Good News for Pork Producers

Remarks by Bruce I. Knight, Chief
Natural Resources Conservation Service

to the winners of the National Pork Board's
2002 Environmental Stewardship Awards
Washington, D.C.
September 19, 2002

Thank you.  It is a pleasure to be here today to discuss the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP) and other aspects of the new farm bill. 

First, I would like to offer my personal congratulations to this year’s Environmental Stewardship Award winners.  It is an honor to be able to meet with you today.

I am also glad to be here with the members of the National Pork Board, my fellow government officials, and other invited guests.

As you know, the new farm bill expanded EQIP and changed it in ways that are good for all farmers and ranchers, including America’s pork producers.  EQIP is the largest program in the farm bill, but it is not the only program. 

The farm bill does provide incentives for proper conservation practices on working lands.  It helps farmers and ranchers improve the environment and meet environmental expectations.  But it also greatly enhances the ability of operators to protect wetlands, water quality, and wildlife habitat.

So in addition to talking about EQIP, I want to look a bit at the big picture:  What the farm bill as a whole will do to help operators, including pork producers, maintain profitability, while meeting their conservation objectives.

I hope you were listening closely and heard me say that I wanted to talk about what the farm bill will do to HELP pork producers meet YOUR conservation objectives.

The phrase “HELP PORK PRODUCERS” is important because so many producers don’t see much of a connection between activities of the Federal government over the past decade on one hand, and anything they view as HELP on the other.

Your industry has been subject to increased scrutiny and regulation over the years. Priority areas, limited funding, and program restrictions have often combined to prevent pork producers from getting what they needed in the way of assistance.

The new farm bill changes that situation significantly.  The farm bill actually contains provisions that will HELP producers meet our country’s rising expectations for environmental quality.  The farm bill will HELP producers meet new environmental requirements and maintain their profitability.  I’ll go over some of those provisions in a minute. 

The other phrase I hope you heard clearly was “MEET YOUR CONSERVATION OBJECTIVES.”   I know that some producers see environmental regulations tugging at them on one side and profitability hanging on for dear life on the other, with a weak glue of cost-share programs keeping the whole thing from falling apart.

There are valid economic reasons for feeling that way.  But that view is very confining, and it keeps us from seeing all the other good that conservation programs can accomplish.

I’ve been a farmer and rancher all my life.  And I’ve never met any of my fellow farmers or ranchers who told me they were in the business because they loved the challenge of meeting regulations and the thrill of applying for cost share programs.

No.

We are in the business because we love the land and the livestock, we love making them produce, and we love our role of feeding, clothing, and sheltering people.  If we lose track of our love for the land, we are missing the joy of being in agriculture.  And we won’t take the time to fully explore how the new farm bill will help us take care of the land.

The beauty of the new farm bill is that it is specifically designed to reward landowners who have been practicing good conservation or who want to start practicing good conservation.  It is directed at achieving both desirable environmental results and economic strength.

Certainly, you can get help in doing what it takes to meet environmental requirements.  And that kind of help is important.  But you can also get help to achieve conservation goals that have nothing to do with requirements.

The NRCS approach is based on voluntary conservation – which means we want to help you achieve your conservation goals.  Some of your goals will be compliance driven, but others will not.  Our approach is also based on local leadership – which means we want to help with things local producers think are important, and not just things that meet Federal requirements.

The good news is that there are resources – and flexibility – in the new farm bill to provide many kinds of help.  There are even provisions in the bill for funding innovative conservation activities.

The farm bill reflects the Department of Agriculture’s commitment to all aspects of conservation assistance.  It is an integrated “portfolio” of instruments responsive to Americans’ growing expectations about agriculture’s role in promoting and protecting environmental quality.  The portfolio of conservation tools contained in the farm bill Includes technical assistance, cost sharing, land retirement, easements, and also a new stewardship incentives program.  The farm bill also stresses partnership and collaboration to permit private sector participation in providing environmental goods and services.

By now all of you should have heard that the new farm bill represents the single most significant commitment of resources toward conservation on private lands in the nation’s history – nearly $13 billion over the life of the bill.  The farm bill presents some really great opportunities for pork producers to engage in conservation.  Not only is there more money overall, but the elimination of priority areas in EQIP, and other changes, mean programs will be more widely available to pork producers.  

I am excited about the new farm bill because it gives us the ability to implement win-win solutions, supported by the Federal government and led by local conservation leaders, and landowners, operators, and managers, who are the stewards of the land.

I want to take a few minutes to summarize the funding for various programs under the new farm bill.  These programs are among the tools that will help you improve your profitability while practicing good conservation.  I’m going to leave the Environmental Quality Incentives Program for last, because it has so many features of interest to pork producers.

So here is a brief overview of the other programs.

The Wildlife Habitat Incentives Program increases to $360 million over six years under the new farm bill.

The new farm bill provides for several programs to protect working farmland and ranchland, including the Farmland Protection Program and the Grasslands Reserve Program.  The Farmland Protection Program will have nearly $600 million over six years.  The Secretary released nearly $50 million in FPP funds just two weeks ago.  The Grasslands Reserve Program will have a quarter of a billion dollars in mandatory spending to enroll up to two million acres of grazing land.

In addition, the Wetlands Reserve Program has significant increases in its acreage cap.

The Conservation Security Program will provide payments for producers who have historically practiced good stewardship on their agricultural lands and incentives for those who want to do more.

Even with all the resources going to these other programs, the farm bill provides its most dramatic growth in the Environmental Quality Incentives Program.  The new farm bill provides more than $5.5 billion for EQIP over six years.  On the first of August, Secretary Veneman announced the release of $227 million for EQIP nationwide, in addition to the $187 million released last spring.  We are using this money to provide financial and technical assistance to farmers, ranchers, and tribes.  Of the additional $227 million, $200 million is for general enrollment for EQIP yet this fiscal year.  An additional $25 million is being used to provide technical and financial assistance for ground and surface water conservation.

As National Pork Producers Council President Dave Roper has said, the farm bill “will go a long way toward eliminating the backlog of EQIP applications, which will pay environmental dividends for our country year after year.”

Several features of EQIP under the new farm bill are of considerable interest to pork producers.

·        Designating at least 60 percent of the increased funding to livestock production practices.

·        Lifting of the animal unit cap.

·        Raising the maximum cost share to $450,000 per individual or entity.

·        Eliminating the “bid down” provision (competitive cost-share reduction among program participants).

·        Making livestock operations eligible to receive cost- share payments for waste storage facilities.

·        Eliminating conservation priority areas

·        Raising the cost share limit for limited resource producers and beginning farmers 90 percent.

·        Allowing payment to producers in the same year as the contract.

·        Reducing the minimum length of an EQIP contract to 1 year after the implementation of all practices.

The farm bill also contains a provision to maintain the trust between operators and NRCS by making your conservation plan information confidential.

The Challenges of Implementation

That is what the farm bill contains.  The big job now for NRCS and our partners is to put these resources to work on the land.  We are working in many areas, including informing producers of the provisions of the farm bill, training our employees to get the job done, expediting the rule making process for provisions of the new farm bill, and finding ways to involve others in farm bill implementation.  We think one key to getting the job done is to stay flexible and delegate as much authority as we can to our employees in the field. 

1.  Getting the word out

We are already working hard to make everyone aware of the conservation provisions of the new farm bill.  The farm bill section of the NRCS web site contains a wealth of information on many of the new conservation programs.  Just go to the NRCS home page at www.nrcs.usda.gov  and click on “farm bill.”   Some programs are still being defined, but we will get that information on the web site as soon as possible.

We have also been putting out press releases to get information into the hands of producers around the country.  Our local offices have packets of information and have been doing presentations in the community through the summer.

We also need the help of bodies like the National Pork Board to make producers aware of all the assistance that is available to them because of the new farm bill.  I hope the Pork Board will continue to use all the methods at its disposal to keep producers informed of how they can benefit from the new farm bill.

2.  Training

We have been training our local employees, so they are able to implement the farm bill and advise producers on its provisions.  Training on WRP, WHIP, and FPP began before Memorial Day.  Training on other programs will begin as soon as we have the information.

We have also developed an electronic version of our Field Office Technical Guide, so that our employees, people in the States, our partners, technical service providers, and landowners have web access to the technical information contained in the guide.

3.  Rule Making

Implementing the new farm bill will require extensive rule making.  We have already started this process, so that we can get rules into place as quickly as possible.  We want to make the rules as simple as possible.  We also want to make the rule making process fully collaborative, consistent with the Administrative Procedures Act.  And, we want to keep as much decision making as possible at the local level, so that local people have as much control of their programs as possible.  Some programs have no changes or only prescriptive changes, and we will expedite the regulatory process.  Other programs, including the new Conservation Security Program, will go through the formal rule making process, including a period of public comment.

4.  Getting others involved

Accomplishing the technical and administrative workload of the farm bill will take hard work by USDA employees, our traditional partners, and a lot more.  The farm bill provides the authority for us to use technical service providers from the private sector, non-profit groups, and government agencies to get the job done.  We hope to have that process in place very soon, with publication of an interim final rule in the Federal Register.

We are not writing the rule in a vacuum.  We conducted listening sessions across the country this spring to find out what producers wanted out of a technical service provider process.  We think the rule will call for a 90-day comment period, during which we will find out what needs to be changed in the process. 

Here are some of the features you can expect in the technical provider process:

The farm bill provides for the Department to offer technical assistance both directly by government employees or through payment to producers to acquire outside assistance from a qualified source.  The farm bill also provides authority for USDA to continue our current process of cooperative agreements with non-Federal entities.

In creating the technical service provider process, we are actually creating a whole new industry of technical service providers out there, who will be doing most of the conservation planning and implementation work for producers.  The farm bill simply provides too much opportunity for NRCS to do all the work. 

Rest assured, NRCS employees will still be around, helping landowners, working with technical providers, and making sure the resources get where then need to be.  Right now, we are filling in the gaps in our field office structure – gaps caused by retirements and other workforce turnover.  We are also using current procedures to continue working with our partners.

In addition, the farm bill authorizes the Department to use program resources to enter into stewardship agreements with State and local agencies, tribes, and nongovernmental organizations.  We need organizations such as the National Pork Board to keep producers informed of the technical service provider process as it takes effect.

Technical service providers are not new to NRCS or to pork producers, but they will play a more extensive role than you are used to.

In closing, let me say how much we at NRCS look forward to working with the pork producers and others who want to work together on resource issues.  The farm bill offers pork producers greater access to voluntary, incentives-based conservation programs.  The programs provide a framework for addressing local resource concerns on working lands, maintaining profitability, and promoting the sustainability of rural communities.

The new farm bill gives us the opportunity to take conservation assistance to a whole new level.  The cornerstone of our work is local leadership by people like this year’s stewardship award winners.

Teddy Roosevelt once said “The movement for the conservation of wild life and the large movement for the conservation of all our natural resources are essentially democratic in spirit, purpose and method.”  That is certainly true as far as NRCS is concerned.  We think locally led conservation is the only conservation that works.  That is why we will continue to work with local people to help every private landowner in America achieve his or her conservation goals.  And that includes every pork producer.

Thank you, and congratulations again to this year’s Environmental Stewardship Award winners.