Implementing the New Farm Bill: Year Three

Remarks  by Bruce I. Knight, Chief Natural Resources Conservation Service at the South Carolina Conservation Partnership Conference, Charleston, SC

Charleston, SC
January 4, 2005

Good afternoon. Thank you, Dick (Coombe). And thank you to the South Carolina Conservation Partnership for allowing me to speak here today.

Let me begin by saying that conservation districts are a vital part of the locally led approach to conservation. The strong working relationships you have developed with a wide range of agricultural interests in the public and private sectors alike are important to getting conservation done. These relationships allow farmers and ranchers to reach their conservation goals the right way – through local decision making. The new farm bill makes these relationships more important than ever!


Farm Bill Implementation

Four activities have dominated our efforts over the last couple of years to implement the farm bill: getting the word out; getting conservation on the ground for 2002, 2003, 2004, and now, for 2005; writing the rules for farm bill programs; and implementing the Technical Service Provider process.

Getting the Word Out

We must continue our efforts to get the word out, so we are sure we have reached the underserved groups in the producer community. USDA is being held increasingly responsible for delivering Agriculture programs to all citizens in this country, and that responsibility flows through agreements and contracts everywhere Federal dollars are involved.

In May of 2003, NRCS held a Partnership Diversity Summit in Washington, DC, to bring together the leaders of several major partner organizations: NACD, NARC&DC, NASCA, and NCDEA, along with the presidents of most of the NRCS employee organizations. The organizations have continued to meet quarterly ever since. The most recent partnership diversity meeting was last month in Dallas.

Each of the partner organizations has come up with an annual diversity award to recognize the contributions of their members. The awards will be presented at the annual meeting of each organization, or some other suitable occasion. If I’m not mistaken, NACD has scheduled its presentation for the annual meeting in Atlanta. I believe nominations close this week.

These awards will help stimulate both awareness of diversity issues and accomplishments within the partner organizations.

Getting Conservation on the Ground

Our second major task has been putting conservation on the ground. During the first year of the 2002 farm bill, we were quite late in getting money out to the States, but that situation has improved each year since then. Secretary Veneman announced preliminary release of the FY 2005 funds to the States on October 22. I am happy that we were able to make the allocations to the States this early, so that farmers and ranchers know what to expect in time to make both their conservation decisions and their production decisions well in advance of the planting season.

South Carolina received nearly $19 million.

Writing the Rules

We also have been working hard to write the rules necessary to implement the conservation provisions of the farm bill. While rules may seem mundane, they are vitally important to ensuring the effectiveness and fairness of the programs.


Other Accomplishments
In addition to the growing workload of providing conservation leadership, technical assistance, and financial assistance under the 2002 farm bill, we got the Conservation Security Program off to a great start in 18 watersheds across 22 States. The first year was crucial to the long-term success of CSP, because the program is five times larger in 2005 and is set to grow every year thereafter. This year, we have $202 million in CSP, enough to fund 202 watersheds -- watersheds in every State and the Caribbean Basin. Secretary Veneman announced the watersheds on November 2.

Here in South Carolina, over 2.7 million acres in the Black, Lynches, and South Fork Edisto River watersheds are eligible for CSP this year. Over the next few years, every producer in every watershed in the nation will have a chance to participate in CSP.

We’re almost done with the final rule for CSP. It should be out soon. I hope you took the time to submit your comments. We hope to announce the dates of the sign-up period at the same time.

But there are things districts can be doing now to help their producers and NRCS get ready to participate in CSP.

One piece of especially good news is that the 2005 self-assessment workbook is already available on the internet and in hard copy or CD at NRCS offices. Self assessment is a new concept. It is made possible largely because of improvements in eGovernment. It is just one of the many ways in which USDA is interacting electronically with those farmers and ranchers who prefer doing business over the Internet.
We certainly hope that, as we continue to demonstrate the success of this program, we will receive the funding included in the 2002 farm bill.

CSP is a new approach. It recognizes conservation achievements on working farm and ranch lands by identifying and rewarding farmers and ranchers who are meeting high standards of conservation and environmental management on their operations.

CSP is a unique approach. No other Federal conservation program rewards agricultural producers for their overall conservation effort.

CSP helps producers maintain existing conservation stewardship and make additional environmental gains by implementing additional conservation measures.

CSP motivates producers to be better stewards. By recognizing producers who practice good stewardship and provide the environmental benefits that society expects, CSP provides strong incentives for producers to improve their stewardship sufficiently to fully participate in the program.

In short, as Agriculture Secretary Veneman has said, “CSP will reward the best and motivate the rest.”


Implementing the Technical Service Provider Process

Another major activity during the past year has been to design and implement the Technical Service Provider process.

The huge farm bill investment for conservation creates a tremendous workload for NRCS, and the temptation would be to hire hundreds or even thousands of additional employees to get the job done. The Technical Service Provider process gives us another way – a better way – a way that is consistent with keeping government small and keeping functions that are available commercially from becoming part of the Federal government.

The Technical Service Provider process should actually strengthen the partnership between NRCS and conservation districts, States, professional associations, Tribes, and others who will be providing the service.

This is why we made adjustments to the rule last year to ensure that we would continue to build upon the partnership. The final rule was published in the Federal Register on November 29.

More than 3,500 potential Technical Service Providers have applied for certification through our TechReg site on the Internet. Nearly 2,200 of them have completed the certification process. More than 60 TSPs are certified in South Carolina, 40 per cent of the local.

We also have posted new not-to-exceed rates on the Web, based on new data. These rates are posted on the Web. The TechReg site is a wonderful example of e-Government at its best. Through it, we have a great tool that service providers can use to apply for certification, that NRCS can use in the certification process, and that producers can use to locate providers.


Accomplishments

NRCS and the partners had many accomplishments in FY 2004: providing conservation technical assistance, applying conservation system plans on more than 27 million acres of crop and grazing lands, developing and applying nearly 10,000 comprehensive nutrient management plans (up from just over 8,000 in 2003), mapping soils or updating soils maps on 28 million acres (up form 22.5 million acres in 2003), implementing the Conservation Security Program, and working toward implementing the President’s management initiatives.

Our Earth Team volunteers nearly a million hours of their time.

NRCS met most of its goals here in South Carolina. NRCS and the partners here in South Carolina wrote conservation plans for more than 128,000 acres of cropland and grazing land, wrote nearly 75 comprehensive nutrient management system plans, established or improved stands on more than 24,000 acres of forestland, and created or restored nearly 12,000 acres of agricultural wetlands.

Other NRCS accomplishments included: Reaching out to be sure every farmer and rancher knew about farm bill programs and had an opportunity to participate, developing national and local priorities for conservation programs, and writing program rules based on thousands of comments from our conservation partners.

We also implemented the Grassland Reserve Program and Conservation Innovation Grants. And, we continued to make progress on the transition to an annual National Resources Inventory.

In addition, we successfully reorganized many parts of NRCS to provide even better support to the conservation efforts of America’s farmers and ranchers. One part of our reorganization was to establish three new Regional Assistant Chief positions in national headquarters to provide a direct link between the Chief’s office and state conservationists.

Each Regional Assistant Chief has responsibility for a group of States. Dick Coombe is responsible for South Carolina and the other Eastern States.

We also created three National Technology Support Centers and Remote Sensing Laboratories – in Greensboro, NC, Fort Worth, TX, and Portland, OR. The National Technology Support Center and Remote Sensing Laboratory up in North Carolina serve this area.

NRCS will use these centers and labs to develop technological tools to help landowners protect their natural resources and still maintain an economically viable operation. Lab and center employees will develop new technologies, refine existing technologies and train our field employees to help landowners make the best use of their natural resources.


OUR STRATEGIC PLAN

Focusing On Conservation Goals

In setting and meeting priorities, we have to focus more on conservation goals and less on programs. We must get as much good, priority-based conservation done on the ground as we can.

Getting More Conservation Done

We need to look carefully at applications in a number of ways to be sure we are getting the most for the taxpayer dollar. We also need to look at other sources of funds to see how to leverage the Federal dollar. The Federal government and the producers can get more conservation done when the cost is shared several ways.


CONCLUSION

To summarize, let me say that we have made a strong start toward implementing the 2002 farm bill, with its tremendous investment in conservation on working lands. There are a few things I would like to ask Conservation Districts to do to further improve implementation of the farm bill.

One area where you can help encourage landowners to greater efforts is in wetlands improvement and restoration. We have reached the point where Secretary Veneman announced this past spring that our nation has no net loss of wetlands due to agriculture. That is a fine achievement, and a tribute to hard work by America’s farmers and ranchers.

But President Bush has called on the conservation partners to do more. On Earth Day, he set a national goal of creating or restoring 3 million acres of wetlands nationwide over the next five years.

We also need your help to encourage more landowners to reestablish or improve their forestland. One of the President’s objectives under the Healthy Forests Initiative is to help private landowners protect, restore and enhance degraded forest ecosystems on their lands in order to promote the recovery of threatened and endangered species. Landowners can use existing programs such as WHIP to reach these goals.

To be successful in the long run, we need to be more strategic. We need to make sure every producer knows about the farm bill and has a chance to participate. We depend on the continued efforts of conservation districts to help get the word out.

We need to focus more on overall conservation goals and less on program implementation. I mentioned that NRCS needs to focus on accepting applications that meet local and national priorities. Conservation districts can help spread the word on those priorities.

And finally, we need to get the most conservation done that we can for the money. We need to use incentives properly, and we need to leverage the Federal funding. Conservation districts can help by developing new partnerships. As we add more partners, NRCS will increasingly serve as a conservation catalyst, an enabler of good conservation.

Working together, we can make the right choices, get more conservation on the ground, and make the farm bill live up to its potential. Together we can all help producers achieve excellence in conservation.

You know, I often say that the 2002 farm bill will usher in the “next golden age of conservation.” Well, working together, we can make that next golden age of conservation a reality.

Thank you.