Land and Natural Resources

U.S. land area amounts to 2.26 billion acres, with over half or nearly 1.2 billion acres in agricultural uses. The share of the land base in agricultural use declined from 59 percent in 1959 to 53 percent in 2017, the latest year for which comprehensive national data are available. Gradual declines have occurred in cropland, while grazed forestland has decreased more rapidly. In 2017, 390 million acres of agricultural land were in cropland (a 15-percent decline from 1959); 659 million acres were in grassland pasture and range (4 percent more than in 1949); 132 million acres were in grazed forestland (46 percent less than in 1959); and 6 million acres were in farmsteads and farm roads (47 percent less than in 1959). Urban land, while it represents a relatively small share of the U.S. land base, has nearly tripled in area since 1959 to 74 million acres.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency estimated that the agricultural sector, including its electricity consumption, accounted for 10.5 percent of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions in 2022. Globally, carbon dioxide emissions are the largest contributor to climate change. However, the emissions profile for agriculture differs from that of the overall economy. In agriculture, crop and livestock activities emit nitrous oxide and methane, mainly from fertilizer application, enteric fermentation (a normal digestive process in animals that produces methane), and manure storage and management. Between 1990 and 2022, estimated greenhouse gas emissions from the U.S. agricultural sector have increased by approximately 5.1 percent. During the same period, estimated total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions have declined by 3.0 percent.

USDA provides financial and technical assistance to agricultural producers through voluntary conservation programs to address natural resource concerns. While the 2002 and 2008 Farm Acts each increased conservation spending, the 2014 and 2018 Farm Acts held total budgeted spending largely level, at an average of between $6.0 and $6.5 billion per year in 2023 dollars. Actual spending (shown in the chart) has varied more year to year. Current major funded USDA programs include the Regional Conservation Partnership Program, which assists partners addressing problems on a regional or watershed scale through methods including land retirement, easements, and conservation practices. The Agricultural Conservation Easement Program provides long-term or permanent easements for preservation of wetlands and the protection of agricultural land from commercial or residential development. The Conservation Stewardship Program provides 5-year contracts that pay producers to maintain or expand existing conservation activities. The Environmental Quality Incentives Program provides financial assistance to farmers to employ conservation practices, such as conservation tillage, and planting cover crops. The Conservation Reserve Program provides 10‒15-year contracts that pay producers to restrict agricultural land use in ways that promote ecosystem services. This chart does not include funding provided under the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), which provided additional funding for several major conservation programs. Estimated IRA spending totaled approximately $3.1 billion in fiscal year 2024 and enacted IRA funding totaled approximately $5.7 billion in fiscal year 2025.

USDA’s Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) covered about 22.9 million acres of environmentally sensitive land at the end of fiscal 2023, with an annual budget of roughly $1.8 billion (making it USDA’s largest single conservation program in terms of spending at that time). Enrollees receive annual rental and other incentive payments for taking eligible land out of production for 10 years or more. Program acreage tends to be concentrated on marginally productive cropland that is susceptible to erosion by wind or rainfall. A large share of CRP land was in the Plains (from Texas to Montana), where rainfall is limited and much of the land is subject to potentially severe wind erosion. Smaller concentrations of CRP land were found in eastern Washington and Oregon, southern Iowa, northern Missouri, the Mississippi Delta, and southeastern Idaho and northwestern Utah.

Water resources consist of surface and groundwater sources that are withdrawn for agricultural, industrial, municipal, and other uses. The proportion of the water used by agriculture varies across the country, in part because agriculture in arid regions is less able to depend on precipitation for water needs. For instance, in the Pacific region from 2005 to 2015, agriculture used about 26 million acre feet of the 36 million acre feet used in an average year—about 72 percent. In contrast, in the High Plains (Kansas, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, and Texas) water for irrigation amounted to 19 million acre feet of the 43 million acre feet of all water withdrawn in an average year—about 44 percent.

Surface and groundwater are the two primary sources of water for irrigated agriculture. Groundwater is pumped from aquifers, while surface water is diverted from natural streams, rivers, and lakes. The reliance on each varies according to the resources available in different regions of the United States. Groundwater is the most common source of water applied for irrigation in the Mississippi Delta, Northern Plains, and Southern Plains regions. The prevalence of groundwater-fed irrigated agriculture in the Northern and Southern Plains relates to the regions’ historically abundant groundwater resources. The High Plains Aquifer (also known as the Ogallala Aquifer), is the largest aquifer in North America and underlies significant portions of the Plains regions. The Mississippi Delta region also has abundant groundwater resources that are relatively near the surface, making groundwater-based irrigation less expensive. In contrast, surface water is the most prevalent source in the Mountain and Pacific regions due to Federal, State, and local investments in water conveyance and storage infrastructure, and legal frameworks in these regions which grant water rights based on historical beneficial use rather than ownership of land along streams and rivers.