Weekly Update - January 2, 2009
January 3rd, 2009
THIS WEEK
Payment Limitation Loophole Remains: Sadly, after vetoing the 2008 Farm Bill twice under the banner that it did not include enough reform to commodity programs, the Bush Administration punted on its opportunity to administratively enact real reform. As we reported in the December 19 version of the Weekly Update, USDA issued a press release announcing a major rulemaking on commodity programs on that Friday evening, just as we went to press. The interim final rule was finally unveiled this past Monday, after first appearing on the USDA website on Christmas Eve. While the new rule makes tiny improvements to the statutory requirement that commodity payment recipients be actively engaged in farming, it unfortunately leaves in place the primary loophole allowing individuals to count themselves as active farmers by doing no farm labor and contributing in any vague way to the “management” of a farm.
On Tuesday, Senator Chuck Grassley (R-IA) held a news conference in which he called on President-elect Obama and his nominee for USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack to complete the job of tightening up the rules now that the current Administration has failed to close the loophole. Grassley continues to call for a quantifiable test that measures what constitutes a significant contribution to the management of a farm.
Together with Senator Byron Dorgan (D-ND), he plans to re-introduce the Dorgan-Grassley payment limitation bill next week when Congress reconvenes. As it has in the past, that bill would define the actively engaged in farming standard as any combination of labor and management equal to at least 1,000 hours annually or 50 percent of the labor and management required for a person’s share of the operation, whichever is less. Current FSA regulations use the 1,000 hour test for labor, but have no clear standard for management. Both current law and the Dorgan-Grassley bill exempt crop share landlords from the actively engaged in farming requirement.
In nibbling around the edges of real reform, the new USDA rule requires all shareholders in a corporation to meet the ill-defined management test. Under the old rule, some shareholders were excluded from even that weak test. The new rule also says the contribution to management has to be “regular and substantial” and “documented” – but again, without any objective, quantifiable standard to measure against. Senator Grassley referred to the changes for stockholders as “much about nothing.”
As an interim final rule, the new requirements go into effect immediately, but are open for public comment until January 28. SAC will submit comments on behalf of its member organizations, while also pressing the new Obama team of USDA appointees who will be in charge of making turning the interim final rule into a final rule to complete the job of real reform. Obama’s agricultural platform specifically calls for reforming the actively engaged in farming rules.
Controversial Animal ID Requirement Withdrawn: In September, USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) issued a directive requiring premises registration under the supposedly voluntary National Animal Identification System for any producer who participates in any federally regulated animal disease program. In a revised memo to its field staff issued on the Monday before Christmas, APHIS withdrew the controversial requirement and instead indicated it is considering a formal rulemaking to do what it tried to do via a simple administrative directive. Ranchers-Cattlemen Action Legal Fund, United Stockgrowers of America (R-CALF USA) led the charge to get the directive retracted.
USDA NEWS
Stakeholder Input Sought for NIFA: On Friday, USDA’s Cooperative State Research, Education, and Extension Service (CSREES) issued a request for stakeholder input into the formation of its successor agency, the National Institute for Food and Agriculture (NIFA). The Federal Register notice says the agency intends to consider stakeholder input received in written comments in developing the proposed new agency for approval by USDA.
The 2008 Farm Bill requires the establishment of NIFA to replace CSREES no later than October 1, 2009. Back in October, USDA issued “guiding principles” that will govern the establishment of the new agency.
SAC’s Research and Extension Committee will consider whether to submit comments in the coming weeks. All public comments must be received by February 6, 2009.
Reminder - AFRI Program Announcement Now Available: The December 19 edition of the Weekly Update contained quite a few major breaking stories one of which we will repeat briefly here. A detailed program announcement reflecting what the eventual FY 2009 Request for Applications (RFA) for the Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI) — [the successor to the National Research Initiative and the Initiative for Future Agriculture and Food Systems] — will consist of was posted on the CSREES website on December 18. A planned upgrade of the grants.gov website has forced USDA to delay the release of the official RFA until late January 2009, but the program announcement has more than enough information to begin fashioning proposals.
Happily, many of the priorities SAC supported have been reflected in the program announcement to one degree or another, including:
- small and medium size farm prosperity, including economic and environmental integration of on-farm production and conservation systems, on and off-farm business activities including local and regional food systems, and farm entrepreneurship and farm transition/entry education (about $4.8 million available)
- managed ecosystems, including multifunctional farm production systems and biodiversity on working pasture and range land (about $5.3 million available)
- sustainable agroecosystems long term program, requesting “proof of concept” proposals for what would become a long-term (10 year), multi-farm, multi-farmer study focused on soil ecology and carbon sequestration (about $1 million available)
- a joint AFRI-EPA program on enhancing ecosystem services from working agricultural land (about $4.5 million available)
- reducing animal pharmaceuticals, antibiotics, and hormones in soil and water, as part of a larger $4.3 million Water and Watersheds program
- classical plant and animal breeding, as one aspect of larger programs in Plant Biology and Environmental Stress, Plant Genome, Genetics, and Breeding, Plant Breeding and Education, and Animal Genome, Genetics, and Breeding program
DULY NOTED
SupportVilsack.com Site Launching: A new website in support of the confirmation of former Iowa Governor Tom Vilsack to be the next Secretary of Agriculture is launching this weekend at www.supportvilsack.com with personal statements of support from, among others, Bob Scowcroft, Denise O’Brien, Gary Hirshberg, and Walter Robb.
ERS Details Million-Dollar Farms: On Monday, USDA’s Economic Research Service released a 47-page bulletin describing the 2 percent of all US farms with gross sales over $1 million a year that now account for 48 percent of the total sales value of US agricultural production. The large sales volume operations, which are particularly concentrated in dairy, livestock, and fruits and vegetables, slightly more than doubled their share of total agricultural receipts between 1982 and 2002. Relatively few million dollar farms specialize in grains and hence million dollar farms account for only 16 percent of government commodity payments, despite their 48 percent market share. Seven percent of million dollar farms and 21 percent of $5 million farms are nonfamily corporate farms. Million dollar farms represent 62 percent of all contract production and 63 percent of million dollar farms use production or marketing contracts. The report, entitled Million-Dollar Farms in the New Century, was written by Robert Hoppe, Penni Korb, and David Banker.
Transition Team Recommendations: Support for Beginning Farmers and Ranchers
December 23rd, 2008
The Sustainable Agriculture Coalition recently presented a set of policy briefing papers to members of President-elect Obama’s Transition Team. The briefing papers lay out SAC’s recommendations for addressing the most urgent priorities of the sustainable agriculture movement. This is the first in a series of blog posts that features some of those policy recommendations. All of the recommendations follow the same format, building off promises the Obama-Biden campaign made before the election.
Obama-Biden Platform
“Encourage Young People to Become Farmers: Becoming a successful farmer is a lifelong endeavor. Barack Obama and Joe Biden will establish a new program to identify the next generation of farmers and ranchers and help them develop professional skills and find work that lead to farm ownership and management.”
Relevant Program
Program: Office of Advocacy and Outreach
Agency: New Office within USDA Executive Operations
Recommendation – Administrative Action
As directed by the 2008 Farm Bill (authorized in Section 14013), create the new Office of Advocacy and Outreach and place it at the Departmental level, as a clearly separate office equal to other Executive Operations offices, directly under and reporting to the Secretary of Agriculture, rather than under or through any other office, mission area, Assistant Secretary or Under Secretary. Ensure that the new directors and staff of the Office of Advocacy and Outreach have significant previous experience working with small farms and with beginning and socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers, as well as a deep understanding of the current and emerging programs of the Department. Ensure that the new office is adequately funded. Make the Office the new Secretary’s centerpiece for moving forward aggressively with major policies and programs for small and moderate-sized family farms and beginning farmers and minority farmers and ranchers.
Weekly Update - December 19, 2008
December 20th, 2008
THIS WEEK
Obama Names Vilsack Secretary of Agriculture: On Wednesday, President-elect Barack Obama officially named former Iowa governor Tom Vilsack as the incoming Secretary of Agriculture. Vilsack, who previously served two terms as the governor of Iowa, has worked most recently as a lawyer in Des Moines since ending his brief 2008 presidential bid in 2007. This fall he served as a fellow at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard and worked for the Iowa State Biosafety Institute.
In making the nomination, Obama indicated his intent “that the policies being shaped at the Departments of Agriculture and Interior are designed to serve not big agribusiness or Washington influence-peddlers, but family farmers and the American people.” During the press briefing, Vilsack mentioned the importance of nutrition and is expected to work with fellow Iowan, Senate Agriculture Committee Chairman Tom Harkin, on the Child Nutrition and WIC Reauthorization Act this year. As governor, Vilsack was a strong supporter of conservation programs (and an early champion of the Conservation Stewardship Program) and alternative energy, including ethanol and wind. In recent interviews he has mentioned the need for the enforcement of payment limitations and livestock market reform.
John Crabtree from SAC member group Center for Rural Affairs interviewed Vilsack in mid- November about a few of these issues. The blog post is available here.
Request for Applications Announced - Risk Management Outreach Assistance for Underserved Farmers
December 15th, 2008
Today, the Federal Crop Insurance Corporation, operating through the Risk Management Agency (RMA), issued a Request for Applications (RFA) for the Community Outreach and Assistance Partnership Program. $3.4 million is available for collaborative outreach, assistance, and training on risk management solutions for socially disadvantaged, limited resource, or traditionally underserved farmers and ranchers who produce priority commodities. Priority commodities are defined as agricultural commodities covered by (7 U.S.C. 7333), specialty crops, and underserved commodities.
Applications will be given higher points if they demonstrate that their projects will: specifically incorporate training on the benefits and implementation of the Adjusted Gross Revenue Lite (AGR–LITE) insurance coverage plan, promote energy alternatives for small farmers and ranchers, and partner with organizations that can meet the needs of limited resources, minority, or beginning farmers and ranchers.
Several SAC member organizations have taken advantage of the RMA Community Outreach and Assistance Partnership Program in the past. In FY 2008 SAC groups received $470,000 collectively in RMA Outreach Partnership Agreements award funding:
· Land Stewardship Project received $50,000 for preparing farmers to successfully manage risks and allow them to meet their farming goals.
· Michigan Land Use Institute received $80,000 for training and tools in northwest and lower Michigan to manage risks among underserved and aspiring farmers.
· Midwest Organic and Sustainable Education Service (MOSES) received $38,660 to deliver training and risk management information to producers from Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Iowa.
· Michigan Food and Farming Systems (MIFFS) received $100,000 to provide educational opportunities and access to risk management tools for small scale, limited resource and minority producers in Michigan.
· Agriculture and Land-based Training Association (ALBA) received $100,000 to advance economic viability, social equity and ecological management among aspiring, limited resource and immigrant farmers.
· California FarmLink received $100,000 to provide trainings and technical assistance that promote a wide range of risk management strategies.
Applications for this competitive awards program are due by February 13, 2009 at 5:00 pm (EST) and all awards and partnership agreements will be completed by September 30, 2009. For more information on eligible commodities, applications, and awards, please see the complete edocket. You can also visit the Partnership and Cooperative Agreements webpage.
Weekly Update - December 12, 2008
December 15th, 2008
THIS WEEK
SAC Members Meet in Memphis! This week SAC members and staff congregated at the St. Columba Retreat Center outside of Memphis to strategize our work with the new Obama Administration, set priorities for the FY 2010 appropriations campaign, and consider future legislative and grassroots advocacy work on new issues such as climate change, food safety, and child nutrition. Those gathered spent part of the first day discussing SAC’s policy recommendations to the Obama Transition Team which SAC will be delivering before the end of the year. On Monday, SAC’s Policy Director Ferd Hoefner was invited to present conservation policy recommendations at a meeting with the Transition Team – see this news article regarding Ferd and others’ participation in that meeting.
SAC was also pleased to be joined by members of the Southern Sustainable Agriculture Working Group’s board of directors for the meeting. On Wednesday afternoon, SAC and SSAWG hosted a joint afternoon presentation and discussion with special guests from the national leadership for the Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education (SARE) program and Organic Agriculture Research and Extension Initiative (OREI) program and the southern leadership for the SARE program.
House Member Musical Chairs: Committee appointments were in the news this week. On Wednesday, Rep. Frank Lucas (R-OK) was named Ranking Member on the House Agriculture Committee. Lucas was previously the top Republican on the subcommittee that handles conservation, energy, credit and research. Leaving the Agriculture Committee will be Bob Etheridge (D-NC), current Chair of the subcommittee for commodity programs and crop insurance. Etheridge won a coveted seat on the House Ways and Means Committee. His exit possibly opens up a subcommittee chair for Rep. David Scott or Jim Marshall, both Georgia Democrats. Also leaving Agriculture is Rep. John Salazar (D-CO), recently mentioned as a possible candidate for USDA Secretary in the Obama Administration. Salazar won a prized seat on the Appropriations Committee. Joining Salazar as one of the two new members on Appropriations will be Lincoln Davis (D-TN). Rep. Zach Space (D-OH) nabbed a seat on the powerful House Energy and Commerce Committee, but has not yet found out if he will need to relinquish his seat on Agriculture or not.
USDA NEWS
RFP Announced for FSMIP: On Tuesday, USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service announced the availability of approximately $1.3 million dollars (subject to final appropriations action by Congress) in competitive grant funds for FY 2009 for the Federal-State Marketing Improvement Program (FSMIP). FSMIP funds will be awarded to a wide range of research projects that aim to help market, transport and distribute U.S. food and agricultural products domestically and internationally. Eligible applicants include State departments of agriculture, State agricultural experiment stations and other appropriate State Agencies. Applicants are encouraged to involve industry groups, academia, community-based organizations and other stakeholders in the proposal development and research process. Several SAC groups have had involvement with FSMIP projects in previous years. Proposals are due before February 11, 2009. For more information, please visit the FSMIP website.
Farm Bill Credit Rule Finalized: On Monday, USDA’s Farm Service Agency published a final rule on farm bill credit program changes in the Federal Register. The rule enacts the SAC-instigated improvements to the Down Payment Loan Program and increases to the maximum loan size for direct loans, as well as the change to FSA inventory rules championed by the Rural Coalition and the Diversity Initiative on behalf of minority farmers. These rules changes, which are all in order, went forward without the usual public notice and comment, under the “public interest” exemption. The changes actually became effective automatically with the passage of the 2008 Farm Bill.
WTO NEWS
No Doha Deal before the New Year: To the delight of U.S. agriculture lawmakers, an attempt to try and tie a bow on the Doha round of global trade talks before the end of the year was rejected by the WTO Director-General on Friday. The latest draft negotiating texts were released last weekend raising the possibility that a meeting to reach a final agreement would be called before the New Year, but concern over the high risk of failure led the WTO Director-General to hold off on calling a meeting. U.S. agriculture and manufacturing sectors opposed the latest draft negotiating texts, arguing that other countries still have not made enough concessions on lowering trade barriers. Senator Grassley (R-IA), Senator Harkin (D-IA), and Senator Baucus (D-MT) commented on the decision to hold off on a final agreement noting that any proposal that did not satisfactorily address U.S. agricultural concerns would also face an uphill battle in Congress.
DULY NOTED
New EQIP Report Finds Industrialized Livestock Disproportionately Benefit: A new report written by Elanor Starmer for the Campaign for Family Farms and the Environment concludes that between 2003 and 2007, 1,000 industrial hog and dairy operations captured at least $35 million per year in funding from the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP). The report, Industrial Livestock at the Taxpayer Trough: How Large Hog and Dairy Operations are Subsidized by the Environmental Quality Incentives Program, acknowledges that a complete analysis of EQIP can only be done when information about the exact size and use of EQIP contracts is made publicly available. Still, the new report cites data that shows a disproportionate amount of EQIP funding goes to industrial livestock operations because of changes in the 2002 Farm Bill that made highly-polluting livestock operations priorities for funding. For a press release and link to the full study visit the Iowa CCI website.
RAFI Appoints New Executive Director: SAC member group Rural Advancement Foundation International (RAFI) announced that Linda Shaw has been appointed as the new Executive Director. Shaw, who is a consultant and former Senior Community Development Officer with Wachovia Bank, has worked extensively in rural economic development and nonprofit administration. She will hold the position, which was vacated by retiring Executive Director, Betty Bailey, starting January 5, 2009.
Rodale Calls for an Organic Green Revolution: A paper released this week by the Rodale Institute argues for a paradigm shift in the way we grow, buy, and eat our food to meet the food security and environmental challenges we currently face. The Rodale Institute, pointing out the shortfalls of the Green Revolution in meeting these challenges and recent research documenting the promises of organic agriculture, advocates for organic farming systems to be at the center of this shift.
Weekly Update - December 5, 2008
December 7th, 2008
THIS WEEK
Ag Appropriations and Stimulus Bill Timing Problem: As we have often reported, the appropriations process for Fiscal Year 2009 got stuck this summer and has remained stuck through the start of the fiscal year on October 1. Now two months into the fiscal year, the process is beginning to move again. Though the House version of agriculture appropriations never made it out of full Committee and the Senate version never made it to the floor, Congress is skipping several steps and moving straight to settling differences between the House Subcommittee-passed bill and the Senate full Committee-passed bill in a “staff conference.” Staff will come up with a draft final bill in December and after review by the appropriators themselves in early January, the bill, probably wrapped together with the other unfinished appropriations bill, will go to the House and Senate floor for final passage. The congressional Democratic leadership is aiming to have the final bills passed by Inauguration Day on January 20.
At the same time, work is underway (again) on a large economic stimulus package. The “safety net” portion of the stimulus bill will almost certainly include an extension of unemployment benefits and an increase in food stamp benefits. More uncertain, however, is whether it will also include emergency money to fully fund the Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) feeding program. Neither the House nor Senate agriculture appropriations bill fully funds the WIC program. The pending Senate bill comes a bit closer than the House bill, but does so in large part by cutting over $400 million in farm bill funding for conservation, renewable energy, specialty crops, organic, and beginning farmers. Even with those cuts to mandatory spending, the bill still comes up significantly short.
The obvious solution is to provide the full additional amount needed for WIC in the stimulus bill and to remove the farm bill cuts from the appropriations bill. Therein lays the timing problem. Only if the stimulus package is considered ahead of the regular appropriations bill will that solution work. It is critical for all groups and citizens who care about hunger, nutrition, conservation, renewable energy, organic, and beginning farmers to tell Congress to take up the stimulus package first and to include WIC as well as food stamp funding. Please click here for our related action alert. Continue reading this entry »
“Notes from the Field”- Raising Heritage Turkeys With the Help of SARE
December 1st, 2008
Jacob Cowgill is a young farmer from Montana. He has spent the past two seasons experimenting with dryland vegetable production in north-central Montana. He and his new bride are planning to start their own farm very soon. For more information about the Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education (SARE) program, visit the SARE website.
A couple Saturdays ago, I placed the final heritage turkey in the chill tank and felt a sense of relief. The season was finally over. The wheat, sunflowers, and other field crops were harvested long ago, and the potatoes put in the root cellar at the end of October, but my flock of heritage turkeys lived on, through hard freezes, high winds, and snow flurries. They had arrived in the mail on May 1 and for the next 7 months, my days revolved around taking care of them. I had heard a little bit about heritage turkeys last winter and decided I wanted to try my hand at raising them. Starting without any feeders, waterers, a fence and shelter, and most importantly start-up capital, I looked around for some sort of funding and I found Western SARE. I applied for and received a grant to raise my heritage turkeys on pasture. It was with this support from SARE, I was able to explore the viability of raising turkeys within an organic dryland farming system.
Jacob's Heritage Turkeys
More than anything, the SARE grant gave me the chance to experiment in something nobody else in the area was doing. No information exists for which turkey breeds are appropriate for north-central Montana or what sort of shelter will survive the high winds and heavy November snows while protecting the flock. In a way, the grant allowed me to be an independent researcher, a private extension agent (and one who has already fielded numerous questions from interested farmers).
Most farmers I know are highly-intelligent and creative people. But since day-to-day farming is already a risky venture, many aren’t willing to go out on a limb to try something new. If agencies aren’t experimenting with sustainable systems, its unlikely farmers will. Grants such as these stimulate innovation on the farm level and provide producers with the guide to create a plan and the support for them to follow through with their ideas. With each successful project, the producer then becomes somewhat of an expert and a resource for others willing tackle an unconventional project. While I certainly don’t consider myself an expert on raising turkeys, now I have enough experience under my belt to do it again next year.
Obama’s USDA Transition Team Announced
November 21st, 2008
USDA Transition Team Announced: Early this week the headquarters of President-elect Obama’s Transition Team announced the members of the Agriculture Transition Team:
Agriculture Transition Team Co-chairs:
Carole Jett – most recently served as deputy chief of the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) at USDA where she also served as the agency’s Farm Bill Coordinator. Jett was the point person for implementation of the 2002 Farm Bill Conservation Title and was previously on staff for the House Agricultural Committee.
Bart Chilton – formerly deputy chief of staff for Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman and staffer for Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle. Most recently, Chilton was a commissioner for the Commodity Futures Trading Commission in 2007.
Agriculture Transition Team Members:
Douglas Jake Caldwell – Director of Agriculture, Trade, and Energy at the Center for American Progress. Formerly Trade and Environment project manager for the National Wildlife Federation
David Lazarus – former legislative assistant to Senator Richard Durbin (D-Illinois)
Mary McNeil – Director of Native American Programs at USDA during the Clinton administration; member of Nebraska’s Winnebago tribe
Karen Stuck – recently retired from her post as Assistant Administrator for International Affairs at USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS)
Michael Taylor – research professor of health policy at the George Washington University; former Deputy Commissioner at the Food and Drug Administration; former Acting Undersecretary for Food Safety at USDA and administrator at FSIS; and Vice President for Public Policy at Monsanto
Dallas Tonsager – member of the Farm Credit Administration Board, former Executive Director of the South Dakota Value-Added Agriculture Development Center; USDA State Rural Development Director in South Dakota and past president of the South Dakota Farmers Union
Christopher Wood – Chief Operating Officer at Trout Unlimited, Senior Policy and Communications Advisor to Forest Service Chief Michael Dombeck during the Clinton Administration
Weekly Update - November 14, 2008
November 17th, 2008
URGENT ACTION NEEDED
Tell Congress to Support Emergency Funding for WIC, Rural Development, and Farm Credit in the Stimulus Bill! On Monday, November 17, the lame duck session of Congress will convene. During the short window of time they have left in Washington D.C., Members of Congress may take up a new economic stimulus bill. It is important that the stimulus package include funding for three major issues: 1) emergency funding for the Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) program, 2) increased program funding for both direct and guaranteed farm operating loans, and 3) direct and targeted support for rural economic development. Please click here for a full action alert with background information. Calls should be made next week!
THIS WEEK
Transition Teams Named: On Thursday, the incoming Obama Administration named a 13-member agency review working group with members who will oversee transition work for a cluster of agencies. Covering agriculture, environment, energy, and interior will be David J. Hayes, a noted environmental lawyer with the law firm Latham & Watkins who served as the number two person at Interior during the Clinton Administration. Hayes has associations with both World Wildlife Fund and American Rivers. Also named on Thursday were the transition team chairs for Treasury, State, and Defense.
The USDA Transition Team has not yet been named, although we expect it to be released very soon. Rumors may be circulating, but we will have to just wait and see when it is released.
Plum Book Published: The so-called Plum Book, published every four years and providing a comprehensive listing of all the political appointed positions in the government, was issued on Thursday. The 209-page book lists over 8,000 federal jobs which can be appointed by the incoming Administration. The book includes the name and salary of the existing office holder for the outgoing Administration, and thus also serves as a way for any incoming Administration to determine who it wants to move out of or leave in current positions. The book can be browsed or purchased here.
“Notes from the Field” - Conservation Stewardship Program Field Day in Wisconsin
November 10th, 2008
This is the first in a series of posts “Notes from the Field” written by staff of SAC member organizations or farmers about how the federal sustainable agriculture programs that SAC fights for and wins make a difference on the ground.
This past August, Katie Wied received a M.A. in Sustainable Development with an emphasis on Public Policy from the School of International Training. Returning back to her home state of Wisconsin, Katie is now the Policy Organizer for Michael Fields Agricultural Institute, a member organization of the Sustainable Agriculture Coalition.
“This program encourages me to maintain my conservation practices and research others.”
-Farmer from Gilman, WI who participates in the Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP).
As the Policy Organizer for Michael Fields Agricultural Institute, I have the role of educating farmers about the new Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP). I love this program because within the world of large commodity payments, it is the first governmental program that provides “green payments” to farmers. In other words, CSP provides payments to farmers and ranchers to maintain and manage existing conservation practices and implement additional conservation activities on land in agricultural production.
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Katie Wied, Policy Organizer for Michael Fields Agricultural Institute, at CSP Field Day
Katie Wied, Policy Organizer for Michael Fields Agricultural Institute, at CSP Field Day
Farmers can be allotted up to $40,000 per year for conducting conservation practices that improve soil, water or air quality, soil and water conservation, wildlife habitat, biodiversity, as well as energy conservation. CSP has been greatly improved in the 2008 Farm Bill and now with improved access to the program, any farmer will now be able to apply for a CSP grant. This brings good news to the sustainable agriculture movement, and like any piece of good news we want to spread it far and wide.
With some newfound momentum I organized various CSP field days throughout Wisconsin. Field days are used to unite farmers by having them gather at a farm for food, education, and good conversation. I decided to reach out to farmers who utilize grazing practices on their farms. Letting cows graze on the land instead of keeping them confined is not only healthier for the cows, but also for the land. I contacted several people from GrassWorks, an amazing grazing network. This Wisconsin-based organization serves as a central point for grazing communities to network and share resources. With their help I was able to arrange short CSP presentations on several of their farms.