Another revenue source to keep farmers farming is getting a boost from the USDA. Under Secretary Robert Bonnie says the new funds will help conserve farmlands and wetlands.
“138 million dollars goes into our Agricultural Conservation Easement Program and this support about 138 individual easements across the country.”
And continue a strategy by Secretary Tom Vilsack to use the Inflation Reduction Act and other funding sources to keep farmers farming.
“We know from the nature of the demand from EQIP and CSP, the Regional Conservation Partnership Program and the Easement Program, there’s significant demand, above and beyond the resources, even under the IRA.”
Undersecretary Bonnie told USDA Radio that prime farmland is increasingly getting lost to development. He sees ACEP as an antidote.
“So, this is a program that helps keep those family farms in families by purchasing the development rights.”
And then there are wetlands.
“These are either grasslands or a lot of times, forestlands. We’re restoring the wetlands features on those.”
Bonnie says those can continue as farms, ranches, and forestlands, as ACEP easements protect wildlife habitat, water quality, and private land ownership.
