About 25 percent of the land in the Chesapeake Bay watershed is dedicated to agriculture. While fertilizers, pesticides, manure and tilled soil are beneficial to crops, they become pollutants when water from irrigation and precipitation washes them into local waterways.
Bay Program partners are working with farmers to help control pollution from the watershed’s 8.5 million acres of farmland. Farmers are utilizing conservation practices such as nutrient management plans, cover crops, vegetative buffers, conservation tillage, and animal manure and poultry litter controls.
Learn more about agriculture and reducing pollution from agriculture.
Implement enhanced pollution controls on agricultural land in the watershed portions of Delaware, Maryland, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia and the District of Columbia to correct the nutrient- and sediment-related problems in the Bay and its tidal tributaries by 2010.
Long-term trend (since 1985)
- The agricultural nitrogen pollution controls score increased from 0 percent to 50.3 percent of goal achieved.
- The agricultural phosphorus pollution controls score increased from 0 percent to 49 percent of goal achieved.
- The agricultural sediment pollution controls score increased from 0 percent to 47.7 percent of goal achieved.
Short-term trend (10-year trend)
Between 1999-2008:
- The agricultural nitrogen pollution controls score increased from 31.8 percent to 50.3 percent of goal achieved.
- The agricultural phosphorus pollution controls score increased from 37.1 percent to 49 percent of goal achieved.
- The agricultural sediment pollution controls score increased from 32.4 percent to 47.7 percent of goal achieved.
Change from previous year (2007-2008)
- The agricultural nitrogen pollution controls score increased from 48 percent to 50.3 percent of goal achieved.
- The agricultural phosphorus pollution controls score decreased from 50.8 percent to 49 percent of goal achieved.
- The agricultural sediment pollution controls score did not change (47.5 percent in 2007 and 47.7 percent in 2008).
Reducing Pollution
The states in the Chesapeake Bay watershed and the District of Columbia have developed strategies for reducing pollution in their jurisdictions. Progress is measured by using the most up-to-date monitoring and tracking data gathered by Bay Program partners. Computer simulations are used to estimate the amount of pollution control efforts implemented in relation to the commitments made by the Bay jurisdictions in their cleanup strategies.
Agricultural Pollution Controls Indicator
These estimates do not account for efforts that cannot be tracked, such as best management practices installed voluntarily by private landowners without the use of public funds. While no pollution reduction can be attributed to these private efforts, they will still contribute to the overall improvement of water quality.
Best Management Practices (BMPs)
Farmers employ dozens of conservation practices -- also known as best management practices or BMPs -- to reduce the amount of pollution reaching local waters and the Bay. A variety of BMPs are being used:
- Nutrient and animal waste management on agricultural lands are particularly effective at reducing nitrogen and phosphorus loads.
- Conservation tillage and the use of fencing to keep livestock out of streams are examples of practices being used successfully to reduce sediment loads.
In part because they are so cost-effective, the Bay jurisdictions are relying on expanded implementation of BMPs on agricultural lands for more than half of the remaining nutrient reductions needed to meet water quality restoration goals.
Jeff Sweeney at 800-968-7229 ext. 844
Chesapeake Bay Program Office