The Du Quoin accounting firm of Emling & Hoffman today advised Perry County-area farmers of an important change in reporting Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) payments on your 2014 income tax returns.
The IRS, for the last few years, has been treating CRP payments as self employment income. The tax court has ruled that the CRP payments operate similar to soil bank payments made to persons who didn’t operate or materially participate in farming operations. The taxpayer contended that CRP payments were rentals from farm real estate. The tax court agreed with the taxpayer. Farmers should report CRP payments received as farm rental income on their 2014 income tax return, and consider amending prior years returns to receive refunds if applicable.
The Conservation Reserve Program is a cost-share and rental payment program under the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA).
The CRP encourages farmers to convert highly erodible cropland or other environmentally sensitive acreage to vegetative cover, such as cultivated or native bunchgrasses and grasslands, wildlife and pollinators food and shelter plantings, windbreak and shade trees, filter and buffer strips, grassed waterways, and riparian buffers.
