Making Conservation Practices more Cost Effective

Making Conservation Practices more Cost Effective

Author: Darrell Bosch

Numerous studies support improving the effectiveness of pollution control efforts by targeting them to areas with the most potential to reduce the pollutant(s) at the least cost. Targeting can involve the selection of practices to be supported as well as the types and locations of farms where practice subsidies will be awarded. For example, some farms in the Chesapeake Bay watershed have higher potential to deliver pollutant loadings to the Bay due to their proximity to the Bay. Subsidies to reduce loadings on such farms will be more cost effective compared to subsidies awarded to similar farms located further from the Bay which deliver proportionately less of their pollution to the Bay (Xu et al. 2020).

Targeting can also involve the selection of practices that achieve pollution reduction at lowest cost. For example, conservation practices on working land may be more cost effective than land retirement in reducing nutrient pollution. Working lands practices include reduced tillage, cover crops, nutrient management, and enhanced nutrient management, which involves subsidizing farmers to reduce nutrient applications below agronomic recommendations (Chesapeake Bay Commission, 2004). Idling land may result in other land being brought into agricultural production. As a result, the effective amount of land retired is less than intended, a phenomenon called slippage. Slippage reduces the total amount of pollution reduction achieved by land retirement, which raises the cost of nutrient reduction. Hu et al. (2024) found for a given government budget expenditure, that enhanced nutrient management reduced nitrogen loadings by a greater amount than land retirement.

References:

Chesapeake Bay Commission. 2004. Cost-Effective Strategies for the Bay: 6 Smart Investments for Nutrient and Sediment Reduction. December. Available from: https://www.chesbay.us/library/public/documents/Cost-Reports/cost-effective.pdf

Hu, C., D.J. Bosch, and W. Zhang. 2024 Extensive vs. Intensive Margin Approach of N Load Reduction from Agriculture: Implications for Chesapeake Bay Watershed. Chesapeake Community Research Symposium. Annapolis, Maryland. June 10-12, 2024.

Xu, Y., Bosch, D.J., Wagena, M.B., Collick, A.S., and Easton, Z.M. Reducing Nitrogen Control Costs by Within- and Cross-county Targeting. Journal of Environmental Management. 263(June 2020) 110333. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvman.2020.110333