Florida Ranchlands Environmental Services Project
| Article Index |
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| FRESP Overview |
| Vision |
| Partners |
| Funding |
| Accomplishments |
| Timeline |
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The Florida Ranchlands Environmental Services Project (FRESP) was launched in 2005 to design and field-test a program that would pay ranchers in the Northern Everglades for providing environmental services of water retention and phosphorus load reduction. Such a program would complement the public investment in regional water storage and water treatment facilities, and would provide ranchers, who face low profit margins and fluctuations in the price of beef, with another source of income. This program would create financial incentives for ranchers to increase the environmental services provided by their lands and encourage land to remain in ranching rather than be converted to more intensive agriculture and urban development/land uses, which would further aggravate the water problems of the Lake Okeechobee and the Everglades, and increase habitat losses.