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Future of CRP

Muskrat24 said:
So with this assumption you would be suggesting that all of the poor producing soils that have been cleaned up just to farm and put into CRP which is not the case. I work in it every day and right now there is plenty of demand to farm those acres. The counties I work in have less CRP acreage than they did 10 years ago. Higher farm profits have driven disposable income available to clean up unproductive ground which then leads to more profit in the environment we have been in. You also have to keep in mind that there are lots of CRP acres in small grain areas too and GRP in grass areas. Commodity markets will be impacted if CRP is eliminated and down goes cash rents.

One factor a lot of people miss is the lack of teeth shown by NRCS. They should be holding these producers to the fire with HEL compliance as they have to be in compliance to receive crop insurance subsidies.
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you lost me at down goes cash rents…….

I also work in your “said” line of business and I have not one customer who cheers when rental rates increase because the neighbor up the road enrolled their CRP for 285$/acre. CRP was not designed to compete against famers, today it does.

I also think you’re confused when you say farmers have more disposable income to clean up unproductive ground. Explain what unproductive means? It doesn’t cash flow for their operation? Or the net value of that land was 0$. Big difference………….
 
Muddyrem said:
you lost me at down goes cash rents…….

I also work in your “said” line of business and I have not one customer who cheers when rental rates increase because the neighbor up the road enrolled their CRP for 285$/acre. CRP was not designed to compete against famers, today it does.

I also think you’re confused when you say farmers have more disposable income to clean up unproductive ground. Explain what unproductive means? It doesn’t cash flow for their operation? Or the net value of that land was 0$. Big difference………….
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Unproductive meaning ground that currently has $0 income to the owner because of trees or fencerow or dilapidated homestead that can be cleared and earn income from. Triple digit farm profits per acre leaves cash available to pay to clean areas creating more productive acres. Didn’t say profitable acres.

100% agree that CRP was not designed to compete with cropland rents. Some of that competition should have been reduced when new contracts were limited to 85%\95% of SRR. Didn’t fix all I know but helped.

If CRP is eliminated some portion of those acres will go back into corn/soybean/small grain production which will increase grain supply driving down grain prices and inputs along with rents will go down because of negative margins.
 
Muskrat24 said:
Unproductive meaning ground that currently has $0 income to the owner because of trees or fencerow or dilapidated homestead that can be cleared and earn income from. Triple digit farm profits per acre leaves cash available to pay to clean areas creating more productive acres. Didn’t say profitable acres.

100% agree that CRP was not designed to compete with cropland rents. Some of that competition should have been reduced when new contracts were limited to 85%\95% of SRR. Didn’t fix all I know but helped.

If CRP is eliminated some portion of those acres will go back into corn/soybean/small grain production which will increase grain supply driving down grain prices and inputs along with rents will go down because of negative margins.
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I think we’re saying the same thing. I agree with majority of what you’re saying and I’m not advocating for all CRP or similiar programs to go away. My issue is that some of these programs have given certain groups of people opportunities to make money off ground that either should be farmed or should not be disturbed, period. A fence row with trees had a place at one point, or it wouldn’t be there. That Fencerow is now gone, because the farmer needs to farm every inch of every acre to make it pencil in. I follow the logic behind high grain prices cure high grain prices and more supply drops potential price. However, majority people would agree, they’d rather farm 4$ corn with low inputs than farm 7$ corn with high inputs. Theres more opportunity when commodities and grain prices are low.
 
Muskrat24 said:
So with this assumption you would be suggesting that all of the poor producing soils that have been cleaned up just to farm and put into CRP which is not the case. I work in it every day and right now there is plenty of demand to farm those acres. The counties I work in have less CRP acreage than they did 10 years ago. Higher farm profits have driven disposable income available to clean up unproductive ground which then leads to more profit in the environment we have been in. You also have to keep in mind that there are lots of CRP acres in small grain areas too and GRP in grass areas. Commodity markets will be impacted if CRP is eliminated and down goes cash rents.

One factor a lot of people miss is the lack of teeth shown by NRCS. They should be holding these producers to the fire with HEL compliance as they have to be in compliance to receive crop insurance subsidies.
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Unfortunately NRCS is not the lead agency on HEL or wetland compliance.. FARM Service Agency is the legal lead. Fsa is the only agency that can legally enforce HEL and wetland compliance. NRCS does the leg work, the field work, and even the letters and talking to the customer. But FSA controlls the computer and buttons. Fsa make final determinations. And many times the paperwork from nrcs days ineligible but FSA never pushed the button.
With that being said, nrcs is not perfect either. Both have +/-.
 
Muddyrem said:
you lost me at down goes cash rents…….

I also work in your “said” line of business and I have not one customer who cheers when rental rates increase because the neighbor up the road enrolled their CRP for 285$/acre. CRP was not designed to compete against famers, today it does.

I also think you’re confused when you say farmers have more disposable income to clean up unproductive ground. Explain what unproductive means? It doesn’t cash flow for their operation? Or the net value of that land was 0$. Big difference………….
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When corn was $3 farmers “had to plant every acre they could” then when corn was $7 “they couldn’t afford not to tear out trees and plant it to corn” there’s only one constant. If I’m not mistaken land “improvements” like tile and bulldozing can be used as tax write offs where the purchase of farmland itself isn’t.
 
*Meaning that if a farmer has 1,000 acres of crop ground he owns plus 200 acres of “waste” ground that is already purchased and possibly paid for. Rather than trying to buy another 200 acres somewhere , it may be a better business move to spend the same amount or less to rip out the trees and creeks and tile them. Then he can write off the entire cost of the land improvements which could save him a ton of money in taxes on a $7 corn year.
 
Iowa said:
*Meaning that if a farmer has 1,000 acres of crop ground he owns plus 200 acres of “waste” ground that is already purchased and possibly paid for. Rather than trying to buy another 200 acres somewhere , it may be a better business move to spend the same amount or less to rip out the trees and creeks and tile them. Then he can write off the entire cost of the land improvements which could save him a ton of money in taxes on a $7
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So where does ripping out trees, destroying creek beds, tiling everything to the hills and farming fence row to fence row align with the goals of the CRP program?

I agree with what you saying, but none of this goes with what CRP was originally designed for. So today, because so much has changed it makes no sense to keep it around with the way its design and used today. That’s all I’m getting at, and it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see how it’s being abused.
 
Muddyrem said:
So where does ripping out trees, destroying creek beds, tiling everything to the hills and farming fence row to fence row align with the goals of the CRP program?

I agree with what you saying, but none of this goes with what CRP was originally designed for. So today, because so much has changed it makes no sense to keep it around with the way its design and used today. That’s all I’m getting at, and it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see how it’s being abused.
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Oh it doesn’t at all, I farm and do custom application for a living. I sprayed for a guy that tore everything he possibly could out , couldn’t figure out why he had a 2 acre cornfield on the steepest sidehill in a crp field until someone told me that 2 acres was timber when he put the rest of the farm in crp. Now The next time around the entire field will be enrolled.
 
What I am saying is the trees are coming out either way and my guess the tax write off from record profits to increase productive ground is gonna happen with more of those acres going to long term crop than CRP these days. Be interesting to compare the total CRP in your counties today versus 10 or 20 years ago. Do people rip out trees to put ground in CRP, yes, but they gonna have to wait for a new farm bill and get cropping history to be eligible. I’d guess there is more habitat for a pollinator in CRP than equivalent size crop field. Was the pollinator program mishandled YES, when full fields were put in with big incentives. Other thing I am saying is doing away with CRP will come with other economic impacts. And until we see substantial decreases in farm profits the disposable income will go to ripping out trees for tax savings.
 
I think maybe there is a little bit of lack of acknowledgement or appreciation on what GOOD CRP can provide in terms of biodiversity, soil health, microbes, habitat for thousands of things not named a deer. I can get caught up in being too deer-centric myself. You can certainly make an argument that a crop field may help your deer more than a CRP field. There are valid arguments to that. But overall, a GOOD CRP, that mimics native prairie provides for SOOO much more than a corn or bean field to overall plant and animal life.
 
I my area of Minnesota, the lakes are pretty nice, clear . Agricultural runoff can hamper that in “dog” days of August .

Sediment basins/catch ponds, CRP, tree buffers all help that . There’s definitely conservation that works—our lake is clearer now than in the 80s/90s…

The lakes I live on is 8000 acres. My community would be nothing without it . It’s not uncommon to have 5000 + tourists/visitors in our area on a prime weekend!

Thousands of boats/pontoons.. the clearer the water the more active the lake for recreation.
 
The lake we're on was a clear lake prior to zebes showing up but they made it so I could with my own eyes see (in perfect conditions) 17'.They've crashed and it has fallen some but 12' is still easy on calm sunny days.
 
I don't think the program should be canned completely, but I think there should be some restrictions on what can be enrolled in the program. I have several neighbors and people I know that put 80+CSR2 farms in the program because they didn't want to deal with people the check just comes. This is hurting the young producers in my area, not only are they competing with the well established producer, but competing against their own tax dollars.

Here's an example, so if it's 70CSR2 and up it doesn't qualify. Sub 70CSR2 farms can qualify. You could move that number down to 65CSR2 and down. I believe heavily sloped ground C slopes or worse should qualify regardless of CSR2. In my corner of Iowa C slopes are very steep prime for Erosion.

I think if some common sense restrictions were applied to the CRP program I don't think there would be much resistance to that.

I think some farms might even hit the market if they didn't qualify for CRP anymore. People want to hit the easy button.
 
Trapshooter1 said:
I don't think the program should be canned completely, but I think there should be some restrictions on what can be enrolled in the program. I have several neighbors and people I know that put 80+CSR2 farms in the program because they didn't want to deal with people the check just comes. This is hurting the young producers in my area, not only are they competing with the well established producer, but competing against their own tax dollars.

Here's an example, so if it's 70CSR2 and up it doesn't qualify. Sub 70CSR2 farms can qualify. You could move that number down to 65CSR2 and down. I believe heavily sloped ground C slopes or worse should qualify regardless of CSR2. In my corner of Iowa C slopes are very steep prime for Erosion.

I think if some common sense restrictions were applied to the CRP program I don't think there would be much resistance to that.

I think some farms might even hit the market if they didn't qualify for CRP anymore. People want to hit the easy button.
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Agreed, I had the same thoughts earlier in this thread. They could easily set a CSR threshold that coincides with a slope rating to keep the high CSR ground and flat seas of grass out of the program.
 
Trapshooter1 said:
I don't think the program should be canned completely, but I think there should be some restrictions on what can be enrolled in the program. I have several neighbors and people I know that put 80+CSR2 farms in the program because they didn't want to deal with people the check just comes. This is hurting the young producers in my area, not only are they competing with the well established producer, but competing against their own tax dollars.

Here's an example, so if it's 70CSR2 and up it doesn't qualify. Sub 70CSR2 farms can qualify. You could move that number down to 65CSR2 and down. I believe heavily sloped ground C slopes or worse should qualify regardless of CSR2. In my corner of Iowa C slopes are very steep prime for Erosion.

I think if some common sense restrictions were applied to the CRP program I don't think there would be much resistance to that.

I think some farms might even hit the market if they didn't qualify for CRP anymore. People want to hit the easy button.
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I agree, only thing I would add is that buffer along streams being a guaranteed qualifier. Because that dirt is usually very high csr.
 
Butch973 said:
Didn’t they put a cap on the rental rates so guys stopped enrolling the good stuff at $300+ an acre? Thought I heard $230?
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The cap was $300 an acre . I just had some go in at $300/acre for 15 years .

Trees—oak, plum, spruce, pine . They will more than likely be there for more than 15 yrs!
 
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