MINNEAPOLIS — The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced $328 million in funding Monday to protect and restore farmlands, grasslands and wetlands across the country.

The initiative, using money provided in the new five-year farm bill, will buy conservation easements from farmers to protect the environment, help wildlife populations and promote outdoor recreation, the USDA said in its announcement. The agency selected 380 projects nationwide covering 32,000 acres of prime farmland, 45,000 acres of grasslands and 52,000 acres of wetlands.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack told reporters on a conference call that the agency received more than 1,450 applications totaling $546 million worth of requests covering 345,000 acres. He said the projects selected cover 129,000 acres, with 60 percent being farmland and grassland and 40 percent wetlands.

“Obviously this is a popular program,” Vilsack said, adding that other assistance may be available for the projects that weren’t selected and that backers of those proposals can try again next year.

The USDA said some of this year’s projects will improve water quality and wetland storage capacity in the heavily agricultural California Bay Delta region east of San Francisco Bay and south of Sacramento.