Government Decision Making and Program Performance: The Case of the Conservation Reserve Program

Abstract

Abstract Performance of the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) in meeting the political preferences of its administrators is highly sensitive to the choice of eligibility, bid solicitation, and bid selection criteria used in making program implementation decisions. Decisions made in the first year of CRP implementation led to suboptimal results; net government cost could have been reduced while simultaneously increasing the extent to which erosion and supply control objectives were met. Simulation of the outcomes for a fully enrolled reserve under alternative implementation schemes indicates that future performance can be improved by manipulating key control variables to directly target preferences.