Alliance to Advance Climate-Smart Agriculture

The Alliance to Advance Climate-Smart Agriculture is a pilot program that will incentivize and reward farmers and ranchers for adopting climate-smart agricultural practices.

Under the three-year, $80-million program, the Alliance and its partners will help producers in Arkansas, Minnesota, North Dakota and Virginia prove the value of paying farmers and ranchers $100 per acre or animal unit for stewardship practices — delivering public value through carbon sequestration, greenhouse gas reduction, improved soil health, water quality, water conservation, and other environmental services.  The pilot is led by Virginia Tech with participation from more than 14 additional partners, as part of the USDA’s Partnerships for Climate-Smart Commodities program.

Led by Virginia Tech's College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, the Alliance will distribute more than $57 million of the largest grant in the university’s history to producers to enact climate-friendly practices and serve as a pilot program for a national model.

The program will rely heavily on research and programs at Virginia Tech, including the Global Agricultural Productivity (GAP) Report and insights from experts in the Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics, the School of Animal Sciences, and the Eastern Shore Agricultural Research and Extension Center.  Virginia Tech researchers will track the greenhouse gas savings of the initiative as they are implemented, quantify the benefits of other environmental impacts such as reduced soil erosion, and examine consumers’ willingness to pay for products with climate-smart labels.

The Alliance officially launched in September 2023.  For more information, including eligibility for interested producers, please visit www.allianceforcsa.org.