Balancing the Conservation Checkbook: How the Federal Government is Quietly Risking America’s Soil
Written by Julia Wickham and Professor Jonathan Coppess

“It’s about the money” – Art Cullen[1]

I. Introduction: Production at High Cost

American agricultural policy has long struggled to balance short-term economic concerns for farmers with long-term environmental investments. The Upper Midwest is facing a nitrate challenge[2]—Iowa is ranked #2 in the nation in cancer rates.[3] Modern agricultural production methods have increased threats to biodiversity and soil erosion.[4] Meanwhile, agriculture is responsible for 25% of net greenhouse gas emissions in some states.[5] Investing in agricultural conservation is the best path forward. The recent recission of Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) funding, increasing incentives to prioritize production and large payouts to producers, along with an uncertain future for crucial programs is alarming for the future of agricultural conservation. This article articulates the interplay between United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) funding and disappearing investments in conservation programs as one of the most pressing environmental issues of 2026.

II. The Cost of Prioritizing Production over Environmental Protection

Environmental stewardship is sacrificed when farmers are given incentives to plant more. In the 1920s, an economic boost during World War I drove farmers in the Great Plains to adopt intensive cultivation methods, pulverizing topsoil.[6] Producers responded to the subsequent economic depression by plowing marginal land, abandoning conservation investments, and pushing production to offset collapsed prices culminating in a Dust Bowl.[7]

Just a generation later, in the 1970s, American crop lands were again losing millions of acres to severe soil erosion from overproduction and dropping conservation practices.[8] Rising global demands following a temporary embargo on soybeans from the Nixon Administration contributed to a spike in crop prices.[9] The Secretary of Agriculture’s infamous push to farmers to “get big or get out” encouraged more land to be put into production from “fence row to fence row.”[10] Together, the 1920s and the 1970s have demonstrated that when producers expand to maximize production, the fallout is not just increased bankruptcies and lost farms, but also land degradation.[11]

Emerging from these twin crises, was the landmark Food Security Act of 1985 (FSA).[12] As part of the FSA, Congress enacted the landmark Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) to remove environmentally sensitive land out of production and implement resource conserving practices for 10 or more years.[13] And it was a massive hit. For example, in 2017, it was estimated that 521 million pounds of nitrogen and 103 pounds of phosphorus were conserved in the soil compared to landed that was cropped.[14] That same year, it was estimated that CRP enhanced water quality by reducing sedimentation by 192 million tons.[15] In the years following the creation of CRP, Congress established other conservation programs to reward environmental stewardship.[16] These programs were major investments in agricultural prosperity. By incentivizing and prioritizing environmental stewardship, Congress aimed to prevent not only another boom-and-bust cycle in agricultural markets, but also in environmental health.

The durability of this investment depends on stable funding especially in times of climate crisis. Recently, while conservation funding has increased overall, it has lost out in relations to ad hoc funding and incentives to plow environmentally sensitive land. The combination emergency funding in recent years through the Commodity Credit Corporation (CCC), the restructuring of baseline funding through the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OB3), and the wavering support of crucial conservation programs, such as CRP, is undermining decades of environmental investment to finance short term economic and political needs.[17]

A. The Conservation Reserve Program (CRP)

CRP is the largest, federal private-land retirement program in the United States, and it has demonstrated numerous positive environmental benefits including reduced soil erosion; water quality improvements through vegetative cover, buffer strips, and reduced fertilizer application; and wildlife population improvement from increased habitat.[18] By 1990, enrollment in CRP exceeded 32.5 million acres, and it was estimated in 1995 to have saved nearly 700 million tons of soil each year on the acres enrolled.[19] That year, the head of the Natural Resource Conservation Service (NRCS) told the Senate Agricultural Committee “we have yet to hear a negative about CRP.”[20]

Budgetary and spending concerns have repeatedly challenged CRP.[21] In 1995, farm bill reauthorization had been pulled into a massive budget reconciliation fight, spearheaded by a Republican controlled Congress focused on federal budget discipline and debt.[22] The following year, Congress revised the program to receive mandatory funding from the Commodity Credit Corporation (CCC).[23] This effectively continued CRP funding without having to revisit appropriations battles to find the 2 billion per year.[24] However, since its enactment, Congress has over time limited the amount of acres that may be enrolled in CRP.[25]

B. The Commodity Credit Corporation (CCC)

Two funding mechanisms exists for the farm bill: appropriations and mandatory.[26] The CCC allows for funding without appropriations in advance.[27] The CCC has served as a mandatory funding mechanism for agricultural programs since 1933.[28] It is wholly-government owned and managed by the USDA.[29] The CCC has a permanent, indefinite borrowing authority of $30 billion from the U.S. Treasury.[30] The majority of its activities are authorized through omnibus farm bills.[31] However, under Section 5 authority, the CCC allows the Secretary of Agriculture a high-level of discretion to carry out many broad operations to support U.S. agriculture.[32] During the first Trump Administration, the total amount authorized by USDA through CCC for a trade aid package, was valued at about $28 billion.[33] This was more than any previous individual discretionary uses of CCC.[34] These 2018 and 2019 trade aid packages provided direct and indirect assistance to farmers affected by “trade damage” from retaliatory tariffs.[35] This Section 5 action brought the CCC so close to its borrowing limit, that it was only through congressional action the CCC borrowing authority was restored before funding for conservation programs went dry.[36]

Again, under the current Trump Administration, the USDA recently announced $12 billion from the CCC for “Farmer Bridge Assistance” payments to provide emergency relief after tariffs have raised concerns in the farm economy.[37] These payments are expected to be released in February 2026.[38] This is nearly one-third of the authorized spending budget of the CCC, which means programs authorized by the farm bill relying on funding from the CCC are, again, deprioritized.[39] In addition, Congress expedited $10 billion in direct economic assistance to farmers in March 2025.[40] All these ad hoc payments are tied to planted acres, which place tough planting decisions on farmers who are incentivized to plant rather than conserve because there is not the same volume of funding.

III. Short-Term Fixes May Have Long Term Environmental Costs

The last decade has seen unprecedented swings in federal conservation investments. The Inflation Reduction Act’s (IRA) historic infusion of conservation investment followed by the OB3’s repurposing and recission of that funding has been tumultuous and confusing. Separately, Congress has continued CRP in each of the 2018 farm bill extensions.[41] Although, Congress has reauthorized other conservation programs through 2031, it has failed to do so for CRP.[42] As a result, this major conservation program faces substantial uncertainty.

A. The One Big Beautiful Bill: Reallocating and Rescinding Inflation Reduction Act Funds

In 2022, the IRA contained an unprecedented investment in conservation programs.[43] For decades, Congress has expanded its investment in agricultural conservation policies .[44] The IRA appropriated an additional $18 billion until 2031 to various programs.[45] The Reconciliation Farm Bill, contained within the OB3, rescinded unobligated IRA funds to four conservation programs and repurposed them with the effect of adding them to the permanent farm bill baseline.[46]Although this is a short term win for environmentalist, ultimately, conservation programs will lose $1.8 billion over the next ten years.[47] Further, the OB3 did not retain the IRA “climate smart” guardrails.[48] These activities included agricultural practices that reduce greenhouse gas emissions, sequester carbon, and build climate resilience.[49]

B. Encouraging Production in High-Risk Areas

The OB3 nearly $60 billion investment in farm subsidy programs, including crop insurance, “dwarfs” the reallocation of conservation funding.[50] This larger investment in crop insurance encourages production of high-risk crops in environmentally sensitive areas, and it is contrary to a future of safeguarding vital natural resources.[51] While more conservation funding will be available in the long term, the changes to crop insurance programs over the same period of time are setting a daunting precedent of rewarding more production in higher risk areas, resulting in greater soil erosion and possibility of nitrogen leeching to groundwater, surface water, and estuaries.[52]

C. CRP and Its Uncertain Future

Perhaps one of the largest harbingers of lapsed environmental investment is the uncertain future of CRP. Previous farm bills have now reduced the enrollment cap from 32 million acres to 24 million acres.[53] Because Congress did not include CRP in the IRA, CRP received no supplemental funding. When the 2018 farm bill expired in 2023, technically CRP’s authority did as well.[54] However, as part of legislation re-opening the federal government, Congress extended CRP until September of 2026.[55] These annual extensions of CRP are troublesome for two reasons. First, the uncertainty may cause landowners and farmers to plow eligible acres. Second, this could make it easier for Congress to shift funding away from the program, a fate similar to the Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP).

CSP is a pivotal program that offers direct payments to farmers in return for implementing conservation on the farm.[56] Congress first authorized CSP in the 2022 farm bill without limits on funding or acres that could be enrolled.[57] In 2008, Congress implemented a limit on acreage, but it authorized an increase each subsequent year.[58] Then in 2018, Congress ended the acreage cap and moved to a funding cap.[59] This drastically reduced the funding, and it made the program more difficult to use, and thus, much more ineffective.[60] This eventually created a “self-defeating” program where fewer funds meant fewer farmers could receive assistance which reduced the support for the program.[61] If CRP were to follow in the footsteps of CSP, it would be detrimental to our ecosystem, and rural economies, to take sensitive lands out of conservation and back into production.

IV. Conclusion

Congress should have learned from the 1920s and 1970s that when agricultural policy plows ahead with short-term production boosts at the expense of land stewardship, the environmental consequences are devastating. Not only should Congress follow through on conservation funding, but federal policies should also build on nearly a century’s worth of momentum. Agricultural conservation is at a pivotal moment. Massive ad hoc payments to farmers while over-insurance of high risk areas and crops, coupled with uncertainty for CRP, is risking our investment in agricultural conservation at a critical time. In addition, small and very long term increases in funding from the OB3 are not an effective or reasonable counterweight to increasing environmental threats.

Author Bio:
Julia Wickham is a third-year law student at Vermont Law and Graduate School, graduating in May 2026 with a J.D. She is the Senior Articles Editor of the Vermont Journal of Environmental Law Volume 27.

[1] Editors Notebook, Storm Lake Times Pilot (Jan. 7, 2025), https://www.stormlake.com/stories/time-to-make-some-noise-about-cancer-in-iowa,123004.

[2] Kristi Marohn, Minnesota Public Radio News, Southeast Minnesota Struggles for Common Ground on Nitrate Pollution as Health Worries Rise, (Oct. 31, 2023), https://www.mprnews.org/story/2023/10/31/does-nitrate-in-southeast-minnesotas-water-present-a-public-health-crisis; Jonathan Coppess et al., A Menace Reconsidered, Part 4: Losing Nitrogen, farmdoc daily (Apr. 18, 2024), https://farmdocdaily.illinois.edu/2024/04/a-menace-reconsidered-part-4-losing-nitrogen.html.

[3] Nina B. Elkadi, Sentient Health (Mar. 14, 2025), What’s Driving Iowa’s Outlier Cancer Rate? It’s Complicated, https://sentientmedia.org/what-is-driving-iowas-cancer-rate/; see Art Cullen, Time to Make Some Noise About Cancer in Iowa, Storm Lake Times Pilot (Jan. 7, 2025), https://www.stormlake.com/stories/time-to-make-some-noise-about-cancer-in-iowa,123004 (“We will continue to grow corn out our ears to feed those hogs and hens no matter how much nitrate drains into the Raccoon River, one of the most endangered in America.”).

[4] See generally World Wildlife Fund (Sept. 26, 2024), 2024 Plowprint Report, https://files.worldwildlife.org/wwfcmsprod/files/Publication/file/8mq6fdcmt4_PlowprintReport_2024_FINAL.pdf; see also Brent J. Dalzell, Topography and Land Use Impact Erosion and Soil Organic Carbon Burial over Decadal Timescales, 218 CATENA (2022), https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0341816222005641#preview-section-introduction.

[5] Minnesota Pollution Control Agency, Greenhouse gas emissions in Minnesota 2005-2022: Report to the legislature (2025).

[6] Jonathan Coppess, Between Soil & Society: Legislative history and Political Development of Farm Bill Conservation Policy 42 (2024).

[7] Id.

[8] Id. at 145 (“In 1974 and 1975, for example, Iowa experienced its worst soil erosion in twenty-five years, with some fields losing as many as fifty tons of topsoil per acre.”).

[9] Jonathan Coppess & Otto Doering, History & Tough Reality: When Payments Do More Harm Than Good, Consider Other Options, farmdoc daily (Sept. 25, 2025), https://farmdocdaily.illinois.edu/2025/09/history-tough-reality-when-payments-do-more-harm-than-good-consider-other-options.html.

[10] Kevin C. Rigdon, Stop the Planting! The 1985 Farm Bill, Conservation Compliance, and America’s Agricultural Conservation Failure, 16 Drake J. of Agric. L. 488, 489 (2012).

[11]Jonathan Coppess & Otto Doering, History & Tough Reality: When Payments Do More Harm Than Good, Consider Other Options, farmdoc daily (Sept. 25, 2025), https://farmdocdaily.illinois.edu/2025/09/history-tough-reality-when-payments-do-more-harm-than-good-consider-other-options.html.

[12] Food Security Act of 1985, Pub. L. No. 99-198, 99 Stat. 1354 (1985); see Jonathan Coppess, Between Soil & Society: Legislative history and Political Development of Farm Bill Conservation Policy 153 (2024).

[13] Megan Stubbs, Cong. Rsch. Serv, R42783, Conservation Reserve Program (CRP): Status and Issues, 1 (2017).

[14] Env’t Benefits of the US Conservation Rsrv. Program 2017, US Dept. of Agric. (2017).

[15] Id.

[16] See generally Megan Stubbs, Cong. Rsch. Serv., R40763, Agricultural Conservation: A Guide to Programs (2022).

[17] Pub. L. No. 119-21, 139 Stat. 72 (2025).

[18] Megan Stubbs, Cong. Rsch. Serv., R42783, Conservation Reserve Program (CRP): Status and Issues, 1 (2017).

[19] Jonathan Coppess, Between Soil & Society: Legislative history and Political Development of Farm Bill Conservation Policy 178 (2024).

[20] Id. at 42.

[21] Id. at 179.

[22] Id.

[23] Id. at 179.

[24] Megan Stubbs, Cong. Rsch. Serv., R42783, Conservation Reserve Program (CRP): Status and Issues, 1 (2017).

[25] Id.

[26] Renee Johnson & Jim Monke, Cong. Rsch. Serv., IF 12047, Farm Bill Primer: Background and Status, 1 (2024).

[27] Megan Stubbs, Cong. Rsch. Serv., R44606, The Commodity Credit Corporation (CCC) (2025).

[28] U.S. Dept. of Agric., About the Commodity Credit Corporation, https://www.usda.gov/farming-and-ranching/resources-small-and-mid-sized-farmers/commodity-credit-corporation (last visited Dec. 3, 2025); see 15 U.S.C. § 714 (2000).

[29] Id.

[30] Megan Stubbs, Cong. Rsch. Serv., R44606, The Commodity Credit Corporation (CCC), 7 (2025).

[31] Id. at 2.

[32] 15 U.S.C. § 714c.

[33] Stephanie Rosch, Cong. Rsch. Serv., IF11289, Farm Policy: Comparison of 2018 and 2019 Market Facilitation Programs, 1 (2019); U.S. Gov’t Accountability Off., GAO-22-104259, USDA Market Facilitation Program: Oversight of Future Supplemental Assistance to Farmers Could Be Improved (2022).

[34] Id.

[35] Id.

[36] See e.g., Letter from Sen. Debbie Stabenow et al. to Sonny Perdue, Secretary of Agriculture, (Nov. 12, 2019), https://www.agriculture.senate.gov/mfp-letter; Letter from Sen. John Hoeven et al. to Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, (Sept. 17, 2019), https://republicans-agriculture.house.gov/UploadedFiles/CCC_Letter.pdf.

[37] U.S. Dep’t Agric., Press Release: Trump Administration Announces $12 Billion Farmer Bridge Payments for American Farmers Impacted by Unfair Market Disruptions (2025); Eric Katz, USDA transfers $13B into ‘slush fund’ for future tariff relief, Gov. Exec. ( Oct. 30, 2025), https://www.govexec.com/management/2025/10/usda-transfers-13b-slush-fund-future-tariff-relief/409198/.

[38] Id.

[39] Id.

[40] U.S. Dep’t Agric., Press Release: USDA Expediting $10 Billion in Direct Economic Assistance to Agricultural Producers (2025).

[41] Megan Stubbs, Cong. Rsch. Serv., IF13114, Agricultural Conservation After Enactment of the FY2025 Budget Reconciliation Law (P.L. 119-21), 1 (2025).

[42] Id.

[43] Inflation Reduction Act, Pub. L. No. 117-69, 136 Stat. 1818 (2022).

[44] See generally Megan Stubbs, Cong. Rsch. Serv., R40763, Agricultural Conservation: A Guide to Programs (2022).

[45] Kelsi Bracmort et al., Cong. Rsch. Serv., IN11978, Inflation Reduction Act: Agricultural Conservation and Credit, Renewable Energy, and Forestry, 1 (2022).

[46] P.L. 119-21, Section 10601.

[47] Jonathan Coppess, The Reconciliation Farm Bill: Is Conservation a Silver Lining?, farmdoc daily (Sept. 11, 2025), https://farmdocdaily.illinois.edu/2025/09/the-reconciliation-farm-bill-is-conservation-a-silver-lining.html.

[48] Andrew Hockenberry & Emma Scott, Stuck in the Weeds: How the Next Farm Bill Impacts the Environment, Vt. J. Env. L. (2025), https://vjel.vermontlaw.edu/top-ten/2025-top-ten/2024/12/stuck-in-the-weeds-how-the-next-farm-bill-impacts-the-environment/.

[49]Megan Stubbs, Cong. Rsch. Serv., IF13114, Agricultural Conservation After Enactment of the FY2025 Budget Reconciliation Law (P.L. 119-21), 1 (2025).

[50] Jonathan Coppess, The Reconciliation Farm Bill: Is Conservation a Silver Lining?, farmdoc daily (Sept. 11, 2025), https://farmdocdaily.illinois.edu/2025/09/the-reconciliation-farm-bill-is-conservation-a-silver-lining.html.

[51] See Ruben N. Lubowski et al., USDA Econ. Res. Serv., Environmental Effects of Agricultural Land-Use Change: The Role of Economics and Policy 47 (2006) (“The increase in insurance subsidies appears to have had the largest effect for low-productivity and certain environmentally sensitive land.”).

[52] Id.

[53] Megan Stubbs, Cong. Rsch. Serv., R42783, Conservation Reserve Program (CRP): Status and Issues, 1 (2017).

[54] Id.

[55] Rachel Cramer, Congress extends critical Farm Bill for a third time. It’s a relief for farmers, but raises concerns, KCUR NPR (Nov. 17, 2025), https://www.kcur.org/environment-agriculture/2025-11-17/farm-bill-extended-crp.

[56] Jonathan Coppess, Between Soil & Society: Legislative history and Political Development of Farm Bill Conservation Policy 190 (2024).

[57] Id.

[58] Jonathan Coppess, The Incredible Shrinking of the Conservation Stewardship Program, farmdoc daily (Oct. 12, 2023), https://farmdocdaily.illinois.edu/2023/10/the-incredible-shrinking-of-the-conservation-stewardship-program.html.

[59] Id.

[60] Lisa Held, Republican Plans for Ag Policy May Bring Big Changes to Farm Country, Civil Eats (July 22, 2024), https://civileats.com/2024/07/22/republican-plans-for-ag-policy-may-bring-big-changes-to-farm-country/.

[61] Id.