USDA announces conservation innovation grants
September 10, 2013 | 06:46 PM
Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack today announced the award of 33 conservation innovation grants to develop and demonstrate cutting-edge ideas to accelerate private lands conservation.
The competitive grants will demonstrate innovative approaches to improve soil health, conserve energy, manage nutrients and enhance wildlife habitat in balance with productive agricultural systems, USDA said in a news release.
Some of the grants will demonstrate the benefits that cover crops can provide and will “dispel myths that have discouraged farmers from cover crop production,” Vilsack said.
The awards total $13.3 million. Six of the approved grants support conservation technologies and approaches to help farmers and ranchers who historically have not had equal access to agricultural programs because of race or ethnicity, or who have limited resources, or who are beginning farmers and ranchers, Natural Resources Conservation Service Chief Jason Weller said in a news release.
In a call to reporters, Weller said the innovation grant program, which is part of the Environmental Quality Incentives Program, functions like a publicly funded conservation venture capital program.
The 33 grants announced today include:
The competitive grants will demonstrate innovative approaches to improve soil health, conserve energy, manage nutrients and enhance wildlife habitat in balance with productive agricultural systems, USDA said in a news release.
Some of the grants will demonstrate the benefits that cover crops can provide and will “dispel myths that have discouraged farmers from cover crop production,” Vilsack said.
The awards total $13.3 million. Six of the approved grants support conservation technologies and approaches to help farmers and ranchers who historically have not had equal access to agricultural programs because of race or ethnicity, or who have limited resources, or who are beginning farmers and ranchers, Natural Resources Conservation Service Chief Jason Weller said in a news release.
In a call to reporters, Weller said the innovation grant program, which is part of the Environmental Quality Incentives Program, functions like a publicly funded conservation venture capital program.
The 33 grants announced today include:
- U.S. Endowment for Forestry and Communities: $700,000 to demonstrate sustainable forestry technologies and create a support system and market access for historically underserved landowners in South Carolina, North Carolina and Alabama;
- Wes-Mon-Ty Resource Conservation and Development Council: $49,000 to use low-cost technology on a demonstration farm to expand cover crop adoption by historically underserved, small-scale specialty crop producers in West Virginia;
- Pheasants Forever: $631,218 to explore and demonstrate ways to integrate pollinator habitat into bioenergy crop production systems;
- University of Tennessee: $634,107 to quantify and demonstrate the long-term impacts of cover crops, crop rotations and no-till farming systems on soil health and crop productivity;
- Conservation Technology Information Center: $482,000 to work with farmers in the Midwest to examine and share the economic, agronomic and environmental benefits of cover crops; and,
- National Fish and Wildlife Foundation: $821,324 to demonstrate and expand the use of manure injection technology in the Chesapeake Bay watershed, which can significantly reduce nutrient losses from animal agriculture production systems.
