03/25/08 CSP sign-up in April

Farm and Ranch March 25, 2008 Agriculture Secretary Ed Schafer has announced a sign-up for the Conservation Security Program, CSP, starting April 18th and running to May 16th. Fifty-one watersheds nationwide are part of this sign-up including one watershed each in Washington, Oregon and Idaho. The eligible watersheds were first announced in the 2007 fiscal year and are the Lower Snake-Tucannon in Washington, Little Lost in Idaho and Mckenzie Watershed in Oregon. Natural Resources Conservation Chief Arlen Lancaster explains why this CSP sign-up is occurring later in the year. Lancaster: "Part of the reason we are having to do it this late in the year is we had hoped we would have a new farm bill with a new CSP program so that we could offer a new sign-up across the nation." And Lancaster says since a 2007 Farm Bill passage in Congress will not occur in time to offer CSP under new rules; Lancaster: "In order to give producers a chance to be rewarded for their stewardship this year in those 51 watersheds we have been talking about for 18 months now, we decided this was the only alternative we had was to go ahead and offer a sign up." To apply for CSP, NRCS asks potential participants to complete a CSP self-assessment workbookavailable on the Web or from local NRCS officesto find out if their operation meets the requirements of the program. CSP is a voluntary conservation program that rewards producers who are meeting the highest standards of conservation and environmental management on private agricultural working lands. I'm Bob Hoff and that's the Northwest Farm and Ranch Report on the Northwest Ag Information Network.