In 2021, the Biden administration put a new twist on an old program that pays farmers to keep land out of production and plant grass instead: Pay them a little more to reduce greenhouse gas emissions at the same time.
The future of that initiative — a climate-smart incentive that’s now part of the Conservation Reserve Program — is one of many climate-focused programs around agriculture that face an uncertain future if Donald Trump wins a second term as president Tuesday.
Advocates say they expect Trump to be much less receptive to tying agriculture policies to climate change. Officials may even deny climate change is real or connected to human activity. But an incoming administration may have little choice but to keep the climate-smart agriculture trend going and just call it something else, they said.
The Conservation Reserve Program is one example. Even if an incoming Department of Agriculture quickly does away with the incentive payment, already-established CRP conservation practices like planting grass or trees and not tilling the soil for years at a time will hold down carbon emissions, said Ferd Hoefner, an agriculture consultant who specializes in conservation.
