The adoption of sustainable agriculture in West Tennessee under the Federal Agriculture Improvement and Reform Act of 1996 : economic and environmental implications

West Tennessee has accrued some of the nation's highest annual soil losses (per acre) due to soil erosion (United States Department of Agriculture, 1994). In 1995, more than two-thirds of the acreage planted to crops in Tennessee employed some type of conservation tillage (Tennessee Agricultural Statistics Service, 1995). This level of conservation tillage is more than a twenty percent increase in acreage that used some type of conservation tillage in 1990 (Tennessee Agricultural Statistics Service, 1995).

While erosion is the predominant environmental issue facing West Tennessee, other negative environmental externalities from agricultural production exist. Externalities like the contamination of groundwater through leaching may not be addressed by conservation tillage practices alone. One method of reducing the environmental impacts of agricultural production from current levels while maintaining the economic viability of farmers may be through the adoption of a site-specific set of alternative production practices.

This analysis estimates how the adoption of alternative practices by West Tennessee farmers may be affected by two markedly different farm policies. These estimates are used to test the hypothesis that decoupling commodity programs from production decisions encourages the adoption of more sustainable practices. This analysis simultaneously tests the hypothesis that a holistic approach to farm management results in a more economically and environmentally sustainable farm.

These estimates are accomplished by comparing the optimal solutions of a mathematical programming model of a West Tennessee representative farm. These solutions portray the farm-level economic and environmental impacts of adding alternative production practices to a set of initial practices under two farm policy regimes: the Food, Agriculture, Conservation and Trade Act of 1990 (FACTA) and the Federal Agricultural Improvement and Reform Act of 1996 (FAIR).

The results for this representative farm suggest that the base acreage requirements of FACTA form barriers to the adoption of alternative practices. Twenty percent more cropland is allotted to alternative production practices under FAIR provisions than FACTA provisions when annual erosion is held to less than or equal to 10 tons per acre. Thus, decoupling commodity programs from production decisions encourages the adoption of more sustainable practices. These results also suggest that soybeans and wheat acreage rather than com wiU replace cotton acreage. The availability of alternative practices, which prompt a shift away from cotton production may not be entirely detrimental to the wellbeing of West Tennessee farmers or society.

By comparing economic and environmental results of the scenarios at different erosion constraints, the holistic approach to farm management results in a more economically and environmentally sustainable farm. As a larger set of alternative/sustainable practices occur in the FAIR solution, the economic and environmental parameters improved on the whole compared with the FACTA solution. Thus, under the conditions set forth in this analysis, a holistic approach to farm management does indeed result in a more economically and environmentally sustainable farm.