Is anyone else working on keeping land in CRP and out of ag production?
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Anne Lewis
I&E Project Administrator
Project WET SD
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Pierre, SD 57501
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Keeping Land in CRP
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It's been interesting to see the articles on "Peak Soil" appear...so people are hopefully becoming more aware of the importance of agricultural lands to our bioindustrial future. In SE Minnesota horrendous erosion problems are arising because lands coming out of CRP (the Conservation Reserve Program) or being taken out of CRP are being used to plant row crops, namely corn to be used for ethanol production. Government payments for CRP to protect fragile lands can't compete with income being earned from corn and other agricultural commodities. Hopefully payments to plant these lands in prairie grasses and other perennial crops for cellulosic ethanol will be available soon (through the new farm bill or other legislation) so we can get them back into grasses and protect them from further erosion. This is really an important issue, because throughout history civilizations have died out because they didn't protect their agricultural soils.
Nancy Adams
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Dirt: The erosion of civilizations by David Montgomery is an excellent examination of this particular topic
Holly White
Kingston Military
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