenc
ing, and other conservation prac
tices on environmentally sensitive
land. In return, participants re
ceive annual rental payments,
cost-share assistance, and other
financial incentives.
Richard Pallman, director of
the Pennsylvania Farm Service
Agency (FSA), the agency ad
ministrating the program under
the USDA, said the program is
being improved, especially in the
type of land it will encourage to
enroll.
There will be stronger incen
tives for enrolling “marginal”
land not well-suited for crop pro
duction, Pallman said, noting
that the program aims to keep
the best land in crop production.
Larger payments will be made on
land with a high “erodibility
index,” a measurement that
gauges the likelihood of soil ero
sion.
CREP has generated some
producer concerns about land
owners enrolling whole farms, in
cluding fields well-suited to crop
production.
Some farmers have also taken
issue with noxious weeds, such as
Canada thistle, spreading via
poorly managed CREP plant
ings.
One of the drawbacks of the
original CREP was that there
were “very few meetings” con
ducted to help get information
out, Pallman noted. When the
meetings did begin about a
year and a half into the program
the “meetings became conten
tious,” he said, with farmers rais
ing management issues.
The FSA hopes to initiate
CREP in the northern counties
with plenty of informational
meetings from the
start, according to
Pallman. These meet-
ings will ideally be of
fered by local agencies
such as county exten-
sion offices and Farm
Bureau chapters, he
said.
Pallman said the
program should bene-
fit tenant farmers as
well as landowners.
Program leaders will
encourage landowners
to share rental pay
ments with producers
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to help them maintain the CREP
lands.
Farmers in the northern part
of the state, particularly dairy
producers, should be able to reap
significant financial benefits from
enrolling CREP lands, according
to Pallman. Rental payments will
likely average $7O-100 per acre
for CREP lands in the northern
tier, he said.
Enrollment for the original
100,000 acres in 20 southcentral
counties is “just about at its limit
right now,” Pallman said.
Charles Abdalla, Penn State
associate professor of ag econom
ics, also provided a brief history
of CREP at the Ag Progress
forum. CREP grew out of the
original Conservation Reserve
Program (CRP) first mandated
by the U.S. Food Security Act of
1985. CREP was first authorized
in 1996, with Pennsylvania com
ing on board in 2000.
CREP workers presented
workshops throughout Ag Pro
gress Days to explain details of
the initiative.
Jeff Finn, Pennsylvania CREP
biologist, said the program is
shifting to award good land man
agers more than in the past.
“(CREP) was pretty much like
any other farm program if you
Mike Llnsenbigler, federal technical manager for
CREP, touts benefits of expanding the program in
Pennsylvania. Richard Pailman, Pennsylvania FSA di
rector, joined with Llnsenbigler and other officials at
Ag Progress Days to announce that the program has
been doubled to include all 43 Pennsylvania counties
in the Chesapeake Bay watershed.
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were doing a good job, there
wasn’t much help,” he said.
One of the changes in the new
CREP will be allowing the enroll
ment of productive hay land, he
said.
CREP partners include the
Pennsylvania Department of En
vironmental Protection, Pennsyl
vania Game Commission, De
partment of Conservation and
Natural Resources, the Chesa
peake Bay Foundation, Ducks
Unlimited, and Pheasant Forev
er.
“With over 71,000 acres plant
ed to conservation practices, the
Pennsylvania CREP is one of the
most effective private lands con
servation programs in the state’s
history,” Pallman said. “Expand
ing the program to include addi
tional counties will reap the
countless rewards of reduced
runoff contaminants, healthier
wildlife, and cleaner water.”
According to the FSA, the
Pennsylvania CREP has prevent
ed 1.1 million tons of sediment
and reduced more than 1 million
pounds of nitrogen and phospho
rous from entering the Chesa
peake Bay. In addition to filter
ing sediment and nutrients from
runoff water, vegetation planted
through the program improves
water quality and provides shel
ter, nesting areas and food for
various wildlife species, such as
grassland birds and small game.
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The map shows the entire CREP area in Pennsylvania,
including original and newly eligible counties.
Graphic provided by Farm Service Agency
The original program, an
nounced in April 2000, was
funded at $2lO million. The addi
tional $2OO million brings the
total funding to $4lO million. Of
the $2OO million, USDA is ex
pected to pay up to $129 million
of the cost of enrolling the addi
tional 100,000 acres in the pro
gram. Pennsylvania’s share is $7l
million.
The states of Maryland, Vir
ginia, and Delaware also have
CREP agreements with USDA to
help restore and preserve the
Chesapeake Bay.
Interested fanners and ranch
ers should contact their local
FSA offices for more information
on eligibility requirements and
application procedures. Addition
al information is also available
online at http://
www.fsa.usda.gov/dafp/cepd/
crep.htm.
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Colleen DeLong, CREP
biologist, outlines details of
the newly expanded pro
gram.