The Northeast Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education (SARE) Program offers competitive grants to farmers, educators, service providers, researchers, nonprofit staff, graduate students and others to address key issues affecting the sustainability of agriculture throughout the region.
Donor Name: Northeast Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education (SARE)
State: Selected States
County: All Counties
Type of Grant: Grant
Deadline: 12/09/2025
Size of the Grant: $10,000 to $100,000
Grant Duration: 3 Years
Details:
The Northeast SARE Farmer Grant program provides funds to farmers to explore innovative concepts in sustainable agriculture conducted through experiments, surveys, prototypes, on-farm demonstrations or other research and education techniques.
The program encourages innovative solutions to challenges in farming and food systems in the Northeast USA, including but not limited to the areas of:
- Marketing and business
- Crop production
- Raising livestock
- Aquaculture
- Social sustainability
- Unconventional agriculture
- Traditional ecological knowledge
- and more.
Funding Information
Awards typically range from $5,000 to $30,000, depending upon a project’s complexity and duration.
Grant Period
Up to 3 years, starting March 1, 2026. Projects must be completed by November 30, 2029.
Geographical Areas
Northeast SARE grants must engage communities in the Northeast USA, which includes the following areas: Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Massachusetts, Maryland, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, West Virginia, Vermont, and Washington, D.C.
Eligible Applicants
- The Farmer Grant program is open to all commercial farm business owners and farm employees in the Northeast region. This grant program accepts all types and scales of farms – large or small scale, organic or conventional, urban or rural, full- or part-time, etc.
- To be eligible, you must meet the U.S. Census of Agriculture definition of a Farm: “Any place from which $1,000 or more of agricultural products were produced and sold, or normally would have been sold, during the census year.
- Farm employees are eligible to apply. If you are applying as a farm employee, you must complete a Grant Commitment Form and ensure that it includes both your signature and the farm owner’s signature verifying they will be financially responsible for the project.
- Farmers on farms affiliated with an institution or a nonprofit organization are also eligible to apply as long as the farm produces and sells agricultural products that meet the farm definition above. For these proposals, you must use the name of the 501(c) organization in the proposal and complete a Grant Commitment Form.
For more information, visit Northeast SARE.
