You don’t have to dig too deep to understand the connection of USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) to clean water in the Chesapeake Bay watershed. For nearly 80 years, conservationists with this USDA agency have built a stellar reputation of helping producers save their soil and improve water quality nationwide with the use of technical expertise and financial assistance.
Conservationists have used this expertise to help farmers in the Chesapeake Bay watershed achieve similar goals. Wise land management is one significant way to prevent the erosion and nutrient runoff that threatens the Bay.
To truly understand the scope of conservation activities in the Chesapeake Bay, you need a bird’s eye view of the rivers, streams and creeks that feed this vast ecosystem. This extensive, but fragile, network of waterways stretches out like the roots that feed the soil and must be properly managed to remain fully functional.
Chesapeake Bay is the nation’s largest estuary, an ecosystem where freshwater and saltwater meet. This week, NRCS and others are celebrating National Estuaries Week by highlighting some of the efforts to improve health of estuaries, including work in the bay watershed.
Farm Bill programs are making it possible for NRCS to help producers address farm water concerns with innovative solutions that fit the needs of the producers and the bay watershed. The Chesapeake Bay Watershed Initiative, or CBWI, funded through the 2008 Farm Bill, was the largest single USDA investment in the bay cleanup effort to date. Between 2009 and 2013, NRCS committed an unprecedented $190 million for expanded implementation of conservation practices on crop, pasture and private forestland in the bay through CBWI.
Under CBWI, 37,456 conservation practices were installed on hundreds of thousands of acres in the watershed, including:
- 497,183 acres of nutrient management to improve the rate, timing and method of nutrient application;
- 228,970 acres of cover crops to absorb excessive nitrogen and phosphorous;
- 1,069 buffers planted along stream banks that prevent sediment and pollutants from entering waterways; and
- 466 acres of grassed waterways to slow water thus preventing soil erosion.
These investments in conservation are benefitting the investor as well, as farmers are maximizing the efficiency of their inputs and they are reducing their costs and ensuring that their production is sustainable.
NRCS’ commitment to reducing soil erosion and improving water quality continues today in the 2014 Farm Bill. The new Farm Bill offers NRCS and its staff new tools to target Bay conservation efforts through the new Regional Conservation Partnership Program, or RCPP. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack has designated the Chesapeake Bay watershed as one of eight critical conservation areas for focused activities to increase restoration and sustainable use of soil, water, wildlife and related natural resources on a watershed scale.
RCPP will help to take voluntary bay conservation activities to the next level. Thirty-five percent of RCPP’s $394 million is being set aside to support promising partnership proposals in these eight critical conservation areas that will increase conservation efforts by working in concert with producers. Final project selections will be announced following the Oct. 2 final deadline.
As NRCS prepares to launch RCPP, CBWI continues to produce tangible water quality benefits throughout the watershed. Water quality improvement practices such as riparian buffers and grassed waterways planted five years ago have life spans of up to 15 years. These practices will continue to have positive impacts such as reducing soil erosion and filtering sediment far downstream.
