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Research Project: Towards Resilient Agricultural Systems to Enhance Water Availability, Quality, and Other Ecosystem Services under Changing Climate and Land Use

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Title: CEAP: Measuring and understanding the effects of conservation practices within watersheds

Author
item Moriasi, Daniel
item DURIANCIK, LISA - Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS, USDA)

Submitted to: Soil and Water Conservation Society Proceedings
Publication Type: Proceedings
Publication Acceptance Date: 4/11/2018
Publication Date: 7/31/2018
Citation: Moriasi, D.N., Duriancik, L. 2018. CEAP: Measuring and understanding the effects of conservation practices within watersheds. In: 73rd SWCS International Annual Conference, July 29-August 1, 2018, Albuquerque, New Mexico. p. 38.

Interpretive Summary: Abstract only

Technical Abstract: The USDA spends about $5 billion per year on agricultural conservation programs in order to help producers and land owners implement good conservation practices (CPs) and systems on their land. In 2003, the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service entered into partnership with USDA Agricultural Research Service and many other partners to create the Conservations Effects Assessment Project (CEAP) to quantify the environmental effects of CPs and programs and develop the science base for managing the agricultural landscape for environmental quality. Over the last 15 years, research has been conducted to test the effectiveness of CPs at various spatial scales based on data collected, archived, and analyzed from CEAP watershed studies. Efforts to communicate with scientists, practitioners, and policymakers the findings of CEAP Watersheds on what CPs work and the temporal and spatial scales at which they work in various climatic and land management sites across the country are on-going. Major findings of the ARS Benchmark CEAP-Watershed Assessment Studies and other watersheds will be presented in the proposed half-day symposium. The findings will focus on highlighting the measured effects of conservation at different scales, with a particular interest in watershed or sub-watershed effects but to include Edge-of-Field (EOF) effects. Where measured effects are not able to be highlighted, particularly at larger scales, the results of a review of previously published effects of CPs or modeled results in a given study site will be presented. Both observational and modeling findings will be presented. One research paper will focus on the findings of rangeland CEAP assessment and another on conservation tools that have been developed. Other special topics to be presented include papers on: 1) quantifying the impact of STEWARDS database data; 2) describing model improvements as a result of CEAP; and 3) discussing the future direction of CEAP in the next decade.