Farmers Unhappy At Prospect
Of Losing CRP Eligibility

WASHINGTON —(AP)— At 61, Andy Breske of Webster, S.D., is getting too old to farm, and he doesn't want to lose the big government check he gets not to.

Breske receives about $18,000 a year to keep 400 acres of his land out of production under the government's $1.8 billion Conservation Reserve Program.

But the Agriculture Department, acting on the 1996 farm law, has proposed changes to the program to exclude all the least environmentally sensitive land.

Breske is among hundreds of people on the Great Plains, from farmers to retirees, business owners and hunters, who have protested the new rules in public hearings and letters to USDA.

"The CRP is a guaranteed thing. When it comes time when you're up there in age a bit like I am, it's nice to have that security," Breske said in an interview.

Clifford Schultes, of Streeter, N.D., sees the hand of the big grain companies behind the proposed restrictions. Grain companies have pushed for scaling back the program; Minnesota-based Cargill Inc. told the department the new rules could be even tighter.

"They want full-scale production so that they can buy our grain for as low as possible a price and make as much money as possible without the risk of higher prices to pay," Schultes said.

About 36 million acres of land are currently idled through 10-year contracts with farmers. About 24 million acres are in contracts due to expire next year.

Nationwide, nearly 14 million acres of CRP land wouldn't meet at least one requirement of the USDA's proposed new enrollment restrictions, according to a University of Missouri analysis.

Under the new rules, the land least subject to erosion would no longer qualify, and USDA will not pay farmers more than the land's market rental rate. Farmers in some states are being paid up to three times the local rental rates.

"Those that are in the CRP would like to stay in the CRP, but the bottom line is that there are lands that were entered in the CRP that do not pose much of an environmental threat," said Randy Weber, associate administrator for the department's Farm Service Agency.

The department is reviewing the 1200 comments it received — so many that employees had to be brought in from field offices to process them — and plans to issue final regulations by early next year, Weber said.

But some lawmakers may push to delay the restrictions so Congress can rewrite the program, said Rep. Collin Peterson, D-Minn.

Breske is paid $44.50 an acre for his 400 acres of CRP land. Half the land would still qualify under the new rules, but only in zigzag parcels that would be hard to cultivate.

If he rented the land to another farmer, he would likely get about $24 to 25 an acre. He can't afford to sell the land because of the capital gains tax, he said.

The CRP income is a concern to many retirees who have come to depend on it. Losing the CRP money "would definitely create a hardship for me," Edna Gully, a widow from Floydada, Texas, wrote USDA.

But money isn't the only issue involved. The conservation program has made a noticeable reduction in the severity of dust storms, especially in the southern Plains, where on windy days the blowing topsoil can make it impossible to see more than a few feet.

"This area is not pleasant for man nor beast without CRP," wrote Opal Renfrow of Friona, Texas.

Juanita Reese, of Plainview, Texas, recalled pre-CRP days "where street lights would come on at one or two o'clock in the afternoon because the sky was so full of dust it would turn dark."

Hunters, meanwhile, fear a sharp decline in pheasants, quail and other game birds as land is plowed up for crops.

"We sportsmen always seem to be on the short end of federal government programs," said Thomas Van Moer of Marshall, Minn. The program "sure helped get the pheasants back," said John Wittmeier of Tripp, S.D.

Not all farmers, however, are opposed to the new rules. Wray Jean Rose of Springfield, Colo., said CRP payments were "easy money."

"The ground in CRP needs to be farmed by farmers," said Craig Cogburn of Happy, Texas, "not by recipients of government rental payments."