The National Farm Stewardship Program

The National Farm Stewardship Program funds about 30 different types of BMPs, with several eligible activities within each BMP. Each province chooses the BMPs it wants to focus on and creates a provincial list of eligible BMPs for landowners to access. Landowners who have completed an EFP apply for the BMPs on their province’s list. Funding varies depending on the BMP and the province. For example, a BMP that deals with farmyard run-off can get 50 per cent funding from the federal government. Each producer has a cap of $30,000 to implement BMPs on their farm, says Cynthia Edwards, DUC’s manager of industry and government relations for the Prairie Western Boreal Region.

“Landowners can count their time and equipment use as part of their cost share,” says Edwards.

DUC has asked that four additional practices within BMPs be eligible for federal funding: restoring drained wetlands, wetland and riparian stewardship, the stewardship of native and natural lands, and modified annual cropping (winter wheat). Late last year wetland restoration was approved for federal funding as an eligible activity within an existing BMP. “This sets the stage for increased wetland restoration across Canada,” says Edwards.

“Wetland restorations are a very simple but very effective way to improve biodiversity,” says Cynthia Paszkowski, associate professor, University of Alberta. In 2001, a comprehensive study of small restored wetlands in Saskatchewan and Alberta showed that the diversity of wildlife, including wetland plants, was nearly identical to natural wetlands, Paszkowski says. “Lots more of these could have a big impact.”

The restorations were done on DUC property or lands which DUC leases and often involved little more than plugging a ditch to reflood a one- or two-acre area. “In many cases, these low-lying areas probably weren’t very productive for agriculture, but do provide societal benefits if restored to wetland” she says.

<< Page 5: Official MOU
Page 7: Value of restorations >>