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Re: another quick way to help prairies (Farm Bill update)

To answer Wayne's question, below is information from someone in the National Wildlife Federation.   In brief, if the Durbin amendment is passed as part of the Farm Bill, landowners will no longer, after the date of enactment of the bill, be able to break out and rowcrop virgin prairies and qualify for commodity payments.   Period.   (Unless Congress repeals the Durbin provision in some future Farm Bill, that is.)   The same is true for the Harkin CRP provision.    So IF we can get the Durbin and Harkin provisions into the new Farm Bill, prairies really will be helped.   Please consider calling your senators and asking them to support  these provisions.  (Thanks for asking, Wayne!)

Cindy

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RE: Durbin amendment:   It's my understanding that there is a date of enactment time limitation on the cropping history.   In other words, the cropping history must have been established before enactment of this legislation.   So, if someone were to dig and crop new land now, then yes, they could get subsidy payments.   But if that person were to dig and crop grass with no previous cropping history (1 in 5 or 3 in 10 years) after the enactment of the farm bill (assuming it retains this provision), then they would be ineligible for commodity payments  (Durbin addresses commodity payments, not CRP.)

Re: CRP issue.  Harkin legislation already addresses the CRP issue of forcing producers to dig-up because they need a cropping history.   Harkin solves this by stating that land eligible for CRP must have a cropping history of 3 out of 6 years, as of date of enactment.  Thus, new land dug up and cropped after date of enactment will not be eligible for CRP.

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(Wayne's original question):  I have a question regarding the Durbin amendment. If I had a 100 acre prairie couldn't I plow it up, plant it to soybeans for one year without any federal payments then qualify for payments after that? I know af several cases where land has been broken up and planted to a crop for 2 years at a loss in order to qualify for crp payments.    Wayne Morton

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Cindy Hildebrand
grantridge@aol.com
Ames, IA  50010

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