Everyone wants to give EQIP a haircut | Food and Environment Reporting Network

Congress is on track to trim the Environmental Quality Incentives Program, a cost-share program to reduce runoff from fields and feedlots, by as much as 16 percent from its authorized level of $1.6 billion. The FY15 USDA spending bills pending in the House and Senate each would cut the program; the House by $209 million and the Senate by $250 million.

The Senate would allot $1.35 billion, the same as the White House request and the amount approved for the current fiscal year. The House bill proposes $1.391 billion for EQIP but it also would cut $109 million from the Conservation Stewardship Program and $60 million from Agricultural Conservation Easement Program for a total of $378 million in conservation programs. “We are pleased that the Senate bill protects farm more funding for important conservation and renewable energy programs than its House counterpart,” said the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition in a blog.

To read the Senate bill, click here. To read the House bill, click here.