The highly popular Environmental Quality Incentives Program would lose around $1 billion in budget authority over the next four fiscal years under the House Agriculture Committee's GOP farm bill draft, according to calculations by the Congressional Budget Office.
EQIP was essentially used as a funding source for other priorities in the legislation. The House Agriculture Committee had been scheduled to start debating the measure
Instead of raising EQIP’s budget authority to $2.85 billion in fiscal 2027 under the provisions of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act passed by Congress last year, the new farm bill would instead bring it to $2.53 billion that year.
Then, budget authority would gradually rise over the next few years until it settles at $3.2 billion in FY31, instead of reaching the $3.2 billion figure in FY28 as established in the OBBBA, the budget reconciliation bill used to enact President Donald Trump's legislative priorities last year.
When adjusting for budget sequestration, the program would lose $325 million in budget authority for FY27, $495 million in budget authority for FY28, $118 million in budget authority for FY29, and $75 million in budget authority for FY30, according to CBO estimates.
A GOP committee aide confirmed that the funding will be used to support other programs in the conservation title and pointed out that the adjusted baseline still represents a $1.5 billion increase for EQIP than what was proposed in the 2024 farm bill draft. They said this represents a roughly 54% increase in permanent baseline funds.
Budget authority would not change in the years following 2031.
Jonathan Coppess, a professor at the University of Illinois who noticed the lost funding in his own analysis of the bill, called the idea of making such a cut to EQIP “shocking.” He pointed out that the program’s popularity has led to oversubscription in recent years.
"Given this is one of the most oversubscribed programs in the conservation space, it's a strange one to cut,” he said.
Rebecca Bartels, the executive director of Invest In Our Land, echoed Coppess’s comments about oversubscription and said her group hopes that the funding is going toward other conservation programs that are “as productive for farmers on the ground.”
Among other conservation program funding changes, the bill would provide $227 million through 2031 to a new Forest Conservation Easement Program, when adjusting for sequestration. It would also increase funding by $11 million through 2031 for farm management incentive payments, $47 million through 2031 for transition options for certain farmers, and $68 million through 2036 for Agricultural Conservation Easement program adjusted gross income limits, according to the CBO estimates.
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