Conservation Effects Assessment Project - Brochure

The importance of CEAP
Under the 2008 Farm Bill, Congress provided
more than $24 billion for the implementation
of conservation programs and practices on
private lands in the United States. A portion of
this was directed to the Chesapeake Bay Watershed Initiative to help restore the Chesapeake
Bay and its watershed. The information from
the 2011 NRI-CEAP survey will provide the
farming community, the general public, legislators, and others involved in environmental
policy with a current account of the environ mental impacts of the application of conservation practices throughout the watershed.

For more information or questions about the CEAP survey,
contact your local NASS Field
Office or visit www.nass.usda.gov:
Delaware
Maryland
New York
Pennsylvania
Virginia
West Virginia

2011
National Resources Inventory

(800) 282-8685
(800) 675-0295
(800) 821-1276
(800) 498-1518
(800) 772-0670
(800) 535-7088

To learn more about CEAP, visit www.nrcs.
usda.gov/technical/nri/ceap.

Conservation Effects Assessment Project
in the Chesapeake Bay Watershed

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U.S. Department of Agriculture · National Agricultural Statistics Service
Natural Resources Conservation Service

What is CEAP?
The 2011 National Resources Inventory (NRI) – Con servation Effects Assessment Project (CEAP) survey
collects information from farmers in the Chesapeake
Bay watershed about farming and conservation practices on cultivated cropland. Farmers installed many
agricultural management practices using publicly
available technical and financial assistance from conservation programs and through their own initiative
and at their own expense. Conservation practices
help farmers and rural communities in the Chesa peake Bay watershed maintain productive farmland,
protect the environment and restore the health of
the Chesapeake Bay.
The information collected through the CEAP survey
is vital to help determine what resources farmers
may need to further protect the soil, water and habitat in the Chesapeake Bay watershed and to document on-farm conservation accomplishments.

How is CEAP
conducted?

Why participate in CEAP?
The survey will capture producers’ current
farming and management practices, including
conservation practices designed to help protect
soil and water resources. The survey will pro vide a complete picture of conservation practices in the Chesapeake Bay watershed. This
information will be used to maintain, modify
and improve programs that assist farmers in
planning and installing on-farm conservation
practices.
Maintaining conservation programs in the
United States benefits producers by protecting
the environment upon which their livelihoods
depend. The programs provide financial incentives such as rental payments and cost-sharing
incentives to offset the cost of installing
conservation practices. USDA conservation programs currently benefiting farmers include:
 Agricultural Management Assistance
 Agricultural Water Enhancement Program
 Chesapeake Bay Watershed Initiative
 Conservation Reserve
Enhancement Program
 Conservation Reserve Program
 Conservation Stewardship Program
 Environmental Quality Incentives Program
 Wetlands Reserve Program
 Wildlife Habitat Incentive Program
In addition to these and other federal programs, assistance is available from state agencies and nonprofit organizations. Also, many
farmers install conservation practices without
public incentives or assistance.

USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service
(NASS) last conducted
on-farm interviews for
CEAP in the Chesapeake
Bay watershed in 2006.
Since that time, area
farmers have continued
to install many on-farm
best management practices. Collecting this up dated information helps
document the prevalence of conservation
practices and provides
the base from which to
strengthen conservation
planning, implementation and management.
NASS representatives
will visit more than
1,500 farms in the
Chesapeake Bay watershed from November
2011 through January
2012 to collect information on farm production
practices; chemical, fertilizer and manure applica tions; integrated pest management; and installed
conservation practices. Respondents are guaranteed
by law (Title 7, U.S. Code and CIPSEA, Public Law
107-347) that their individual information will be
kept confidential.
USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service will
combine the data collected with information from
its hydrologic, climate and soil databases to esti
mate environmental and management conditions
for the Chesapeake Bay watershed.