With enrollment on the decline for the 13th year in a row, the USDA said it would accept offers from landowners past the original deadline of Friday to take fragile cropland out of production for 10 years or longer. In announcing the extension, the USDA said that the Biden administration was looking for ways to bring land into the reserve.
Some 20.8 million acres are in the Conservation Reserve, the smallest total since 1988, with contracts expiring on Sept. 30 on 3 million acres. Up to 25 million acres can be enrolled. Created in 1985, the Conservation Reserve pays landowners an annual rent in exchange for idling fragile land. As part of climate mitigation, President Biden has mentioned paying farmers “to put their land in conservation.”
“The general CRP (Conservation Reserve Program) signup is extended until further notice,” Steve Peterson, acting administrator of the Farm Service Agency, told USDA Radio News. “There are some discretionary items the secretary makes decisions on, so they wanted to give him the opportunity to do that.”
Enrollment peaked at 36.8 million acres in 2007 and has declined annually since. The 2018 farm bill lowered the rental rate to offset the cost of raising the enrollment cap for the Conservation Reserve. In the past, landowners received an annual payment equal to the local cost of renting farmland. Now the rent is 85 percent of the county average for land entering through so-called general enrollments, which are aimed at large tracts of land. The rate is 90 percent for “continuous” enrollment, open to high-priority practices, such as filter strips or windbreaks, on small parcels of land.
Signup for the CRP Grasslands option is set for March 15-April 23. The grasslands option is intended to preserve grassland, rangeland and pastureland from conversion.
The homepage for the Conservation Reserve is available here.