Reduced Tillage as an Economic Response to Clean Air Regulation

Arizona is the first state in the nation to regulate agricultural practices in order to reduce dust emissions near urbanizing areas. This BMP program requires dust mitigation actions in some combination of tillage and harvest, crop land, and non-crop land activities. Contingent valuation methods were used to estimate the willingness-to-adopt reduced tillage equipment. At $10-26 per acre in long-term net benefits associated with the BMP, adoption generates dust emission reductions on 10-35 percent of the cotton acreage. Most dust mitigation, however, will occur through the reduction of the number of conventional tillage operations and the urbanization of agricultural lands. (JEL Q15, 55)