1990 Farm Bill Forum 



Proceedings 



Montana Salinity Control 

 Association 

 Jane Holier 



Program Director 



The Montana Salinity Control Association is a 

 program that represents 33 conservation 

 districts in eastern Montana counties. We'd like 

 the farm program to move more toward a 

 conservation-oriented or incentive-based 

 program and away from production subsidies. 



Salinity results in the loss of cropland and 

 production. This problem affects over 300,000 

 acres in Montana and is important to individu- 

 als with damaged land. On a national scale, 

 salinity is not as large a problem. However, the 

 slow degradation of the groundwater and 

 surface water problems in the Northern Great 

 Plains are beginning to affect the public at large, 

 as well as downstream users. I think that is why 

 we'll get more attention on salinity control. 



The answer to salinity control is to build peren- 

 nial crop rotations into the farm program so 

 that producers will be willing to adopt, and 

 never be penalized later for having forages in 

 their rotations. We need the long-term forage 

 rotation because of the extended growing 

 season. Forages grow early in the spring and 

 throughout the season into the fall when none 

 of the other annual crops will do that. Also, 

 forages are deeper rooted, therefore, use more 

 soil water and all the annual precipitation. 



There are two major problems with having just 

 a voluntary salinity control program. The first 

 one is that with forages and other alternative 

 crops operators have limited or reduced 

 income. Since there are no subsidies either and 

 usually no disaster payments, they're depend- 

 ent on a cash crop and become reluctant to 

 incorf)orate them into their normal rotation. 

 There are some things you might want to 

 address in the farm bill. One would be to add 

 some program benefits and /or a subsidy to 

 those crops or perhaps lower the subsidy for 

 grain so that they become more economically 

 comp>etitive. We'd like to see development of 

 markets for forage crops and our alternative 

 crops. We'd like to see research into the adapt- 



ability of alternative crops such as canola, 

 sunflowers, and the annual legumes. There are 

 limited research funds to address those at this 

 time, but we certainly have the need for it. 

 Many times when we need answers to those 

 things, we have to go to our Canadian neigh- 

 bors. 



We'd also like to see a continuity from one farm 

 program to the next. There is a fear among 

 landowners that they will lose their cropping 

 base if they put land into a long-term forage 

 program. 



We also have a problem v\ith land ownership 

 between recharge area and discharge areas. 

 When the individual owns only the recharge 

 area and not the discharge area, there is no 

 incentive for him to protect the water resource 

 nor reclaim his neighbor's saline seep. We'd 

 like to work with you to develop incentives so 

 they'd be willing to adopt those programs. Will 

 it become a carrot or a stick for non point source 

 pollution? We need voluntary incentive pro- 

 grams versus regulatory or punitive programs. 



You might consider changes in the CRP pro- 

 gram. Perhaps a shorter contract period, maybe 

 five to six years, would allow more flexibililty. 

 It would be easier to rotate small acreages of 

 crops. It could help with the stagnation 

 problem of the introduced species that we are 

 concerned about on CRP land as well as the 

 weeds, diseases, and insects. We'd also be 

 interested in managed CRP programs, perhaps 

 to allow limited grazing or haying and then 

 have a smaller annual payment. An example 

 would be winter grazing, or haying in years 

 that you have excess or abundant growth 

 because that's when the stagnation problem 

 would occur. Inroduced species that are not 

 clipped occasionally will not use all the mois- 

 ture that is available. We would encourage 

 deep-rooted legumes in CRP seed mixtures. 

 Since legumes require more managment, there 

 might be higher payments for managing them. 



We would suggest there be higher CRP pay- 

 ments for restoration of wetlands. These 

 wetlands are important because they are often 

 discharge areas for saline seeps when farmed. 

 They provide excellent wildlife habitat and are 



Montana Chaptar, Soil and Watar Conservation Society 



20 



August 28, 1888 



