Slippage effects of land-based policies: Evaluating the Conservation Reserve Program using satellite imagery.

The Conservation Reserve Program ( CRP) is the largest land-based agricultural policy in the US. Several economic studies have studied this programme; however, only a few have studied its implications for non-enrolled land, that is, its regional effects on land use decisions. This paper examines the CRP's indirect effect on the conversion of non-agricultural land to agriculture, phenomenon known as land slippage. Building on earlier studies, I model county-level slippage empirically using satellite imagery, which allows observation of specific land cover changes (e.g., forest to agriculture). Results suggest the existence of CRP slippage, but at varying rates according to initial land covers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]