Agricultural Management Assistance (AMA)

The Agricultural Management Assistance (AMA) helps agricultural producers manage financial risk through diversification, marketing or natural resource conservation practices. NRCS administers the conservation provisions while Agricultural Marketing Service and Risk Management Agency implement the production diversification and marketing provisions.

How It Works:

Producers may construct or improve water management structures or irrigation structures; plant trees for windbreaks or to improve water quality; and mitigate risk through production diversification or resource conservation practices, including soil erosion control, integrated pest management, or transition to organic farming.

AMA is available in 16 states where participation in the Federal Crop Insurance Program is historically low: Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Utah, Vermont, West Virginia, and Wyoming.

Program At A Glance:

• AMA provides financial assistance up to 75 percent of the cost of installing conservation practices.

• Total AMA payments shall not exceed $50,000 per participant for any fiscal year.

• Participants are not subject to Highly Erodible Land and Wetland Conservation provisions of the Food Security Act of 1985.

• Participants are subject to Adjusted Gross Income provisions of the Food Security Act of 1985.

• AMA offers an additional higher cost-share for historically underserved producers.

Producers must:

• Be engaged in livestock or agricultural production.

• Have an interest in the farming operation associated with the land being offered for AMA enrollment.

• Have control of the land for the term of the proposed contract.

• Be in compliance with the provisions for protecting the interests of tenants and sharecroppers, including the provisions for sharing AMA payments on a fair and equitable basis.

• Be within appropriate payment limitation requirements.

Land Eligibility:

• Land on which agricultural commodities or livestock are produced, such as cropland, hayland, pastureland, rangeland, and grassland.

• Land used for subsistence purposes, private non-industrial forestland, or other land on which agricultural products, livestock, or forest-related goods are produced.

• Land on which risk may be mitigated through operation diversification or change in resource conservation practices.

• AMA provides financial assistance up to 75 percent of the cost of installing conservation practices.

• Total AMA payments shall not exceed $50,000 per participant for any fiscal year.

• Participants are not subject to Highly Erodible Land and Wetland Conservation provisions of the Food Security Act of 1985.

• Participants are subject to Adjusted Gross Income provisions of the Food Security Act of 1985.

• AMA offers an additional higher cost-share for historically underserved producers.

Contact your local NRCS office to get apply.