The Canadian Federal Government has also directly subsidized drainage 

 investment in Ontario. Drainage activity in Ontario peaked in the 1968-72 

 period, when a Federal initiative provided an additional one-third subsidy. More 

 recently, the Federal Government has subsidized drainage investment in eastern 

 Ontario through the Eastern Ontario Subsidiary Agreement. Subsidization of 

 drainage investment by the Federal Government has been the major determinant of 

 the level of drainage activity in the Province. Historically, 500-700 drains 

 have been constructed annually; but this rose to a peak of 1,200 drains per year 

 during the period when the Federal Government was effectively doubling the 

 Provincial subsidization rate of 33% (to 66%). 



Bardecki constructs an index that he calls the propensity to drain. The 

 index formula is 



PD = A"^ (W * C) 



Where PD is the propensity to drain index; W is the area of soils whose crop 

 production capacity is limited by excess soil moisture; C is the area of high 

 (crop) productivity soil; and A is total area. 



Mapping the PD index reveals that the greatest propensity to drain occurs 

 in the area of longest and greatest drainage activity, which is the extreme 

 southwestern part of the study area. The index mapping shows that the greatest 

 future wetland losses may occur in those areas that combine a higher than average 

 PD with large remaining wetland areas. Further analysis of the impact of 

 agricultural drainage on wetlands in the study area shows that wetlands are 

 typically drained after extensive initial drainage investment occurs. Moreover, 

 some wetlands are drained as an indirect consequence of the installation of 

 equipment whose primary purpose is to drain nonwetland areas. 



Bardecki concludes that wetlands preservation efforts in Ontario would be 

 aided by termination of Provincial subsidization of private drainage investment 

 by farmers. But despite the fact that wetland drainage is often an indirect 

 effect of drainage projects, he is not sanguine about the effect of preserving 

 wetlands through a project-by-project review system. Drainage will eventually 

 become a basinwide phenomenon, thereby rendering the review process ineffectual 

 unless (and until) the underlying economic forces generating on-farm drainage 

 investment dissipate. 



83. Dinan, K.F. 1988. Wetland protection in the rainwater basin of Nebraska. 

 Pages 65-67 in P.J. Stuber, coordinator. Proceedings of the national 

 symposium on protection of wetlands from agricultural impacts. U.S. Fish 

 and Wildlife Service Biological Report 88(16). Washington, DC. 



This paper faces a problem and issue that is ducked in much of the 

 economics and institutional literature on wetlands. A pervasive assumption in 

 this body of work is that imputing large preservation benefits to wetlands will 

 have the effect of slowing wetlands drainage and conversion. In the regulatory 

 arena, it is usually assumed that if the 404 permitting process were applicable 

 to on-farm wetlands, the regulatory process would provide a direct major 

 impediment to agricultural drainage of wetlands. Dinan asserts that drainage 

 of Nebraska's Rainwater Basin wetlands often involves 404 permit application. 



61 



