Weighing Benefits of a Nation-wide Conservation Reserve Program (CRP)

(WASHINGTON, DC) At the end of the past fiscal year (2017), USDA’s Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) covered more than 23 million acres of environmentally sensitive land. With an annual budget of almost $2 billion, CRP was USDA’s largest conservation program in terms of spending. Enrollees receive annual rental and other incentive payments for taking eligible land out of production for at least ten years. Program acreage tends to be concentrated on marginally productive cropland that is susceptible to erosion by wind or rainfall. A large share of CRP acreage is located in the Great Plains (from Texas to Montana), where rainfall is limited and much of the land is subject to potentially severe wind erosion. Smaller concentrations of CRP land are found in eastern Washington, southern Iowa, northern Missouri, southern Idaho, and the Mississippi Delta. The CRP program is authorized by the Farm Bill and is expected to remain under the next five-year legislation – the 2018 Farm Bill.