USDA Farm Business Management and Benchmarking Competitive Grants Program

The Farm Business Management and Benchmarking (FBMB) Competitive Grants Program provides funds for improving the farm management knowledge and skills of agricultural producers by maintaining and expanding a national, publicly available farm financial management database to support improved farm management.

Donor Name: U.S. Department of Agriculture

State: All States

County: All Counties

Type of Grant: Grant

Deadline: 04/10/2023

Size of the Grant: $500,000

Details:

The FBMB program aims to strongly support intellectual talent and collaborative efforts to maintain the national, publicly available farm financial management database needed to meet the challenges facing the nation’s agriculture and food systems. Meeting these challenges will require innovative approaches that foster multi-disciplinary projects. This means that farm management producers must be educated and prepared to work effectively across disciplines in order to work to solve agricultural and educational challenges. The FBMB program supports all producers to develop farm management knowledge that is consistent with the food and agricultural priorities of USDA/NIFA.

The assistance provided by these programs, to the extent practicable, shall be coordinated and delivered in cooperation with similar services or assistance by other Federal Agencies or programs supporting improved farm management. The Secretary may give priority to applicants that:

Demonstrate an ability to work directly with agricultural producers.
Collaborate with farm management, education programs and associations.
Address the farm management needs of a variety of crops and regions of the United States; and
Contribute data to support the national farm financial management database.

The FBMB program supports social and behavioral science disciplines, as well as leadership skills development opportunities. Incorporation of social/behavioral sciences and leadership development is important for addressing many of the challenges facing agriculture and farm communities, such as increasing global demand for food production in the face of limited natural resources; improving health and reducing obesity by engaging in heathy diets; and alleviating poverty by fostering economic opportunity.

Global Engagement. NIFA supports global engagement that advances U.S. agricultural goals. NIFA recognizes that collaboration with international partners may be necessary to attain the agency’s goals for U.S. agriculture, promote global competence of our nation’s future agricultural workforce, and promote safe and nutritious food security in a growing world. Therefore, although application to this RFA is limited to eligible U.S. institutions, applicants may collaborate with international partners, to include subcontracts to international partners or other institutions. Applications must clearly demonstrate benefits to the United States.

The FBMB program leads to improved farm management knowledge and skills of individuals directly involved in the production of agriculture, and therefore is aligned with the following USDA Strategic Plan FY 2022-2026

Strategic Goal 2: Maximize the Ability of American Agricultural Producers to Prosper by Feeding and Clothing the World/Objective 2.1: Provide an Effective Financial Safety Net for Farmers and Ranchers to Sustain Economically Viable Agricultural Production and Support Rural Jobs and Economic Growth/Objective 2.2: Increase Agricultural Opportunities and Support Economic Growth by Creating New Markets and Supporting a Competitive Agricultural System.
Strategic Goal 4: Facilitate Rural Prosperity and Economic Development/Objective 4.1/Expand Rural Business Opportunity and Rural Quality of Life with Access to Capital; Improved Infrastructure, Broadband Access, and Connectivity; and Support for Workforce Availability.
Strategic Goal 5: Strengthen the Stewardship of Private Lands Through Technology and Research/Objective 5.1: Enhance Conservation Planning with Science-Based Tools and Information.

Program Area Description

The FBMB program outlined in this RFA seeks to expand upon work begun in FY 2010 to improve the farm management knowledge and skills of individuals directly involved in production agriculture. Specifically, applications are being solicited to address one or both of the following objectives:

Maintain and expand the already established national, publicly available farm financial management database to support improved farm management knowledge and skills for producers of a variety of crops and livestock throughout multiple regions of the United States, and
Establish or expand collaborative farm management educational programs with farm organizations or associations that will contribute data to the existing national farm financial management and benchmarking database to improve the farm management knowledge and skills of all agricultural producers.

In addition to addressing one or both of the objectives above, the FBMB program anticipates funding projects that demonstrate one or more of the following measures:

Advancing data gathering and conducting research on cost of production, farm profitability factors, and farm policy.
Developing or expanding cooperation and data sharing among existing farm management associations and business management education programs across the nation to convert their financial analysis activities to a uniform information system.
Providing training, assistance, and software to states with farm management associations to facilitate uniform financial procedures and software.
Improving the profitability and competitiveness of small and medium-sized farms and ranches by providing access to high quality, uniform farm business management benchmarking information; or
Improving producers’ abilities to successfully manage their agricultural operations through periods of high risk, volatility, and financial stress.

At a minimum, applicants should provide evidence that they:

Will expand or establish a farm management program that works directly with agricultural producers to contribute data to the national farm management and benchmarking database.
Address the farm management needs of a variety of crops and regions of the United States.
Establish and collaborate with more than five farm management education programs or associations that are representative of agricultural diversity in multiple regions of the United States.
Maintain farm financial analysis software applicable to the production and management of a wide range of crop and livestock agricultural commodities (including organic and specialty crop commodities).
Establish procedures that enable producers to (i) benchmark their farms against peer groups; and (ii) to query the benchmarking database by location, farm type, farm size, and commodity at all overall business and individual enterprise levels.
Contribute data to the national farm financial management database; and
Provide public online access to farm and ranch financial benchmarking databases.

Funding Information