The Senate Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry Committee advanced the Agricultural Act of 2026, a major step toward updating conservation programs that will impact wildlife habitat and hunting and fishing access. 

Today, the Senate Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry Committee advanced the Agricultural Act of 2026 on a party line vote – bringing us closer to a comprehensive ag policy update than we have been since 2018.   A lot has happened in agricultural conservation policy since then. Key programs have been extended and received major funding boosts, first through the Inflation Reduction Act and then made permanent in the Working Families Tax Cut Act, also known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. But without a Farm Bill, there has been no opportunity to improve the underlying structure that makes these programs work.

“It has been far too long since the Farm Bill conservation programs that fish, wildlife, hunters, anglers, and farmers depend on were updated. We’re grateful to Chairman Boozman, Ranking Member Klobuchar, and members on both sides of the aisle who are working to advance positive updates to these critical programs.” said Aaron Field, TRCP’s director of private lands conservation. “This is a significant step, but there is still a lot of work to do and very little time to do it. Despite that challenge, we encourage bipartisan commitment to passing a Farm Bill that works for sportsmen, sportswomen, and working lands alike.” 

Before we summarize some key provisions of this bill, there are a few important dynamics to keep in mind:  

With that in mind, what’s actually in this bill? Farm Bills cover a wide range of issues – from nutrition assistance and agricultural research to trade, risk management, and livestock disease. Here, we focus on the provisions most likely to affect habitat and access for hunters and anglers. 

Conservation Provisions in The Agricultural Act of 2026 would:

Shift Funding Among Title II Programs 

This bill has been informally called “Farm Bill 2.0”, in recognition that many priorities were accomplished through the budget reconciliation process last summer. As part of that package, Congress made the remaining conservation funding from the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act permanent. This represented a major investment in Title II programs and shifted the balance among several programs, particularly the Regional Conservation Partnership Program (RCPP) and the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP). However, Chairman Thompson’s team has consistently stated their intention to reallocate those resources to support policy improvements and new programs in this Farm Bill. Priority programs differ among members of the hunting and fishing community—and even more among the broader ag conservation community—but TRCP’s focus throughout this process has been ensuring that conservation funding remains conservation funding, and this bill meets that criterion. 

Reauthorize and Improve the Conservation Reserve Program 

The Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) is one of the most well-known and important conservation programs that USDA administers. The House-passed Farm Bill would simply reauthorize CRP in its current form. The Senate bill makes much more impactful changes, many of which come directly from the CRP Improvement and Flexibility Act.  By increasing payment limitations, restoring cost share for mid-contract management, and reaching a compromise on emergency haying, this bill would make CRP more attractive to landowners and more valuable to wildlife. 

Support Voluntary Conservation Easement Programs

This bill would have substantial impacts on conservation easement programs. One of the most significant is the creation of a new Forest Conservation Easement Program with mandatory funding filling a gap in current easement opportunities and supporting working forest conservation. The bill also makes several adjustments that expand management opportunities on new and existing wetland easements, helping ensure these wetlands continue to provide quality habitat for generations. Additionally, this bill would expand access to easement programs by exempting them from adjusted gross income (AGI) eligibility limits and eliminating their payment limitation. 

Simplify the Regional Conservation Partnership Program 

The Regional Conservation Partnership Program (RCPP) has tremendous potential to deliver conservation in innovative, partnership-driven ways, but the program has long been hampered by barriers that frustrated partners and limited its impact.  This bill returns the RCPP to an earlier structure that connects projects to “covered programs” like EQIP.  It also aims to shorten approval timelines and reimburse partner administrative expenses. While the covered program model has both advantages and drawbacks, efforts to streamline the RCPP are welcome, as is the addition of wildlife corridors and habitat connectivity to the program’s purposes. 

Encourage Habitat Connectivity Across Programs

In addition to the language within RCPP, the bill encourages the Secretary of Agriculture to “encourage the use of conservation practices that support the development, restoration, and maintenance of habitat connectivity and wildlife corridors” in all conservation programs. The impact of this provision will vary depending on the priorities of any given Secretary but given the importance of corridors for species like Western big game, the direction is encouraging.  

This bill also reiterates Ag Committee support for big game migration by codifying USDA’s authority for the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP) and Grassland CRP to work together on the same operation. This will improve the wildlife value of both programs, and builds upon the success of the Migratory Big Game Initiative. 

Leave Access Funding Unchanged 

For years, the TRCP has been advocating for increased Voluntary Public Access and Habitat Incentive Program (VPA-HIP) funding. The Voluntary Public Access Improvement Act, led by Senator Steve Daines (R-Mont.) and Senate Ag Committee members Senator Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) and Senator Marshall (R-Kan.) would have met that mark but is not currently included in the Senate Farm Bill. Fortunately, VPA-HIP received $70 million over seven years in the Working Families Tax Cut Act, also known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act last summer. While important, that funding level is unlikely to expand the program’s impact.  

Strengthen Tools for Enhancing Forest and Watershed Health 

The bill provides or strengthens several tools aimed at improving forest health and watershed function, with benefits for water quality, fish and wildlife, and resilience to wildfire and drought. Notable provisions include reauthorization of the U.S. Forest Service’s Water Source Protection Program and improving the Watershed Condition Framework, expanded use of good neighbor agreements, and additional improvements to watershed health and drinking water sources within the Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Program. 

There are many other provisions in this bill that we will continue to follow, and there is still a long road before its impacts are felt on the ground. The TRCP thanks both House and Senate Agriculture Committee leadership for their work toward a bipartisan Farm Bill that supports habitat and access. 

You can help. Conservation is, and should be, a shared priority regardless of party affiliation or ideology. Congress needs to hear that this is important to you. Take action here. 

Top photo: @NickMKE on Flickr.

The Hunter & Angler’s Guide to the Farm Bill

We know it can be challenging to break through the alphabet soup of program acronyms to understand why the reauthorization and improvement of Farm Bill conservation programs is a top priority. In The Hunter & Anglers Guide to the Farm Bill, we demystify the Farm Bill and the crucial conservations programs that sportsmen and women should care about.