09/26/06 CSP watersheds for 07

Farm and Ranch September 26, 2006 USDA announced Monday that 51 watersheds in 50 states and U.S. territories will be eligible for the 2007 Conservation Security Program, CSP. There will be one eligible watershed in each Pacific Northwest state. They are the Little Lost watershed in Idaho, the Mckenzie in Oregon and the Lower Snake-Tucannon in Washington. USDA says the number of watersheds selected for 2007 was based on President Bush's requested funding for CSP for fiscal year 2007. It's the lack of funding that has been the primary criticism of CSP by agricultural groups who otherwise like the program for compensating farmers and ranchers for ongoing conservation efforts on working land. Ag groups say its unfair for some producers to get a payment when others doing the same conservation don't just because they are in a different watershed. At a federal listening session on cooperative conservation in Spokane earlier this year Dianna Roberts with Washington State University Extension modified USDA's own slogan regarding CSP. Roberts: "The CSP, Conservation Security Program, was designed to reward the best and encourage the rest. That was a great theory. So far in practice it has rewarded the first and discouraged the rest." USDA says 2007 eligible watersheds were announced now to allow farmers and ranchers adequate time to gather resource information on their operations in preparation for a prospective sign up. I'm Bob Hoff and that's the Northwest Farm and Ranch Report on the Northwest Ag Information Network.