The National Fish and Wildlife Foundation is releasing this Request for Proposals in anticipation of an agreement with USDA for their tentatively selected proposal, “Farmers for Soil Health Climate Smart Commodities Partnership.” The Farmers for Soil Health Climate Smart Commodities agreement with USDA is still pending.
Donor Name: National Fish and Wildlife Foundation
State: Selected States
County: All Counties
Type of Grant: Grant
Deadline: 02/28/2023
Size of the Grant: $1,200,000
Grant Duration: 4 years
Details:
In partnership with the Farmers for Soil Health collaboration and with pending support from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Partnerships for Climate Smart Commodities, the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF) anticipates awarding competitive grants to accelerate the voluntary adoption of cover crops on corn and soybean farms in 20 states.
Farmers for Soil Health is a collaboration of National Corn Growers Association, the United Soybean Board, the National Pork Board, and other partners, with a goal of encouraging farmers to expand their adoption of cover crops to 30 million acres nationwide by 2030.
NFWF is serving as the fiscal administrator of the tentatively selected Farmers for Soil Health Climate Smart Commodities Partnership (FSH). FSH would accelerate long-term cover crop adoption by creating a platform to incentivize farmers through a marketplace that efficiently quantifies, verifies, and facilitates the sale of ecosystem benefits. FSH would create a new transition program that would build cover crop capacity nationwide.
With a national and state approach, FSH’s proposed strategy is four-pronged:
- FSH will support and expand technical assistance (TA), enrollment, and education programs in its targeted states through grants associated with this current request for proposals.
- FSH will establish a new financial assistance (FA) program to incentivize cover crop adoption on over 1.3 million acres of crop fields in corn and soybean production. Participating farmers will plant cover crops for three years and receive Transition Incentive Payments totaling $50 per new acre of cover crops planted ($25/acre year 1, $15/acre year 2, $10/acre year 3). Signing Incentive Payments of $2 per acre are available for up to 600,000 acres of existing cover crops. NFWF will make the annual FA payments to participating farmers with other funding separate from the grant funding available through this request for proposals.
- FSH will create and launch an enrollment platform as well as a nationwide cover crop Measurement, Reporting and Verification (MRV) system.
- Lastly, FSH will create a public marketplace platform to connect farmers to buyers of climate-smart commodities and opportunities for premiums and incentives.
Program Priorities
- The Farmers for Soil Health Partnership will fund projects that provide “on-the-ground” technical assistance delivery. Successful proposals will strategically address gaps and needs for supporting cover crop adoption in one or more of the 20 states. Eligible grant recipients are limited to state corn, soy, and pork commodity affiliate organizations and their designated partners.
- Grant recipients can hire or support field conservation professionals, such as conservation agronomists, who will help producers implement cover crops and other soil health practices. Grants will also provide support for increasing outreach and communications capacity, facilitating farmer enrollment for Farmers for Soil Health incentive payments, equipping farmers with information and data management capabilities to access ecosystem service markets, and addressing other barriers to cover crop adoption. Grants are expected to promote economically sound approaches that achieve positive environmental outcomes.
- The Farmers for Soil Health Partnership is prioritizing 20% of the partnership’s financial assistance ($13.65 million for 273,000 acres) for Historically Underserved and small producers. Competitive proposals will work collaboratively with diverse partners to incorporate local input and meaningfully engage with underserved and small producers.
Funding Information
- Approximately $15 million in grant funding is available under this funding opportunity. Typical grant awards will range from $200,000 to $1,200,000, with an estimated average grant size of approximately $750,000 per state-level program. The grant range is estimated based on a single state proposal. Multi-state proposals may exceed $1,200,000.
- Grant period of performance will typically be four years following finalization of the grant agreement, to coincide with the full lifecycle of the two enrollment cohorts under FSH.
Eligible and Ineligible Entities
- Eligible applicants include state commodity organizations (including research and promotion programs, also called “checkoff programs”) and their designated partners. Designated partners may include 501(c) organizations, state government agencies, local governments, municipal governments, tribal governments and organizations, or educational institutions partnering with a commodity organization.
- To be competitive, applicant organizations must demonstrate capacity and experience commensurate with the scale of the project being proposed and the funding being requested.
- Individuals, federal government agencies, and for-profit entities are not eligible to apply for grant funding.
For more information, visit NFWF.
