Contact: Laura Zaks

National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition

press@sustainableagriculture.net

Comment: In Moment of Need, House Farm Bill Underdelivers with Empty Promises

Washington, DC, February 14, 2026 – The National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC) released the following statement attributable to Mike Lavender, NSAC Policy Director, in response to the Farm, Food, and National Security Act of 2026, House Agriculture Committee Republican’s draft farm bill text released yesterday:

“More than seven years since the last farm bill, and in a moment of need for farmers, the Farm, Food, and National Security Act lacks the robust investments and reforms necessary to propel American agriculture forward. The bill takes no meaningful steps toward building a fair, responsible, and accessible farm safety net while needlessly siphoning funding away from popular and effective conservation programs. 

It does, however, create opportunities for important steps forward, particularly for local and regional food systems – by connecting local farmers to nearby communities and expanding meat processing capacity. Unfortunately, these investments lack mandatory funding, severely stunting their potential to improve farmer viability and community health.

Moreover, dozens of critical programs, including those that support beginning farmers and ranchers, organic agriculture, and vital farmer-driven research, are both unimproved and level-funded, representing a roughly twenty percent cut due to seven years of inflation. NSAC will continue its review of legislative text in the days ahead. Farmers deserve a farm bill that delivers a fair farm safety net, builds climate resilience, and invests in strong local supply chains – anything less would fall short of what American agriculture actually needs.”

Stay tuned to NSAC’s blog for deeper analysis and coverage of the farm bill reauthorization, including the Farm, Food, and National Security Act of 2026.

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About the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC)

The National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition is a grassroots alliance that advocates for federal policy reform supporting the long-term social, economic, and environmental sustainability of agriculture, natural resources, and rural communities. 

Learn more and get involved at: https://sustainableagriculture.net

The post Comment: In Moment of Need, House Farm Bill Underdelivers with Empty Promises appeared first on National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition.

This is the final post in the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC)’s series documenting the ongoing staffing crisis across the US Department of Agriculture (USDA). The scale and pace of staffing losses across the USDA, combined with the uncertainty introduced by a sweeping USDA reorganization plan, have weakened the Department at the very moment farmers face rising production costs, unstable markets, and climate-driven disasters. As the series comes to an end, the data show a workforce under extreme strain and an urgent need for renewed investment in the staff that make the People’s Department function.

 A Year Defined by Unprecedented Staffing Losses

Beginning in January 2025, USDA experienced historic staff losses. Nearly 3,000 employees separated from the agency in the first quarter alone, according to the Office of Personnel Management. These early losses included both career staff, many with 20 years or more of institutional knowledge, and recent hires who had not yet completed their first year of service. 

The truly unprecedented staff losses followed soon after, with roughly 15,173 USDA employees who accepted Deferred Resignation Program (DRP) buyouts. 94% of the USDA staff who left via the DRP were located outside of the Washington, DC area. All of the staff who accepted the DRP officially separated from the agency on September 30, 2025. 

Figure 1: Location of USDA Staff Who Left Via DRP

The consequences of these losses were immediate.

• Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), already struggling to meet rising farmer demand, lost planners, conservationists, and program technicians whose expertise cannot be easily replaced. Promising conservationists like Gretchen Troutman and Josh Hardin are no longer there to help farmers design conservation plans and get funding to protect and enhance the resources that ensure their farm’s viability.

• Farm Service Agency (FSA) lost staff responsible for administering farm loans, disaster assistance, and commodity programs—programs that require precise and timely processing to keep farms solvent. FSA offices like the Oklahoma office where Kevin Dale used to work have had their staff cut in half or are fully vacant, even as work demands increase with the need to allocate 30 million new base acres and administer an additional $12 billion in farm financial assistance. 
• Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) and Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) lost experienced inspectors, veterinarians, and scientists, threatening on-the-ground food safety capacity.
• Rural Development offices lost staff with an average of 13.5 years of service, with losses concentrated among both the most junior and most experienced employees, leaving gaps in both institutional memory and the future of the agency. These Rural Development staff administer programs like the Meat and Poultry Processing Expansion Program (MPPEP) to help grow rural economies.
• The research agencies Economic Research Service (ERS), National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA), and Agricultural Research Service (ARS) lost economists and scientists whose research supports federal decision-making, weakening USDA’s capacity to produce market forecasts, evaluate rural well-being, and administer competitive research grants.

Taken together, the federal workforce responsible for serving farmers and supporting rural communities shrank dramatically in a matter of months.

 A Reorganization Plan That Accelerates Risk

In July 2025, USDA announced a major reorganization plan, drafted without public input, that would relocate thousands of jobs, consolidate field offices, and restructure core program functions. Early details suggest the relocation of up to 2,600 headquarters and regional staff, along with the consolidation or closure of field offices across NRCS, FSA, Rural Development (RD), and other agencies. US Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins has publicly stated that she expects up to half of the staff to leave the department rather than relocate.

For agencies already operating with gutted staff and the loss of institutional knowledge, this reorganization introduces additional uncertainty. Staff have been given limited details about timelines, office closures, reassignments, or new reporting structures. Farmers and stakeholders have been offered no clarity on how service delivery might be affected. During their adhoc public comment period on the reorganization, the USDA received nearly 47,000 emails. Their own analysis concludes that 82% of the responses expressed negative sentiment and concerns. 

The risks of USDA reorganization are clear. The deepest staffing losses occurred in agencies already stretched thin and struggling to meet farmer demand, leaving many USDA programs operating with minimal capacity at a time when farmers are facing a worsening financial crisis. Farmers rely on these agencies for conservation planning, loan processing, and disaster assistance. Any reorganization risks amplifying service gaps precisely when farmers need USDA support the most.

 The Shutdown and Reopening

When the government shut down on October 1, 2025, the incredible importance of USDA staff and services became even more evident. Outreach events were canceled, conservation planning stalled, and loan processing halted.

Farmers like Lindsay, from Tourvaille Farm in Ohio, could not get their conservation contracts paid on time because staff were furloughed. Others like Celeste, a farmer from Washington, didn’t receive their much-needed farm loans and safety net payments. These and the hundreds of other stories of American farmers and rural communities unable to access the resources and services they depend upon made visible the often-overlooked importance of USDA staff. 

The bill to reopen the government – passed on November 13, 2025 – included several provisions that shape the future of USDA staffing and services:

• First, the bill provided full-year funding for USDA, ensuring that USDA staff will not be furloughed for the remainder of the 2026 fiscal year.
• Second, Congress inserted new oversight requirements that could limit USDA’s ability to move forward with large-scale reorganizations, relocations, or office closures. This represents one of the first meaningful checks on the reorganization since its announcement.
• Third, the legislation stabilized funding for research and scientific programs. These investments protect programs critical for research and economic forecasting, areas where staff was already thinned due to the 2025 staff losses.

However, the shutdown bill did not reverse the staffing losses the USDA has already endured. It did not pause the reorganization, only slowed it and perhaps established some guardrails. And it did not provide any emergency hiring authorities or explicitly additional staffing budgets that agencies desperately need to rebuild.

Charting a Path Forward for Federal Agricultural Capacity

The USDA staffing crisis of 2025 makes clear that the department’s capacity has been compromised at a moment when robust federal support for farmers is most essential. If these staff losses are not addressed, access to USDA services will become more uneven and core missions of the USDA, from conservation to farm resilience, food safety, and rural development, will suffer.

NSAC urges the Administration and Congress to rebuild staffing across all USDA mission areas and pause the reorganization until a transparent and iterative process is laid out to meaningfully integrate stakeholder input. USDA must prioritize immediate hiring in NRCS, FSA, RD, and other agencies suffering acute shortages. No USDA reorganization and structural change should proceed until USDA conducts a transparent impact assessment, engages meaningfully with farmers and frontline staff, and demonstrates that proposed changes will strengthen, not weaken, service delivery.

The past year has shown how deeply USDA’s ability to serve the public depends on a strong and stable workforce.

The post USDA Staffing Crisis: A Year of Losses and the Road Ahead appeared first on National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition.

A Year Like No Other

As 2025 comes to a close, we find ourselves reflecting on a year that reshaped the food and farm policy landscape: from major disruptions in federal agencies to stalled policymaking in Washington, farmers and communities continue to feel the impacts. The historic government shutdown this fall was just the most recent situation to put our food and farm system under strain. Stable federal programs are critical for farmers and families across the country, and funding delays and terminations, shifting agency decisions, and the loss of experienced staff at USDA have created hardship for millions, especially those who already faced systemic barriers to accessing USDA programs and services. 

At NSAC we are always guided by our members and the federal policy priorities we set together – this year those included strengthening the farm safety net, advancing climate resilience in food and agriculture, and building strong local and regional food systems that benefit farmers and families.  We moved quickly and creatively to introduce bills in Congress designed to carry reforms and investments forward, we supported farmers and nonprofits navigating agency funding disruptions and terminations with guidance and peer support, and we organized our coalition to speak out in hundreds of channels nationwide – from social media to radio to local and national news – to elevate farmers’ and families’ stories about what was happening on the ground. This blog post reflects on that work, the progress made, the setbacks we faced, and the resolve that carried our coalition through a year marked by both instability and extraordinary collaboration.  

Building Better Policies in Washington for the Farm Bill and Beyond 

Congress failed to pass a full five-year farm bill again this year – leaving everyone who relies on this critical major legislation stuck for another year without an opportunity for real policy reforms or investments. NSAC and nearly 600 national, state, and local organizations delivered a joint letter to Senate and House leadership, as well as Agriculture Committee chairs and ranking members, urging Congress to advance not only an overdue farm bill but one that truly supports family farmers, strengthens rural communities, expands healthy food access, and more. The letter also called on Congress to correct harmful provisions enacted through the recently passed budget reconciliation bill.  

We still saw some legislative wins this year:  we helped draft, refine, and introduce nearly a dozen “marker bills” this year that together will build better farm and food policy in a future farm bill.  

Farm Safety Net

• Save Our Small (SOS) Farms Act – modernizes federal farm safety net programs to make crop insurance and disaster assistance more accessible for small, specialty, and beginning farmers, helping them stay on the land despite economic and climate challenges.
• Crop Insurance for Future Farmers Act – makes crop insurance more affordable and accessible for new and veteran farmers by increasing the premium‑subsidy support and extending the time they’re eligible. 
• Farm Ownership Improvement Act – establishes a five‑year pilot program allowing farmers and ranchers to get pre‑qualified or pre‑approved for direct farm‑ownership loans to make it easier for new and beginning farmers to secure land. 
• Capital for Beginning Farmers and Ranchers Act – creates a multi-year FSA loan pilot to help new farmers access flexible capital for startup costs, infrastructure, and management systems, addressing high barriers to entry and supporting the next generation of farmers.
• Withstanding Extreme Agricultural Threats by Harvesting Economic Resilience (WEATHER) Act of 2025 – modifies the federal crop-insurance program to create a new type of coverage that pays farmers quickly and automatically when severe weather hits their area, giving them a simpler and more reliable safety net as extreme weather and natural disasters become more common.

Local and Regional Food Systems 

• Strengthening Local Food Security (SLFS) Act of 2025 – helps small and mid-sized farmers sell more locally grown foods to schools and community programs, boosting farmer income while giving families better access to healthy food.
• Local Farmers Feeding Our Communities Act – helps small and mid-sized farmers sell more local food through state and tribal programs, creating stable markets for producers while improving access to fresh, nutritious food for families in need.
• Strengthening Local Processing Act (SLPA) – standing challenges in the livestock and poultry supply chain. It advances a more resilient, competitive, and regionally rooted meat processing sector by updating the Cooperative Interstate Shipment (CIS) program, increasing size eligibility, improving state cost shares, and requiring FSIS outreach. Together, these reforms would enable small and mid-sized processors to expand sales across state lines and strengthen regional food systems.

Climate Resilience

• Agriculture Resilience Act – would adapt the farm bill to today’s realities by investing comprehensively across  conservation, research, renewable energy, and rural development to help producers build resilience, boost profitability, and achieve net-zero agricultural emissions by 2040.
• Strong Farms, Strong Futures Act – strengthens the Conservation Stewardship Program by creating region-specific climate mitigation practice bundles and higher cost-share incentives, giving producers more options and greater support to build complex and resilient conservation systems.
• Support the WEST Act – strengthens key USDA conservation programs by boosting cost-share for water-saving and drought-resilient practices, expanding support for perennial systems, and enhancing soil-health outreach and testing to better serve producers in Western arid regions.
• Organic Science and Research Investment (OSRI) Act – strengthens USDA’s organic research and data programs by boosting funding, coordination, and support for organic and transitioning farmers so that innovations in soil health, climate resilience, and sustainable production can benefit all producers and bolster rural economies.
• Innovative Practices for Soil Health Act – strengthens USDA conservation programs to better support farmers adopting perennial and agroforestry systems, enhancing technical assistance, research capacity, and incentives to improve soil health, resilience, and long-term sustainability across US agriculture.
• Converting Our Waste Sustainably (COWS) Act of 2025 – offers incentives for livestock and dairy farms to manage manure sustainably by funding practices and composting methods that cut greenhouse‑gas emissions and improve soil and water quality. 

The government shutdown resolution package passed in November included a one-year extension of the Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018 – the farm bill. This extension is largely “clean” – meaning without major changes to the 2018 bill – but it does have one problematic change that NSAC is fighting to remove in future bills: the bill removes key payment limits and income eligibility rules for EQIP and CSP, effectively enabling the largest operations to access unlimited conservation funding, shifting conservation resources away from smaller and mid-sized producers, and exacerbating existing trends where demand far exceeds available resources, shutting out access to these popular programs. 

Protecting Federal Investments in Sustainable, Equitable Policy

This year’s federal budget process, shaped by a major reconciliation package and competing House and Senate spending proposals, set in motion decisions that will influence conservation, farm viability, and community resilience for years to come.

The spring and early summer centered on the so-called “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” (OBBB), a major reconciliation package that folded remaining Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) conservation dollars into the permanent farm bill baseline, securing long-term funding but removing the climate guardrails that ensured those dollars supported climate friendly practices. OBBB shifted significant resources away from nutrition assistance programs and toward commodity programs, putting vulnerable communities at risk while abandoning programs that support the vast majority of farmers and rural communities. Overall OBBB represented a mixed outcome: a long-term win for conservation funding, but a failure to invest in long-term solutions that promote markets and invest in production systems that build all farmers’ autonomy and self-determination.

Appropriations debates intensified through the summer. The House advanced a $25.5 billion FY26 agriculture bill along party lines with major cuts to conservation, research, and local food systems programs, along with several harmful policy riders. The Senate, in contrast, passed a bipartisan $27 billion bill that largely preserved funding for core farmer- and community-serving programs. With no agreement in place by September 30, the government entered the shutdown that lasted from October 1 to November 12.

The FY2026 agriculture appropriations bill included in the shutdown resolution reflected continued funding cuts to several important USDA programs. While some programs maintained their current funding levels, others saw reductions, limiting USDA’s capacity to provide technical assistance, support innovative production, and strengthen local and regional food systems at a time when farmers need those services most.

Pressing USDA to Better Serve Farmers

With the start of the new Trump Administration came major shifts in USDA leadership and direction. Throughout the year, NSAC challenged the agency’s harmful program terminations, staffing cuts, and policy reversals, while lifting up farmer stories and working to advance our coalition’s priorities wherever possible. NSAC and partners worked extensively to secure funding from the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 for critical conservation and rural energy programs this year. Delays and cancellations in payments by the Trump Administration left tens of thousands of farmers and ranchers without funds that were already contractually committed by the federal government. Despite over $2.3 billion in signed contracts nationwide, these interruptions forced farmers to cover project costs out of pocket, threatening farm viability and undermining trust in federal programs. Across all of our campaign priorities, our coalition worked to ensure USDA hears from the producers most affected by its decisions and remains accountable to the communities it is meant to serve.

Proposed USDA reorganization: In July, USDA announced a reorganization proposal with little detail and no meaningful input from farmers. NSAC submitted extensive comments outlining how the plan could destabilize critical functions, from agricultural research to conservation programs to components of the farm safety net. We also mobilized farmers, advocates, and partner organizations to weigh in, despite USDA’s failure to follow the standard Federal Register comment process for a proposal of this scale.

USDA staffing crisis: This year revealed the depth of USDA’s ongoing staffing crisis. Through our multi-part blog series, we highlighted how the loss of more than 18,000 staff positions, and additional reductions expected under proposed restructuring, has already weakened the agency’s ability to deliver conservation assistance, research, technical support, and other essential services. By documenting impacts across key agency mission areas, especially at NRCS, we helped policymakers and the public understand the stakes and the urgent need for a transparent, farmer-informed process to rebuild USDA’s capacity. 

With these agency-wide challenges in view, our campaigns worked on multiple fronts to hold USDA accountable and push to safeguard the programs farmers rely on.

Farm Safety Net 

• NSAC recently published a major analysis of the current farm crisis, highlighting rising production costs, collapsing crop prices, and unprecedented instability in federal programs. NSAC has continued to press USDA to take immediate action to restore program stability, provide revenue-based relief and loan protections, and strengthen the farm safety net so that farmers can weather this crisis and stay on their land.
• In early December, USDA announced the Farmer Bridge Assistance (FBA) Program to address the economic impacts of tariffs and provide needed economic relief. NSAC, in partnership with the National Young Farmers Coalition, provided a swift analysis of the announcement and the limited program details that were released. NSAC highlighted the importance of FBA as a first step in providing economic assistance to farmers, but underscored the need for additional action to repair and expand the safety net to support all farmers. 
• 2025 marked ten years since the first Whole Farm Revenue Protection (WFRP) crop insurance policies became available for producers. Since the introduction of this new risk management option in the 2014 Farm Bill, NSAC continues to advocate for improvements via legislation and regulatory changes at USDA that would make the product more accessible and functional for a broader set of producers. 
• USDA has continued to distribute disaster relief funding through the Supplemental Disaster Relief Program (SDRP) throughout this past year. Prior to the announcement of SDRP Stage 2 in late November, which specifically provides assistance for non-insured crop producers, NSAC provided guidance to Farm Service Agency (FSA) leadership on how to ensure accessibility to program funds for those producers. These recommendations included streamlined and reduced paperwork, clearer instructions in USDA documentation, and exemptions to the requirement for crop insurance enrollment among others. NSAC continues to provide support to our members as Stage 2 of SDRP applications remain open through April of 2026. 

Local and Regional Food Systems

• Early in the year, USDA abruptly paused and then later terminated the Local Food Purchase Agreement (LFPA) program, a nationally popular program with bipartisan support that helped farmers grow and sell produce into local schools, hospitals, and institutions. NSAC swung into action in partnership with  National Farmers Union to deliver a letter with more than 1,000 signatures urging the program’s reinstatement. We helped over 100 farmers share their stories about why this program matters for their communities and businesses in press stories nationwide and raised the alarm on Capitol Hill, hosting briefings and meetings led by affected farmers, which led to bipartisan support for legislative solutions for the future of this program. 
• This year, NSAC focused on deepening stakeholder engagement around the FDA Food Traceability Rule, working closely with the Reagan-Udall Foundation to explore new possibilities for future food safety improvements and gather industry insights to inform more practical, effective implementation.
• In October, USDA’s Beef Strategy Report offered modest wins for small and very small processors, such as reduced fees for overtime and holiday inspections. But limited funding in the Meat and Poultry Processing Expansion Program underscored the need for continued advocacy to ensure these processors can access the resources they need.

Climate Resilience 

• At USDA, shifting priorities in the Rural Energy for America Program (REAP) and the Rural Development Business and Industry (B&I) Guaranteed Loan programs created uncertainty for farmers seeking to adopt renewable energy. An August memo from USDA deprioritizing larger ground-mounted solar projects and raising questions about whether grants can be used to purchase solar technologies manufactured outside of the US, left producers with few clear answers, even as NSAC pressed USDA for needed guidance.
• NSAC opposed EPA’s proposal to repeal the 2009 Endangerment Finding, as removing the scientific and legal basis for regulating greenhouse gases undermines climate protections. The proposal leaned on a discredited draft claiming climate change is “neutral or beneficial” for most agriculture, contradicting decades of research and farmers’ experience on the ground.
• In September, NSAC worked for weeks both behind the scenes and in the press to persuade USDA to open its SARE funding pool, which helps farmers and researchers address sustainability and profitability concerns on farms. We helped coordinate a letter with more than 500 farmer signatories urging USDA to ensure the timely release of SARE funding. While we succeeded in seeing the RFA released, the delay until September 11 left host institutions little time to secure awards before the fiscal year ended, jeopardizing farmers’ access to regionally specific research. 

Stronger Together

One of NSAC’s longtime coalition sayings reminds us that “No one knows everything. Together we know a lot.” Our coalition is at its strongest when we lean into our shared values and practice relationship-centered, collaborative advocacy. This felt especially true in a year as complex as 2025.

In February, nearly 100 member organizations and more than 30 farmers from 17 states gathered in Washington, DC for our winter meeting and lobby day, one of our largest to date. Meetings were held with roughly 150 lawmakers to share farmer stories and underscore the critical importance of federal agriculture programs. Despite funding freezes and political chaos, our coalition’s collective voice made it clear that Congress must ensure USDA fulfills its commitments.  In August, NSAC coalition members from across the country attended our summer meeting in Stowe, Vermont, to ground ourselves in shared strategy – and of course visit amazing local farms and eat lots of maple creemees.

After many years of planning, NSAC completed a new 5-year strategic plan and has begun a new 2-year policy priority-setting process to be ready for 2026-2028 and beyond. Earlier this year, NSAC also developed an interactive time of our coalition’s history.

Looking Ahead to 2026

2025 presented steep challenges, requiring us to defend decades of hard-won progress while continuing to push forward. This year reinforced the importance of being resourceful and creative in a rapidly changing policy landscape – and we’ll keep it up next year too. Farmers, ranchers, and families nationwide all deserve a food and farm system that nourishes people, stewards our environment, and builds strong economies: we believe this is a future everyone can help create. Here’s a preview of what’s to come from us in 2026:  

• We will continue to campaign around the priorities our members and their thousands of farmer and community leaders bring to our shared table: reforming the farm safety net, bolstering resilient local and regional food systems, and fostering climate change resilience. We’ll bring these priorities to appropriations, to a potential new farm bill, to USDA, and everywhere in between here in DC. 
• We’ll gather in person together with our members and farmer leaders as always: in DC this winter and out in the field in August. This time together helps us build our strategies and strengthen our relationships as we learn from one another and advocate together. 
• Our analysis – always free and available to the public here on our blog – will continue. We will continue to highlight what’s happening in DC, what it means for farmers and eaters, and lift up ways for all of us to be heard on the issues that matter for food and farms. 

Throughout 2026, we will continue mobilizing grassroots action, delivering timely analysis, and supporting our members and partners as we build momentum for a sustainable, resilient, and equitable farm and food future. 

The post Chaos, Collaboration, and Courage: A Look Back at 2025 appeared first on National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition.

Contact: Laura Zaks
National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition
press@sustainableagriculture.net
Tel. 347.563.6408

Release: Congressional Members Reintroduce Legislation that Creates Fairer Competition, Advances Environmental Health, and Protects Workers

Washington, DC, December 15, 2025 – Representatives Alma Adams (D-NC-12), Zoe Lofgren (D-CA-18), Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC), Jim McGovern (D-MA-2), Nydia Velázquez (D-NY-7), Rashida Tlaib (D-MI-12), Cleo Fields (D-LA-4), Jill Tokuda (D-HI-2), André Carson (D-IN-7) and Senators Ed Markey (D-MA), Peter Welch (D-VT), Adam Schiff (D-CA), Alex Padilla (D-CA), and Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) introduced the Enabling Farmer, Foodworker, Environmental, and Climate Targets through Innovative, Values-aligned, and Equitable (EFFECTIVE) Food Procurement Act in the House. The bill offers an alternative approach to making food purchasing decisions, and a better way to spend public dollars on food.

“Every year, the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) spends billions on food purchases with a concentrated few of the largest food companies in the nation. The EFFECTIVE Food Procurement Act would instead reroute taxpayer dollars to foster strong, reliable market opportunities for countless farmers, ranchers, and processors. This promotes the viability of family-owned small and mid-sized farms and invests in the communities – from rural to urban – that they call home,” commented Hannah Quigley, Policy Specialist with NSAC.

The EFFECTIVE Food Procurement Act would require USDA to weigh the benefits of environmental sustainability, social and racial equity, worker well-being, and animal welfare when evaluating and awarding federal food contracts. It would also establish a pilot food purchasing program requiring that 20% of all USDA food purchases meet the new criteria. Finally, the bill provides technical and financial assistance to businesses to help them make necessary upgrades or obtain food safety related certifications required to become a USDA approved vendor. Taken together, these changes offer opportunities for USDA to be more responsive to the needs of school and community nutrition programs, while promoting the success of small businesses.

“The bill would allow USDA to further its mission to nourish communities, protect natural resources, and increase farm profitability by using their existing spending power. The proposed changes for USDA food procurement would provide additional market opportunities for small and mid-sized farms that simultaneously promote fairer competition and responsible land stewardship,” Quigley said.

Find more details about the EFFECTIVE Food Procurement Act in the bill text.

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About the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC)The National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition is a grassroots alliance that advocates for federal policy reform supporting the long-term social, economic, and environmental sustainability of agriculture, natural resources, and rural communities. Learn more: https://sustainableagriculture.net/

The post Release: Congressional Members Reintroduce Legislation that Creates Fairer Competition, Advances Environmental Health, and Protects Workers appeared first on National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition.

Washington, DC, September 24, 2025 – This week, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) disbursed funds for the Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program (SARE). SARE funding – which is normally made available in March –  was first made available through a ‘request for application’ (RFA) on September 11, giving SARE Host Institutions little time to secure funding before the end of the federal fiscal year. 

“The widespread support for SARE, most notably from farmers and ranchers themselves, speaks to the programs’ transformative impact across nearly four decades. In meeting its statutory obligation, USDA has ensured that SARE will continue its critical role in helping farmer driven research keep pace with the growing challenges of rural economies, soil health, and competitiveness of American producers,” said Mike Lavender, Policy Director at the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition. 

Hundreds of farmers alongside a bipartisan contingent of Members of Congress rallied behind SARE in recent months. NSAC is pleased that, in accordance with statute, SARE Host Institutions have received SARE funds and can now move forward with funding important research and education projects for farmers and ranchers across the country. SARE administrators estimate that with this fiscal year’s funding, roughly 400 farmers and ranchers will receive funding to do on-farm, regionally based, and outcome-oriented competitive research. This number does not account for the thousands of farmers, ranchers, researchers, extension agents, and graduate students that participate in SARE funded research, education, and outreach programming every year. 

NSAC remains a strong supporter of SARE and continues to advocate for growing the program’s research and funding capacity. To learn more about SARE and its impacts, visit our Grassroots Guide.

The post Release: USDA Disburses Funds for Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program appeared first on National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition.

The scholarship was created as a tribute to SAAFON’s former director, the late Cynthia Hayes. Cynthia filled a key need for connection when she co-founded SAAFON, the first network for African American organic farmers in the US, and dedicated her life to serving communities in California, the Caribbean, and, of course, the Southeast. 

NSAC is one of many nonprofits that Cynthia enriched. She was a key inspiration for NSAC’s initiatives around racial equity in food and agriculture and an ally in NSAC’s effort to increase opportunities for young leaders of color in the sustainable food and agriculture movement. The scholarship program, now in its seventh year, aims to support Black and Indigenous students pursuing food systems careers.

“I am so proud of this year’s scholars! We received three times our typical volume of applications this year, and Vicki, Alaina, and Mikelanj absolutely shined. They each have already demonstrated a tenacious commitment to working to create a better future for farmers and communities, and I can’t wait to hear about what they do next,” said Tyler Edwards, NSAC Grassroots Advocacy Coordinator.

Biographies and statements from each of this year’s winners are included below:

Vicki Mines attends La Salle University and is pursuing a Master’s degree in Public Health. 

“I am a Philadelphia native, public health graduate student, and co-founder of Nriife Roots Collective, where we believe in reclaiming the means for nourishment through food sovereignty. I am a passionate advocate for food justice, leading community gardening and culturally relevant nutrition education through Brewerytown Garden. My work centers on transforming local food systems through education, equity, and access,” shared Vicki 

Alaina Parr is originally from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and is currently attending Northwestern University, pursuing a Bachelor of Science degree in Social Policy with a second major in History and a minor in Environmental Policy. Her original introduction to food systems work began during a gap year, when she spent time working on multiple farms in different parts of the country. Since then, she has integrated that found passion for agriculture and food access with her ongoing work in social and labor justice.

“I am passionate about alleviating barriers to fresh food access and reclaiming control over food systems for marginalized inner-city communities,” commented Alaina. “My current work focuses on urban agriculture as a pathway to accessible fresh food, and I aim to continue using my studies in policy and history to situate food insecurity within its broader systemic context and advocate for community based solutions grounded in resistance and care.” 

Mikelanj Ajinaku is a rising senior at Florida Agricultural & Mechanical University pursuing a Bachelor of Science in Agribusiness.  

“I believe in the power of agriculture as a source of liberation, autonomy, and wellness within Black and marginalized communities. Through my studies with agroecology research, cooperative economics, and traditional herbal medicine, I’ve noticed how sustainable food systems and cultural knowledge can heal and empower. I want to reclaim agriculture as a path to sovereignty and community care, not just a profession. I’ve worked with the Lola Hampton-Frank Pinder Center for Agroecology and interned with the Innovation Learning Laboratory at Morehouse School of Medicine to help bridge agricultural business development, agroecological practice, and holistic wellness,” said Mikelanj.  

Contact: Laura Zaks

National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition

press@sustainableagriculture.net

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About the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC) The National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition is a grassroots alliance that advocates for federal policy reform supporting the long-term social, economic, and environmental sustainability of agriculture, natural resources, and rural communities. Learn more and get involved at: https://sustainableagriculture.net

The post Release: Seventh Class of Cynthia Hayes Scholarship Recipients Honor Her Legacy appeared first on National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition.

Contact: Laura Zaks

National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition

press@sustainableagriculture.net

Tel. 347.563.6408

Release: Agriculture Resilience Act Advances Bold, Farmer-Driven Vision

National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition Proudly Endorses Critical Climate and Agriculture Bill

Washington, DC, April 22, 2025 – Today, on Earth Day, Representative Chellie Pingree (D-ME-1) and Senator Martin Heinrich (D-NM) introduced the Agriculture Resilience Act (ARA). The ARA outlines farmer-driven, incentive-based strategies for how the next farm bill can support farmer livelihoods and build climate resilience. The National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC) is proud to endorse a bill delivering a bold vision for the future of agriculture. The ARA would adapt the Farm Bill to the current reality by ensuring conservation, research, renewable energy, and rural economic development programs empower farmers and ranchers who are eager to drive climate solutions on the ground.

Through the first hand experiences of the effects of increasingly extreme conditions including floods, drought, wildfires, and increasing pest pressures, farmers and ranchers know the fundamental threat that a changing climate poses to their livelihoods and the viability of agriculture. In response to the challenges facing producers nationwide, Representative Pingree and Senator Heinrich offer the ARA and express their commitment:

“From historic droughts and wildfires to devastating floods and extreme weather, America’s farmers are directly impacted by the climate crisis,” said Pingree, a longtime organic farmer and senior member of the House Agriculture Committee. “With the Farm Bill in limbo and the Trump Administration actively undermining farmers’ interests, bold legislation like the Agriculture Resilience Act is more urgent than ever. These goals are ambitious—but they’re achievable. By helping farmers adopt practices that boost resilience and profitability, this bill charts a path to not only create a more sustainable future for America’s agriculture sector, but ensure greater economic viability for our farmers as well.”

“New Mexico’s agricultural producers and rural communities rely on the health of our land and water to sustain their families and communities. They are also the first to feel the impacts of climate change. That is why we need to provide our farmers and ranchers with new tools to not only protect their land and way of life, but also be part of the climate solution,” said Heinrich. “I’m pleased to reintroduce the Agriculture Resilience Act, which sets a national goal of achieving net-zero emissions in agriculture by 2040 through farmer-led, science-based initiatives. I’ll continue working to bring our communities the tools they need to improve soil health, expand conservation programs, increase research into climate-friendly agricultural practices, and support on-farm renewable energy projects.”

In response to the introduction of the bill, NSAC issued the following comment: 

“The ARA outlines key investments and policies needed in the next farm bill to support the long-term sustainability of our farms and food system. With the changing climate posing serious threats, the risks to our agriculture producers are growing fast. Across the country, farmers and ranchers already know which practices are the most effective for building strong, resilient operations. It is more important than ever to invest in their efforts to safeguard against climate stresses and to protect their land and livelihoods,” said Richa Patel, NSAC Policy Specialist. 

The 119th Congress’ ARA commits to the same focus as previous versions by centering on important climate and agriculture solutions, including perennial practices like agroforestry, agrivoltaics that combine agriculture and renewable energy goals, and the breeding of regionally-adapted crop varieties and animal breeds. By offering both incentives and research in support of solutions on which sustainable farmers are already taking the lead, the bill expands opportunities for the establishment of strong, farmer- and community-led strategies for building farmer economic security while confronting the climate crisis. 

The updated section-by-section can be found here.

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About the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC)The National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition is a grassroots alliance that advocates for federal policy reform supporting the long-term social, economic, and environmental sustainability of agriculture, natural resources, and rural communities. Learn more: https://sustainableagriculture.net/

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While the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) has not confirmed the number of employees that have already been laid off or their plans for a forthcoming “reduction in force”, staffing chaos has reigned at the agency for the past several weeks. The firing of nearly 6,000 probationary employees was ruled illegal and extensive terminations are being reported across agencies including the Agricultural Research Service (ARS), Farm Service Agency (FSA), and Natural Resource Conservation Service (NRCS), among others. USDA even mistakenly fired key staff responding to the current bird flu outbreak. 

USDA staff in all agencies provide essential services to farmers, ranchers, and rural communities. They administer and manage a wide range of programs and technical assistance that keep farms working and the agricultural economy functioning. In many cases, they are hard working, valued members of the rural communities they serve all across the country. This post examines what is at stake if USDA staffing cuts continue. 

Farmers, Communities Lose When Staff Are Cut

After waiting eight months for his NRCS job to start, Josh Hardin was finally settling into his role as a district conservationist, recruiting new participants, keeping contracts on schedule, and guiding farmers through conservation programs, when he was suddenly let go in the mass firing of probationary employees. In his region of Arkansas, farmers had gone years without a local NRCS office, and when he was hired, they were relieved to have someone who knew the land, the programs, and their needs. “Finally, somebody who knows what’s going on and knows how to help us,” one told him. But just as he was getting his footing, he was fired, leaving colleagues scrambling and farmers without the staff to support them. This time of year is particularly busy at NRCS offices as they prepare for spring deadlines to rank new applications and assess current contracts. Without adequate staffing, contract work has fallen behind, and farmers who had just started building trusting relationships with NRCS are now left without guidance. 

“One office cannot handle eight counties. Farmers and landowners cannot drive four counties over to sign a paper or have a meeting, they need to go back to their work,” he said, emphasizing how staff losses break vital local connections. Fortunately, Hardin is one of the many recently fired USDA staffers who hope to soon return to work after the Merit Systems Protection Board (MSPB) determined that their firings were illegal. 

Stories like Josh’s are being replicated around the country as staffing cuts take effect. Agripulse reports that at least eight USDA offices in Indiana, six in Kansas, five in Oklahoma, four in Missouri, and three in Minnesota have no NRCS staff following the first wave of layoffs. Farmers in all of these states and counties are now guaranteed to experience delayed conservation planning services, overwhelmed staff, and a sense that the systems they rely on are unraveling. NRCS staff are essential for delivering technical assistance and helping farmers and ranchers implement conservation practices that improve their environmental and economic outcomes. They guide producers through popular and over-subscribed conservation programs like the Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP) and the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP). Cuts to NRCS staff undermine the delivery of these wildly popular programs.

NSAC member Renewing the Countryside (RTC), which supports farmers and rural communities in the Upper Midwest, says they are also already feeling the impacts of USDA staffing cuts. RTC has previously held events at USDA service centers as a way to “let producers get to know where the service centers are, who to talk to in which office within the service center, and help get the USDA faces familiar so that producers are comfortable when they need the resources.” Facilitating these visits has proven an effective way to connect historically underserved farmers to USDA. When they reached out to schedule a next group visit, however, RTC was told that due to limited staff capacity they would be unable to hold the meeting at the local USDA office. The senior state official encouraged RTC’s farmers to schedule one-on-one visits, but that can be intimidating for producers who are unfamiliar with the USDA. 

Staffing Cuts Cause Long-Term Research Loss

One of the agencies hit hard by the first round of layoffs has been USDA’s Agricultural Research Service (ARS). NSAC member the Organic Farming Research Foundation (OFRF) reports that between 10-50% of the workforce at some ARS sites has been terminated. The firing of these scientists throws vital agricultural research into immediate disarray as the scientists who run the projects are unable to staff and support the research. These cuts have meant the immediate end of research with long-term implications for agriculture, like research done by Cornell PhD student Alex Lando who studies the potential for Entomophthoralean fungi which could provide a safer alternative to chemical pesticides. The loss of ARS staff and associated research will reverberate for decades and undermines much needed innovation in agriculture and forestry. 

Probationary Employees: The First to Be Laid Off

Employees in their probationary period, typically those with less than one year of service or two years in an excepted service appointment, have been particularly vulnerable to massive federal layoffs. On January 20, 2025, the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) issued a memo to all federal agencies that led to the firing of thousands of probationary federal employees. The number of probationary employees at the USDA and the extent of their firings is unclear as the agency has not publicly reported their staffing cuts. While the firing of nearly 6,000 USDA probationary employees was determined to be illegal, it is possible that the scope of firings has been and will be much wider. Using public data from OPM’s Fedscope federal workforce data, we estimate the number of probationary employees across the USDA is more than double that number, meaning thousands more critical staff may be vulnerable to cuts.

According to the most recent FedScope data available, in September 2024 there were 12,231 employees, or 12.42% of the USDA’s workforce, that had been in their position for less than one year. These employees were most likely still on probationary status and the number is likely higher considering that probationary periods may extend for up to two years for some positions.

Among USDA divisions, the National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) had the highest percentage of employees with less than one year in their position (17.42%), likely due to recent efforts to rebuild staffing levels following its relocation to Kansas City. The Forest Service (17.27%) and Agricultural Research Service (15.47%) also had high shares of employees with less than one year in their positions, suggesting that any widespread layoffs could disproportionately impact these agencies. 

Divisions with the highest percentage of employees with less than one year of service include (full table in appendix):

Geographic Breakdown: Where Layoffs Could Hit Hardest

Looking at employment patterns by state, USDA employees in the western US appear to have the highest likelihood of being affected. California had the largest number of USDA employees with less than one year in their positions (1,733), followed by Oregon (1,042), Montana (776), Idaho (734), and Washington (622). In percentage terms, Idaho (21.1%), Montana (20.8%), and Oregon (20.79%) had some of the highest shares of newer employees. These states could see significant staffing reductions if layoffs target probationary employees.

Telework, Return-to-Office Orders, and Additional Workforce Reductions

In addition to layoffs of probationary employees, on January 20 the White House issued an Executive Order requiring departments terminate remote and telework arrangements for federal employees. This will likely lead to further staff reductions if employees are unable or unwilling to work in-office or to relocate if their duty station is not local. 

According to the FedScope data from September 2024, 42.74% of USDA employees (42,086 individuals) were eligible for telework. While not all telework-eligible employees will leave their jobs if required to return to in-person work, even a 10% attrition rate among this group could result in more than 4,000 additional departures.

Divisions with the highest percentage of telework-eligible employees include (full table in appendix):

If USDA continues pushing for a full return-to-office policy, the loss of telework-flexible jobs could further exacerbate staffing shortages.

Implications for Farmers and Rural Communities

Significant workforce reductions at USDA will have far-reaching implications for farmers, ranchers, and rural communities that depend on agency services. Agencies like NRCS and FSA play critical roles in delivering conservation assistance, loans, and disaster assistance programs. A depleted workforce in these divisions could lead to delays in program delivery, reduced technical assistance, and weakened implementation of conservation and farm resilience efforts.

For example, NRCS has already lost a substantial portion of its 1,299 employees with less than one year in their positions, impacting the agency’s ability to process Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP) and Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP) contracts—two programs that are hugely popular and over-subscribed. Already, only about one quarter of CSP applications are funded each year. Staffing cuts endanger the recruitment, ranking, and support for these hugely popular programs, and will guarantee frustrating and necessary delays for producers. Further, NRCS, and FSA staff located in county service centers are hardworking, respected members of rural communities. Indiscriminately firing them only harms the social and economic fabric of small towns across the country.

Restoring USDA’s Workforce

Without confirmed numbers from USDA, we can only estimate the scope of current layoffs—but reports suggest thousands of employees. The impacts of the first wave of USDA layoffs are already being felt by farmers and rural communities. In an NSAC briefing on March 6, Adam Chappell, a farmer from Cotton Plant, Arkansas, shared his dismay about staff losses: “The NRCS in Arkansas, we depend on it. It has saved our farm a couple of times because it’s allowed us to implement programs and conservation that have allowed us to cut inputs like herbicides and fertilizers and things. And without them, I wouldn’t be here fighting the fight now. And we were already short staffed in Arkansas.” 

Plans for even more widespread staff cuts would be devastating and would undermine the ability of farmers to access the support they need, especially as tariffs threaten an even more difficult few years ahead. 

The administration’s indiscriminate staffing cuts have already had significant consequences, leaving farmers and rural communities without critical support. The USDA must immediately stop these reckless and indiscriminate firings and take urgent steps to rehire essential staff to restore its capacity to deliver vital programs and services across farm country.

Appendix: USDA Staff

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Contact: Laura Zaks

National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition

press@sustainableagriculture.net

Release: NSAC Holds Briefing as USDA Funding Freeze and Layoffs Threaten Farmers and Communities Nationwide

Washington, DC, March 6, 2025 – Today, the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC), a coalition of more than 150 farm, food, conservation, and rural organizations, held a virtual briefing on how the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) funding freeze and employee layoffs are affecting farmers and ranchers. 

Panelists – who called on USDA to end the freeze and release funding on all signed contracts – included farmers from North Carolina, Arkansas, Wisconsin, Nebraska, and California. These farmers shared their own stories of how the ongoing federal funding freeze – in addition to significant layoffs at USDA – has created challenging and often dire circumstances for farmers and communities from coast to coast, threatening farm viability and livelihoods. 

Rachel Bouresssa of Wisconsin said “I have EQIP and CSP contracts. I also work with organizations with RCPP agreements. At a time that I am looking forward to the growing season ahead, I am unsure if many of my contacts will be paid. … It’s not just my work. There are many small businesses, from excavating companies to plumbers, engineers, and suppliers that will also be impacted and they may not even know it yet. These are small businesses in rural communities. 

“The NRCS in Arkansas, we depend on it. It has saved our farm a couple of times because it’s allowed us to implement programs and conservation that have allowed us to cut inputs like herbicides and fertilizers and things. And without them, I wouldn’t be here fighting the fight now. And we were already short staffed in Arkansas. We’ve got NRCS agents manning two or three counties and we just lost 40 plus employees. We were short to start with, so what does that mean about payment processing?,” said Adam Chappell, a farmer from Cotton Plant, Arkansas.

Steve Tucker from Southwest Nebraska said “We have a lot of big companies that do big runs of product, but on the flip side of that, there’s nobody to take care of the smaller brands who are doing more specific specialized products and want to work directly with farmers …. So {I got} a Resilient Food Systems Infrastructure (RFSI) grant … to try and help provide some funding to help get these things off the ground. I had farmers on board. … I had {consumer packaged good} brands,… We put this together, had numbers. And then this freeze happened and I went back to ’em and they said, nothing’s going to go until that freeze comes off or the freeze disappears, then we’re done, we’re out,” Tucker lamented. 

Patrick Brown of Warren County, North Carolina has 90% of his acreage enrolled in a Partnership for Climate-Smart Commodities program. He was scheduled to plant 500 acres of grain this spring and the contract was scheduled to go through 2028. 

“Now that the current project has been frozen and we’ve actually already done the work as far as planting those cover crops in the fall, we’re now going into the 2025 growing season with financial uncertainty whether or not I have to face the fact of putting this farm back into collateral and bond operation capital in order to plant a successful crop or wait on the federal government with emergency relief, which we still have not received,” said Brown noting that “without farming, we don’t eat and it is really terrifying going into this year faced with this level of financial uncertainty, but also the markets and the tariffs that are being announced daily, and the mental health aspect of farming as well.”

Anna Knight of Redlands, California talked about the impact of the funding freeze on Local Food Purchase Assistance (LFPA) program, saying “every single week, my farm packs 1,000 food boxes with 12 different kinds of fruits and vegetables sourced from 25 different farming families. … we receive about $6,000 a week for this produce. We’ve been in contract with USDA for the last 12 months in order to produce these boxes and we’ve been planting, harvesting, weeding, packing in this effort. On Monday, we were alerted that this program was frozen and that tomorrow, Friday the 7th is going to be our last delivery. …For us, this represents an immediate $60,000 loss…Collectively, this suspended contract represents $300,000 that immediately is gone and our farmers don’t have an outlet for. LFPA has been such an important and impactful financial bridge that has helped so many farmers in my region be able to get back on our feet and connect with community members who really need this fresh produce. This is a real economic impact and economic loss for the farmers in my community.”

Mike Lavender, NSAC Policy Director, added that “stories like those shared by today’s panelists are playing out in countless communities nationwide. The ongoing federal funding freeze is threatening livelihoods as we speak – and creating uncertainty, confusion, and anger among the very people the Department is meant to serve. It’s high time for USDA to end deliberation of whether or not to honor its own word, and to immediately release funding on all signed contracts.”

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The National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition is a grassroots alliance that advocates for federal policy reform supporting the long-term social, economic, and environmental sustainability of agriculture, natural resources, and rural communities. Learn more and get involved at: https://sustainableagriculture.net

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Shortly after his inauguration on January 20, 2025, President Trump issued an array of executive orders, a practice that has become common in recent years. However, abnormally, several of these executive orders triggered a pause on broad swaths of federal funding. As a result of this pause, the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) is now refusing to make payments to farmers on signed contracts for voluntary conservation. By threatening to renege on these contracts, the Trump Administration is breaking commitments to farmers and threatening the economic stability of rural America.

Since the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) in 2022, America’s farmers, ranchers, foresters, and rural small businesses have been signing up in droves to receive funds by entering into formal contracts with USDA. Rural residents in every state have benefited from the IRA through contracts to support conservation efforts on working lands and to improve energy efficiency and energy independence. These programs are designed to provide reimbursements, where farmers take on the initial expense of any contracted project with the expectation that USDA will promptly reimburse them. However, the freeze on payments is preventing those timely reimbursements from happening.

Many projects funded through the IRA are already a year or more underway, and consequently farmers and ranchers have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars out of pocket, trusting that USDA would hold up their end of a legally binding agreement. Pausing IRA funding means leaving tens of thousands of farmers holding the bill for work they were legally promised they would not have to complete alone. Many now face an unplanned expense so large it could destroy their farm businesses. Crushing farms by withholding contractually promised funding is not only unlawful, but it harms rural communities by undermining families that are central to local economic growth, and leaving small businesses that service the farm economy all across this country in a state of panic.

On Friday, February 21, Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins released the “first tranche” of IRA funding originally promised to farmers. Unfortunately, this release represents less than 1% of the IRA funding already guaranteed to farmers through signed contracts. As farmers make decisions for next season’s planting and rural businesses operate in a challenging economic climate, this announcement fails to address the sheer scale of the promises broken. The nation’s farmers, and rural America as a whole, deserve the certainty that the USDA will honor its commitments and immediately release funds on all signed contracts.

What Rural Programs Are Supported by the IRA? 

IRA funding has reached rural communities and farmers through a number of programs. This post focuses on the boosts that the IRA provided to working lands conservation programs and the Rural Energy for America Program (REAP). 

The IRA appropriated more than $19.5 billion to existing agricultural conservation programs administered by the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS): 

• $3.25 billion for the Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP)
• $8.45 billion for the Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP)
• $4.95 billion for the Regional Conservation Partnership Program (RCPP)
• $1.4 billion for the Agricultural Conservation Easement Program (ACEP)
• $1 billion for Conservation Technical Assistance (CTA)

These programs are long-standing conservation programs that help farmers, ranchers, and foresters maintain and adopt conservation practices on their land and keep their land in agricultural production.  Farmers pay for conservation improvements such as planting cover crops, prescribed grazing, efficient irrigation, nutrient management, improving tillage programs, and planting wildlife habitat. These are all classic conservation activities that address a wide variety of farm-site and environmental challenges, above and beyond limiting a farm’s greenhouse gas emissions. In fact, the IRA targeted funds at the majority of the most popular practices supported through contracts over the last three years.

Table 1: Top CSP Activities Funded By Acres – Pre IRA

Table 2: Top EQIP Activities Funded by Acres – Pre-IRA

These conservation contracts operate almost entirely on a reimbursement and cost-share model. EQIP has a total payment limit of $450,000 and CSP $200,000, meaning that farmers enrolling in both programs can incur significant costs before receiving reimbursement from USDA. Further, since EQIP allows contracts up to 10 years in length and CSP requires five year contracts, farmers who enrolled in either program at any point in the last three years have likely already begun to make expenditures on their contracts, or are already halfway through building entirely new infrastructure on their farms. Both programs offer to support the planning, design, materials, equipment, installation, labor, management, maintenance, or training costs of adopting conservation practices, meaning farmers are asked to take the lead in paying for every element of the conservation practices outlined in their contracts, and those contracts stipulate each element, from the first written plan through final installation in the field. Interrupting such contracts at any point guarantees farmers are left holding a big, even farm-threatening bill.

The IRA also appropriated $820.25 million to the Rural Energy for America Program (REAP). Since it was established in 2008, REAP has helped farmers and rural small businesses with grants and loan guarantees that help them improve energy efficiency and energy independence through projects like energy efficient irrigation systems and solar panels. REAP has been extremely popular with rural businesses and farms seeking to reduce energy costs and improve financial viability. As with conservation programs, IRA funding has provided a much needed boost to this wildly popular program. Read more about REAP and IRA funding in NSAC’s blog here.

IRA Boosts to Conservation Contracts

To date, the IRA has funded 30,715 conservation contracts across all 50 states, promising more than $2.3 billion directly to American farmers, ranchers, and foresters. 

Historically, these programs have been hugely popular with farmers and ranchers and have often turned away over 75% of many applicants each year because they lacked adequate funding. IRA funding provided a much needed boost to these valuable and trusted programs, which still proved insufficient to fund even a third of the farmers applying. These conservation programs are extremely popular with farmers and every year thousands of applicants are turned away due to lack of funding. Even with the boost from the IRA, just 31% of applications were awarded contracts in CSP in FY2023. 

Withholding IRA funds means breaking nearly 31,000 contracts with farmers and ranchers that support their farm’s financial and environmental sustainability. Of the $2.3 billion promised to farmers on those contracts, the majority is likely still in USDA’s coffers. As noted above, contracts span years, meaning some simpler contracts signed in the earliest years of IRA funding (FY2023) may already be paid out in full. However, the charts below show that over $1.9 billion worth of USDA’s obligations to farmers fall in FY2024 or later, meaning contracts signed within the last year. Farmers have likely only begun to make major expenditures under these contracts during this winter season, when many farms plan and make purchases to support their upcoming field seasons. This means the vast majority of what USDA owes farmers is both yet to be paid out, and must be delivered as fast as possible to avoid farmers making dramatic changes to their plans for the 2025 crop year. News articles and anecdotes from the NSAC network have already confirmed that many farmers have chosen to change their plans for this growing season, as these unnecessary and unlawful delays from the Trump Administration have shattered farmer trust in USDA and caused them to make what they feel are farm-saving decisions.

Table 3: IRA Supports Conservation Contracts

IRA Strengthens Rural Energy Independence

The IRA has funded 6,822 REAP grants across all 50 states, paying farmers and rural businesses more than $1 billion for projects that increase their energy independence and save costs, supporting $2.75 billion in rural economic development. Withdrawing IRA funds means pulling out of investments in rural businesses and rural energy independence. 

Table 4: IRA Supports Rural Energy Independence

Every State Benefits from the IRA

Farmers, ranchers, and rural businesses in every state have received conservation contracts and REAP grants funded by the IRA. The map below shows the total IRA funding paid to farmers and rural businesses through CSP, EQIP, ACEP, and REAP. 

The IRA has invested in rural communities, businesses, and farms in both red and blue states. These funds have provided a much needed boost to extremely popular and long-standing programs that support small businesses and farmers to reduce costs and ensure their viability. 

Conclusion

Through lawfully signed contracts, the USDA has promised critical funding to farmers, ranchers, and rural businesses in every state –  funds that stand to strengthen conservation efforts and advance rural energy independence. By reneging on these promises, the USDA is not only cutting off vital resources, but also breaking commitments to farmers and rural communities that have acted in good faith and moved forward spending their hard-earned money to honor their contractual obligations. The $20 million released on February 21 is only a drop in the bucket compared to the full extent of the financial support promised to America’s farmers. USDA must honor all existing contracts and agreements now, and communicate its commitment to do so to farmers with a unified voice at all levels of government. To do anything else is to tarnish the full faith and credit of the Department, and force unneeded fear and hardship on rural America writ large.

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