USDA ANNOUNCES FIRST NATIONAL SIGN-UP FOR NEW CONSERVATION STEWARDSHIP PROGRAM

Continuous Enrollment for Producers Begins Aug. 10

HONOLULU, Aug. 10, 2009— Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced that the U.S. Department of Agriculture will begin continuous sign-up for the revamped Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP) on August 10 with the first signup period cutoff scheduled for September 30. CSP encourages agricultural and forestry producers to maintain existing conservation activities and adopt additional ones on their operations.

The program will be offered to producers in the 50 states, District of Columbia and the Pacific and Caribbean areas through continuous sign-ups. Agricultural and forestry producers must submit their applications by Sept. 30 to be considered for funding in the first ranking period. Congress capped the annual acreage enrollment at 12,769,000 acres for each fiscal year nationwide. USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) administers CSP, a voluntary conservation program designed to encourage agricultural and forestry producers to adopt additional activities and to improve, maintain and manage existing ones. Eligible lands include cropland, grassland, prairie, improved pastureland, rangeland, non-industrial private forestland—a new land use for the program—and agricultural land under the jurisdiction of an Indian tribe. Individual landowners, legal entities, and Indian tribes may be eligible to apply for CSP assistance.

USDA is finalizing the program’s policies and procedures. The CSP interim final rule, published in the Federal Register, is open for public comment through Sept. 28. To apply for the newly revamped CSP, potential participants will be encouraged to use a self-screening checklist first to determine whether the new program is suitable for them or their operation. It is available on the NRCS Web site at www.nrcs.usda.gov/programs/new_csp/csp.html.

Once a potential participant has determined program suitability, the next step is to enter the producer’s current and proposed conservation practices in the conservation measurement tool (CMT). This tool estimates the level of environmental performance to be achieved by a producer implementing and maintaining conservation activity. The conservation performance estimated by the CMT will be used to rank applications. States will determine their own priority resource concerns, one of the criteria that will be used to rank applications. States will rank applications with similar resource concerns and will establish ranking pools to do so.

Agency field staff also will conduct on-site field verifications of applicants’ information obtained from the CMT. Once the potential participant has been field verified and approved for funding, he or she must develop a conservation stewardship plan. For additional information about CSP, including eligibility requirements and the interim final rule, please visit http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/programs/new_csp/csp.html.

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USDA is an equal opportunity employer and provider.

Jolene Lau
Public Affairs Specialist
USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service
300 Ala Moana Blvd., #4-118
Honolulu, HI 96850
(808) 541-2600 ext. 135

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