Three Rivers RC&D

We have been busy this year wrapping up enrollments for the Productive Conservation on Working Lands Crop Establishment Program. With a last minute push for this summer’s planting season we enrolled a new batch of projects bringing us to within 160 acres of our goal of 1000 acres. These new projects are being established on formerly row cropped land and will not only sequester carbon in the soil, but will also improve the availability of many native grasses and forbs. This will help make future prairie restorations in Minnesota more diverse and affordable.

Our cooperators are finishing up work on the field demonstrations and market studies for PCWL as well. I have received preliminary reports on a couple of projects and it looks like we will have a lot of good information to share with Minnesota producers growing perennial conservation crops.

There have been several developments in the biomass marketing arena this year. Biomass Crop Assistance Program has announced availability of funds. While this program excludes some sources of biomass in plants using a combination of biomass and fossil fuels, we hope this program will help stimulate the bio-energy industry and help these perennial crops to become competitive with traditional row crops on marginal and ecologically sensitive land.

Also in a post from the Minnesota Project, they detail the newly formed Office of Ecosystem Services and Markets. Just the fact there is an acknowledgment of the ecosystem services provided by the agricultural sector is a step in the right direction. Unless we can realistically value these services provided by farmers, there is little economic incentive to implement some of these conservation practices. While quantifying the value of these services will likely prove difficult, the important first step is to acknowledge clean water and productive soils hold economic value to society.