The Role of NRCS in Rangeland Management

Remarks by Bruce I. Knight, Chief, Natural Resources Conservation Service,
at the Society for Range Management Annual Meeting
Casper, WY
February 2, 2003

Thank you, Clarke (McClung). Good morning, everyone. I am happy to be here
with you today to discuss the role of the Natural Resources Conservation
Service in Range Management.

I always enjoy talking about range management issues, because I come from a
range background. I may spend most of my time in Washington, DC, but my
heart and my land is in South Dakota.

I grew up in South Dakota, and I get out there to my ranch as often as I can
especially during calving and pheasant seasons. I know how strong the
environmental ethic is among people who live and work on the range. That is
part of why it is such an honor for me to be the Chief of the NRCS and to
be here with you today.

The roles of the Society for Range Management and NRCS fit together quite
nicely, which is the reason so many of our employees and partners are
members of the Society. It is important that our employees be active in
professional organizations such as the Society.

We are proud that NRCS employees are pursuing leadership positions in the
Society, and we will provide the support that we can to assist them in being
effective leaders. Angela Williams, an NRCS district conservationist from
Oklahoma, has been elected Second Vice President. Jeff Burwell, state
resource conservationist from Colorado, has been elected to the board of
directors.
Others serve on national committees and at the chapter and section levels.

I would like to take just a moment to congratulate the Society on your
efforts to achieve a higher profile in the formation of national policies
for rangeland management. In looking at the farm bill, it is easy to see
that you were successful in getting range management issues onto the table
and into the law.

Thanks to your hard work, rangeland management concerns are better addressed
in almost every program covered in the farm bill. I congratulate you, and I
invite you to continue providing input as we formulate the rules to
implement the conservation title of the farm bill.

My assigned discussion topic for today is The Role of the Natural Resources
Conservation Service in Rangeland Management. What Id like to do is give
you a brief overview of our role in rangeland management, and spend my
remaining time talking about some of the things we are doing right now to
help improve rangeland management.

Helping Others Manage their Land

Our role in rangeland management is different from that of any other Federal
agency: unlike other Federal agencies, we do not manage any land. The
Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management manage millions of acres of
Federal land, including rangeland. Instead, we work with other people who
own, operate, and manage land.

Our customers are private landowners and managers, State land mangers, and
Tribal land managers. Our customers manage millions of acres of non-federal
land, including rangeland. We work with these landowners and land managers
to help them make informed decisions.

As you all know here in the West, private and public lands are often
interspersed, which requires us to understand federal and State management
issues and work with a variety of land management agencies.

We also administer a variety of programs that help landowners and managers
offset some of the costs of implementing conservation practices on their
lands.

Our work is local, on-farm in nature, with most of the decisions being made
locally as a part of ongoing conservation partnerships. We have NRCS
offices in most counties. These NRCS offices work closely with county-level
conservation districts, which are established under state law. We also are
also involved with State conservation agencies, State departments of
agriculture, various offices within Tribal governments, conservation groups,
professional societies, and others.

We are proud to be partners in conservation with the Society for Range
Management.


Providing Technical Assistance

Within NRCS, our primary objectives are to provide landowners and land
managers with technical assistance for voluntary application of resource
conservation. We work one-on-one with landowners who seek our assistance,
assessing their resource needs and advising them on resource solutions.
Landowners have come to value our technical service.

The new farm bill includes a provision for us to rely more on private
sector, non-government organizations, and State and Tribal governments to
provide technical assistance and deliver
conservation practices. Members of the Society are going to play an
important part in providing these services. In fact, in a few minutes, I
will be signing a Memorandum of Understanding outlining how NRCS and the
Society will work together in providing technical services.

Im sure your members who become technical service providers will do
everything they can to build and sustain the trust of landowners.


A Science-Based Agency

We have gained the trust of landowners because they know NRCS technical
assistance is based on the latest scientific information, much of it
developed in cooperation with our nations leading universities.

We are continuing the cooperative development of Ecological Site
Descriptions (ESDs) on rangelands. ESDs build on the earlier work of plant
community classification and are supported by the Societys Unity in
Concepts working group findings.

We will continue working with federal, state, and local agencies, the
university and research community, professional organizations, and
landowners to ensure that ESDs are scientifically sound and will meet the
challenges of tomorrow.

Our National Resource Inventory and Soil Survey provide the latest
information on the condition of our natural resources. We are making soil
survey data available in digital form. Last fiscal year, we mapped soils or
updated soil maps for more than 22 million acres. We provided nearly 300
soil surveys in digital format.

We realize that much of the land without soil surveys is rangeland,
particularly in the West. We are working with land management agencies to
find ways to fund the work. We hope that by working together, we can get
these surveys done.

Our SnoTel and and ScanMaster data produce accurate soil moisture and
snow-pack data for predicting moisture conditions. Last year, we
established a web site to monitor drought conditions around the country.
The site provided up-to-date information for land managers and decision
makers. Those of you who watched the 2002 Winter Olympics may have seen
snow data from our monitoring sites in Utah.

Our Plant Materials Centers produce plants well suited for a variety of
climate and soil conditions. Last year we released 29 plants for
conservation, and our PLANTS database on the web had nearly 2 million
customers.

Our standards for conservation practices are based on the latest scientific
information from a variety of sources.

Our Grazing Lands Technology Institute leads the acquisition of new
technologies, such as NUTBAL.

And we are developing and testing new science-based tools, such as SOLIM, a
computer system for capturing expert knowledge of soil and landscape
interactions.

These and other tools provide the scientific basis for our technical
assistance.

With the increased emphasis on conservation in the Farm Bill, we need better
ways of measuring the effects of practices. I know that some of you are
interested in this field and will be involved in developing these tools.

In summary, we start from the conservation needs and goals of our customers,
and use science-based solutions to help them reach their goals.


The 2002 Farm Bill

Congress and the American people have seen the value of conservation on
private lands and have funded a variety of conservation programs under the
farm bill to help reimburse landowners and managers for their conservation
efforts. While these programs do not drive our conservation efforts, they
serve as valuable tools.

There is a lot in the new farm bill to be excited about. It includes an
increase of $17.1 billion in conservation over ten years and that will
help do a lot of valuable conservation work on rangeland and farm land in
this country.

The farm bill also changes the emphasis of conservation programs from idling
environmentally sensitive land to promoting conservation on working lands.

Both in its size and its emphasis, the farm bill announces our entry into
what I call the next golden age of conservation. And the farm bill has
already produced results on the ground. Before the fiscal year ended last
September, we released nearly $750 million in farm bill money to producers.

The program that increased the most in the new farm bill is the
Environmental Quality Incentives Program EQIP. Its increase is $9 billion
over 10 years! Nine billion dollars will help many more livestock
producers and crop producers reach their conservation goals. And, for the
first time, 60% of that is designated for livestock producers.

Secretary Veneman announced last week at the cattle industry convention in
Nashville that we have completed the rule for EQIP. We will be working hard
over the next few weeks to inform producers and others of the contents of
the rule. The public comment period runs for 30 days from the date of
publication in the Federal Register. I hope you will make your views known,
so we can make any changes that may be needed to make the program operate
better for you.

The farm bill also provides resources for other conservation programs:
The Wildlife Habitat Incentives Program
The Farm and Ranch Land Protection Program
(And notice; that Ranch is now part of its name!)
The new Grassland Reserve Program --
The Wetlands Reserve Program
and
The new Conservation Security Program.
Even though the farm bill represents a major investment in conservation,
interest among produces is so strong, we will still have to set priorities.
Applications have been rolling in, and we now have backlogs for all our
conservation programs. That means we have to be more strategic in
implementing the new farm bill.

We need to reach out to all producers, including, minorities, women, and
first-time farmers. We need to make sure the applications we approve meet
local and national priorities. And, we need to leverage Federal dollars to
get the most conservation done. We will be working with producers and our
partners to develop other sources of funds that will leverage the Federal
dollar.

By being strategic, we will be able to serve all segments of the producer
community, help them work toward specific conservation goals, and stretch
the Federal dollar.

We look forward to working with the Society and all our conservation
partners to make the next golden age of conservation a reality. I am
especially looking forward to the Second National Grazing Lands Conference
coming up later this year in Nashville.

Thank you for your hard work in the Grazing Lands Conservation Initiative,
and for all you are doing to make the conference a reality. I look forward
to seeing you in Nashville.