The Alabama Department of Agriculture & Industries is pleased to announce the Resilient Food Systems Infrastructure Program (RFSIP) is to build resilience in the middle of the food supply chain, to provide more and better markets to small farms and food businesses, to support the development of value-added products for consumers, to encourage fair prices and fair wages, and to establish new and safe job opportunities.
Donor Name: Alabama Department of Agriculture & Industries
State: Alabama
County: All Counties
Type of Grant: Grant
Deadline: 01/15/2024
Size of the Grant: $10,000 to $100,000
Grant Duration: 3 Years
Details:
The primary goal of RFSI is to support food system crops and products meant for human consumption (excluding meat and poultry products, which are funded through other USDA programs). The program also aims to:
- Support development of value-added products available to consumers;
- Support proposals that provide fair prices, fair wages and new and safe job opportunities that keep profits in rural communities; and
- Increase diversity in processing options in terms of business model approaches, geography, and availability to underserved communities
Priorities
ADAI conducted statewide outreach through a priority identification survey and inperson outreach meetings to ascertain funding priorities for the RFSI program in Alabama. Based on the collected data from surveys and input from outreach meetings, funding priorities for Alabama RFSI subawards will include:
- Projects that increase local producers’ abilities to process, aggregate, and distribute agricultural products,
- Projects that construct, expand, or modernize processing/value-added facilities;
- Projects that construct, expand, or modernize distribution facilities;
- Projects that construct, expand, or modernize storage facilities;
- Projects that purchase and/or modernize middle-of-the-food-supply-chain equipment; and
- Projects that will increase the local food supply to school systems and grocery stores
Funding Information
- Infrastructure Grants will be funded at a minimum amount federal funding of $100,000 and a maximum amount of federal funding of $3 million per USDA AMS guidelines stated in the RFSI Program Scope and Requirements. The total federal funding available for Infrastructure Grants in Alabama is $5,789,517.11.
- Projects may start on May 25, 2024 and must be completed by May 24, 2027.
Grant Activities
Program may include:
- Expanding capacity for processing, aggregation and distribution of agricultural products to create more and better markets for producers;
- Modernizing manufacturing, tracking, storage, and information technology systems;
- Enhancing worker safety through adoption of new technologies or investment in equipment or facility improvements;
- Improving the capacity of entities to comply with federal, state, and local food safety requirements;
- Improving operations through training opportunities;
- Supporting construction of a new facility;
- Modernizing or expanding an existing facility (including expansion and modifications to existing buildings and/or construction of new buildings at existing facilities);
- Construction of wastewater management structures, etc.;
- Modernizing processing and manufacturing equipment; and
- Developing, customizing, or installing equipment that reduces greenhouse gas emissions, increases efficiency in water use, improves air and/or water quality, and/or meets one or more of USDA’s climate action goals.
Eligibility Criteria
Entities eligible to apply for Infrastructure Grants include:
- Agricultural producers or processors, or groups of agricultural producers and processors;
- For-profit entities operating middle-of-the-supply-chain activities such as processing, aggregation, or distribution of targeted agricultural products, whose activities are primarily focused for the benefit of local and regional producers, and that meet the eligibility requirements of the SBA small business size standards;
- Nonprofit organizations operating middle-of-the-supply-chain activities such as processing, aggregation, distribution of targeted agricultural products;
- Local government entities operating middle-of-the-supply-chain activities such as processing, aggregation, distribution of targeted agricultural products;
- Tribal governments operating middle-of-the-supply-chain activities such as processing, aggregation, distribution of targeted agricultural products; and • Institutions such as schools, universities, or hospitals bringing producers together to establish cooperative or shared infrastructure or invest in equipment that will benefit multiple producers middle-of-the-supply-chain activities such as processing, aggregation, distribution of targeted agricultural products.
For more information, visit ADAI.
