July 10, 2018

Dialogue with Daryl

Topic: Issues

July 10, 2018: NDFB has a long-standing policy opposing perpetual easements, so we're concerned that the Senate version of the farm bill provides for billions to roll expiring CRP acreage into permanent easements.

Download the NDFB is opposed to perpetual easements mp3

Read the transcript:

Both versions of the farm bill have now been passed. The House passed theirs first, followed by the Senate passing theirs. Instead of trying to focus on everything that’s contained in both of those bills, we want to talk about one aspect of the Senate farm bill. That is, the addition of 1.8 billion dollars over the next 10 years for permanent easements on expiring CRP contracts. Yes, 1.8 billion with a “b” dollars over the next 10 years for expiring CRP to be enrolled in to a permanent easement.

Here at NDFB, we are opposed to perpetual or permanent easements, and believe they should be restricted to at least only one generation, so that we do not tie the hands of future generations, future land use, future needs of our communities, our state and our country.

People have to be allowed to adapt. They must be allowed to manage their property as they need and as they see fit.

We don’t know what the future holds regarding agriculture. Look at the technological advances we have made in the last 50 years, especially in the last 10 to 20 years, of how we’ve taken marginally productive land and made it more productive with less inputs to supply the needed nutrition, the food that our state and our country and our world needs.

So, to think that a permanent easement that ties up the land, restricts its uses, gives the government control over the individuals that own it, to think that is a good thing is a misguided concept.

We hope that this provision gets removed in the conference committee. We hope that our senators and our congressman work hard to make sure that there’s no more new money and new permanent easement programs created in the farm bill.

Take the 1.8 billion out, use it as a savings or put it into a program that is needed. We feel that government controlling land, whether it’s owning it or controlling it through an easement and telling you what to do, is poor policy. Leave land ownership and land decisions up to the individual. Let that freedom, opportunity and self-reliance shine through, that makes our great country