AMES — Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Mike Naig announced a new state-funded conservation cost-share pilot project supporting farmers and landowners in the watersheds upstream from the Des Moines and Cedar Rapids metropolitan areas. The Streamside Buffer Initiative encourages farmers and landowners living in these priority watersheds to add perennial buffers to fields along streams to prevent nutrients from entering these important source water areas. The Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship is initially allocating $3 million from the state’s Water Quality Initiative fund to support this pilot project.
Naig announced the pilot project during the Conservation Districts of Iowa Annual Meeting in Ames.
This state-funded cost-share initiative is intended to be more flexible than existing federal cost-share programs to encourage even more farmers and landowners to participate…