Many North Dakota livestock producers are being left high and dry when they try to apply to hay or graze the 24 million Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) acres released by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) in May through its critical feed use program. Many had inquired about signing up weeks ago, but were told to hold off, since local Farm Service Agency (FSA) offices had not received the appropriate forms from the federal office.
That wasn't a concern until a U.S. district court judge entered a permanent injunction against the CRP release last week, after the National Wildlife Federation sued the agency over the program. The judge did, however, make several exceptions to the permanent in-junction to help livestock producers who are reliant on CRP for forage this year. He ruled that there will be no cap on eligible acres for haying and grazing, and producers whose con-tracts had already been modified and approved for critical feed use could proceed with haying and grazing, as per their state requirements.
He also ruled that all applications to hay or graze CRP acres that were filed but not ap-proved before the July 8 restraining order will now be processed, but those producers will be subject to shorter usage periods.
Those exceptions help, but the producers who are being left out are those who tried to ap-ply for the program but weren't able to, since the county FSA offices didn't have the appro-priate paperwork to sign them up. In fact, less than 400 livestock producers in North Dakota were able to sign up.
"USDA should have been better prepared when it unveiled this program and communi-cated its plans to its field offices, as well as agricultural and wildlife interests," said North Dakota Stockmen's Association (NDSA) President Mark Huseth. "There was confusion at the county level, and each office handled the situation differently."
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Huseth admits that the agency's intentions, to help livestock producers deal with forage shortages, were good when it launched the program, but poor planning botched it up for many of those who really needed it.
The one chance those producers do have yet is if they can document a reliance on the critical feed usage program, as well as an investment of more than $4,500 in haying equip-ment. If they can, they will be allowed to submit new applications, the judge ordered.
Huseth said he is the most frustrated with the National Wildlife Federation's suit and the impasse it caused even before the judge's decision came in. "It's too bad that the Wildlife Federation had to resort to a lawsuit over this," Huseth said. "Agriculture and wildlife in-terests could have come to terms much better by sitting across the table from one another and hammering out any differences. Our goals are not that different. We both want what is the best for the land and the animals."
The NDSA is urging USDA to approve emergency haying after Aug. 1 for the original 26 North Dakota counties in the disaster declaration, plus any others that may now qualify. "This would be a start in correcting some of the problems livestock producers are facing in securing CRP forage in this disaster year," Huseth said.
The NDSA will also ask the State FSA office to inform the U.S. district court judge of the application problems producers had and petition him to reconsider his order in light of the new information.
