...and exactly what are they (government) paying for? I have found several parcels of land I'm interested in purchasing, but a few are under the CRP program.

-- melody, AL (realworld3d@hotmail.com), December 27, 2001

Answers

That is the Conservation Reserve Program, most likely. I am collecting data right now for an article that I am writing about it and other similar programs. What state are you in?

Basically, the CRP usually works like this: You own the land but the part of it covered by CRP is restricted as to what you can do with it. Usually you can not build on it (ever!) and you may not even be able to farm it. You may be able to look at it once in awhile, but that may even be doubtful.

You are still the owner of the land, but aside from some limited "forest management" there's usually not a whole lot that can be done with it. On the bright side, you know that no one can ever build there, and if you are the one who puts the CRP easement on the property, you can sometimes get an annual stipend, a one time cash payment, or both from the government for it. Around here the one time payment runs about $2,700 an acre, the annual stipend is between $80 and $100 an acre per year.

Again, what state are you in?

-- chuck in md (woah@mission4me.com), December 27, 2001.

Chuck, around here, IA, there is only a yearly payment. You can put the land in CRP for up to 10 years. While it is in CRP you can not crop the land, run cattle on it or build on it. Once it is out of CRP, you can do what ever you want with it. You can hunt on the land though and that is what a lot of people are doing with their CRP land here. Unfortunately, this has put a lot of land in the hands of investors that have never seen a farm (or their land) since the govt payment makes their payments for them or if they paid for the land, it gives them a very nice return on their investment.

here is a link that gives all kinds of info

http://www.fsa.usda.gov/dafp/cepd/crpinfo.htm

-- beckie (none@this.time), December 27, 2001.

Thanks, Chuck. The properties I'm looking at are in OK and AR. The payments are about $30+ per acre, and most run through the year 2010. When the original contract expires, I would have the option of whether or not to renew, wouldn't I? I plan to farm/garden no more than 20 acres - I'd like keeping the rest of the land as it is. And it wouldn't hurt to have an extra payment to put towards the loan.

-- melody, AL (realworld3d@hotmail.com), December 27, 2001.

Here in Oklahoma, you will have to leave the land in the program until the full term is up. You are not allowed to build, graze or farm the land. Two years ago we had such a drought that the farmers were allowed to bale the grass on the CRP land to use for their own livestock, but they couldn't sell it. It's a strange program-lots of land laying idle, I guess the farmers are getting paid NOT to grow anything. When the term is up, you have the option to renew it or use the land as you please.

-- cowgirlone (cowgirlone47@hotmail.com), December 27, 2001.

Melody, The initials stand for Conservation Reserve Program, a USDA program to take highly erodible and poor soil properties out of production, protecting surface water. The best thing for you to do is get ahold of your Conservation District or the Natural Resources Conservation Service (they are often housed together with FSA) There is presently a CRP program that will pay a rent on property that is put into filter strips along water ways and around surface water and if your land QUALIFIES, it can be put into a CRP program, with plantigs that provide shelter and food for wildlife. To my knowledge there are no programs that allow you to put good farm land into the program for $ per year like the initial program 15 years ago. You may not use the land to make money while it is in the program and pasturing, haying, etc. would be making money. The program generally runs for a given number of years (ours was 10 with a one year extention) and if you choose to remove any acreage from the program you may, you will lose that rent for that year. (I will be taking 10 acres out of ours for pasture this spring, reducing my payment by the equivelent of the rent on that 10 acres.) If you hope to drop a large amount of good farmland in the program you will be disappointed, they are not accepting just any ground only that which meets certain requirements, soil type, if highly erodiable, how close to water, etc.

There is another program called PA116 that gives the owner a rebate on property taxes, but you cannot divide the parcel and sell plots without paying back the full amoount of the taxes that were rebated. This program was designed to keep good farmland in farming, and help the farmer by giving them a break on taxes.

You should also check on the program called Farmland Preservation. With this program, if accepted, you are paided the difference between agricultural value and development value in exchange for NEVER selling the land for development. This program has been very successful in Pennsylvania (Lancaster County I think) and Maryland. This program is going to a local control level and I'm not sure how that will work in the future, FSA should be able to give you more info when the Farm Bill is passed and put into effect.

Once again to find out for sure what program this land is in please go to the Farm Services Agency (under USDA in the phone book) and ask about it, this is public information and they can give you the correct information you need, that is what they are there for. There are a lot of government programs for farmland, these are the one's I'm aware of and they change with new farm bills, and many people confuse them so check it out for yourself. Don't be scared off by the programs, you can work around them generally.

And the fellow who is writing the article, your information is a little confused so you may want to check with FSA also, they have a web site that this info is on too, don't know the address but I'm sure you'll find it under USDA.

-- Betsy Koehnlein (Betsyk@pathwaynet.com), December 28, 2001.

What great answers!! I work with CRP *every* day. It's a big part of my job. You can buy out existing CRP but you have to pay the Feds back what was paid out plus interest, plus a penalty. If you want to build or truck garden on CRP you'll need to do this.

CRP varies from sign-up to sign-up, fiscal year to fiscal year, farm bill to farm bill. Right now, for new ground going into CRP, the program is limited to what they call the "continuous sign-up". This is a ten to fifteen year program that mainly places filter strips of grass or trees along streams, lakes and wetlands (there are a couple other practices such as windbreaks and some terrace work). Marginal pasture also qualifies in this permutation so you don't need cropping history on the acreage going in. Rental payments, cost shares and bonuses are very high for this program right now, it's best I've ever seen them offer, so it's very popular. You can't farm it under traditional grain farming practices for what they will pay you to put it in CRP.

Chuck, I think you are thinking of either WRP or some other conservation easement program. CRP does not require a permanent easement.

Buying existing ground in CRP is often considered desireable as you'll have annual income from the property. The older contracts were often for highly erodible soils in uplands that went to cool season grasses. They will allow you to manage these fields for wildlife and install food plots, disk strips etc. There are mowing restriction so check with your local office.

Holler at me by email if you have other questions I can try to answer!

-- Susan (smtroxel@socket.net), December 28, 2001.

Betsy's answers are good---go with that. This was originally intended to take out of production marginal land or land that should never have been farmed in the first place. As usual, it didn't necessarily do that because politicians don't think through the implications of their actions and because there's always a hidden adgenda. The government will help you plant trees on the land, also, and you can plant, for example, locust, which could be for firewood or posts etc, after the 10 years is up. Can't do Christmas trees, tho, as I remember, because that's considered a crop. The biggie is that, if you should plan to sell any of the land in CRP, it would have to remain in for the term or be "bought out" of the program. Talk to your Soil and Water Conservation people. Ask for info at the County Extension office. They can give you the details. At least at the beginning, you had to bid a price per acre to get into the program, but it has changed and maybe that changed. Just be sure you read the fine print; government programs never give you anything without taking something of equal or greater value in return.

-- Rosalie (Dee) in IN (deatline@globalsite.net), December 28, 2001.

In Maryland, there is an additional easement that you can add under the Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program that is PERPETUAL, meaning the land can never be put into farm use.

I'll admit that this stuff is arcane, confusing, and always changing. There are very few people in our county government that have any clue as to how it really works, so getting the straight story on it is near impossible. There are so many different programs that can work in conjunction with each other, or separately, or in lieu of. Some of them are:

• CRP
• Timber (forest) Banking
• Riparian Buffer easements
• Transferrable Development Rights
• Rural Legacy Easements
• Wetland Preservation

There is a guy here in Montgomery County, MD who works for the Department of Economic Development as a Farmland preservation planning specialist. He is one of the few people who understands these programs well enough to actually get anything done about them. Call your local Soil Conservation Extension or County Extension agent.

One difficulty with these programs is that they are seldom administered by the same entity. While one program might be run by the county with federal help, another might consist of sponsorships given by private organizations such as ducks unlimited. Still others might be federal programs, and to top it all off, the rules on their use vary from county to county and state to state. In Frederick Co, MD, for example, landowners can "double dip" by putting the same piece of land into conservation under two separate programs that do approximately the same thing. In Montgomery County, they wouldn't even consider it.

We've been working with various organizations on some of these programs for our own land for a couple of years now. So far, it hasn't been a very rewarding experience. The many levels of bureaucratic red tape and flaming hoops make me wonder sometimes if it isn't more trouble than it's worth. I know some people personally, however, who have taken advantage of these programs with great success. In certain situations, these programs can be very helpful to someone who is trying to reduce the cost of land ownership. The best thing that happened in my case is that I got the government to pay me to do what I was willing to do for free, that is plant trees on 4 1/2 acres of property that I really didn't want to spend the next fifteen years mowing.

Mowing bad, trees good. Free trees even better. That's how I see it.

For those who are being paid NOT to grow crops, my question is, what is the best type of crop not to grow? Corn? Beans?

;-)

-- chuck in md (woah@mission4me.com), December 28, 2001.

Around here it's milo and soybeans.

-- Barbara Fischer (bfischer42@hotmail.com), December 28, 2001.

Here in Minnesota there are state programs that also work with the CRP, and complicate the issue even more. As if it isn't complicated enough, right?

Years ago there was a lump payment, 'forever' program that was called CRP. Such creatures do exist in some areas.

Here you have to maintain a cover crop (grass of some sort), pay taxes, and control weeds. Pretty much nothing else is allowed on it. In times of severe drought you might be able to graze it or hay it, but only if you give money back, etc. Some forms of recreation/ hunting is allowed on it, but no other agriculture.

Most programs run 10 - 15 years, with renewal options.

I would check with the local government branch that administers the program to see what there own specific interpitations of the program are. Seems not everyone reads the rules the same way, and you need to follow whatever the locals are allowing.

--->Paul

-- paul (ramblerplm@hotmail.com), December 28, 2001.

Click for

Conservation Reserve Program

-- ~Rogo (rogo2020@yahoo.com), December 29, 2001.