Conserve and Profit
Aug 1, 2008 12:00 PM, By Lynn Grooms
"A significant barrier to the adoption of best management practices is not only the availability of cost-share money, but the fact that the cost-share money is often accompanied by red tape,” says TFI's West. “While we understand the need for accountability, barriers exist, for example, to certified crop adviser participation in current cost-share programs. If CCAs are a top source of BMP advice, then farmers' use of them for technical assistance should be allowed in cost-share programs.”
Several federal programs provide some financial assistance. These include the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP), the Environmental Quality Incentives Program, the Conservation Security Program and the Wetlands Reserve Program. Some states also offer financial assistance. “Contact your local conservation district office,” Scanlon says.
Risk Protection Program
Farmers can look to environmental and other organizations for assistance as well. The Nature Conservancy, for instance, offers a Risk Protection Program. The program began in 2000 in northeast Indiana's Upper St. Joseph River Watershed, which extends into Michigan and Ohio. Four years later, the program was implemented in Indiana's Tippecanoe River Watershed.
Funding was provided by the Monsanto Fund for a three-year period and also was given to The Nature Conservancy project offices in Iowa and Michigan. “The program was started as a result of the rare and threatened species we are looking to protect in each given area,” explains Kent Wamsley, field representative, Tippecanoe River Project, The Nature Conservancy. “The focus is on rare and threatened fish and mussel species. The major threat to them is sedimentation.”
In this program, growers can enroll a maximum of 150 acres of either strip-till or no-till and compare them to conventional corn production systems over a three-year period.
Crop inputs and yields are tracked using Purdue University's WinMax program. The Nature Conservancy uses these data to determine economic gain or loss for each system and if payment to the grower is necessary. The program covers the dollar difference if the new high-residue farming system does not outperform conventional systems, Wamsley says.
The Nature Conservancy has enrolled about 10,000 acres in the Tippecanoe River Watershed into the Risk Protection Program since 2004. Though annual enrollment has decreased since that time, farmers who participated in the three-year program are now using high-residue corn systems on more than three-quarters of their operations, and some have made a full transition into a no-till or strip-till system, Wamsley says.
“Several of these growers have been able to fine-tune their fertilizer programs and lessen the amount they are putting on the field without yield loss,” says Wamsley, adding that they also have realized fuel savings. “With the high cost of fuel today, one can quickly realize the savings from fewer trips across the field, which both no-till and strip-till do for them.”
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