United States Department of Agriculture
Natural Resources Conservation Service
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Help Available for Arizona Agriculture to Save Water

Updated 9/9/2009

Agricultural and forestry producers who want to improve their land’s natural resources can apply for help from the Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP). Sept. 30 is the first application deadline for CSP, although applications are accepted on a continuous basis.

Making better use of our limited water supply is one emphasis of CSP. Agricultural and forestry producers could receive money to do the following to improve water use:

Eligible applicants include operators of private agricultural land, private forest land, and Indian tribes. CSP is a national program, but each state has the flexibility to determine its own resource concerns. In Arizona, priority will be given in the following areas:

Agricultural Land: Air Quality, Animals, Energy, Plants, and Water Quantity
Forestry: Animals, Plants, Soil Erosion

Two types of payments are possible through CSP. An annual payment for installing and adopting additional activities, and improving, maintaining, and managing existing activities is one type of payment, and a supplemental payment for the adoption of resource-conserving crop rotations is another possibility.

The estimated range for annual payments is:
• Cropland - $12 to $22 per acre
• Nonindustrial Private Forestland - $6 to $12 per acre
• Pastureland - $7 to $14 per acre
• Rangeland - $5 to $10 per acre

The estimated range for supplemental payments includes a resource-conservation crop rotation at $12 to $16 per acre.

CSP was authorized in the 2008 Farm Bill and is administered by the USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service. Visit the Web at www.az.nrcs.usda.gov contact to contact your local NRCS office, or call 602-280-8842 for more information.
 



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