Awarded Grants
Below is a listing of our awarded grants that tackle big food and agriculture challenges.

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430 Grants found

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Breeding and Characterizing New Cultivars of Grain and Fiber Hemp

Year Awarded  2023

FFAR award amount   $750,000

Total award amount   $1,500,000

Location   Ithaca, NY

Matching Funders   International Hemp

Grantee Institution   Cornell University

Hemp growers have been largely limited to varieties of hemp cultivated in Canada or Europe, but these crops do not thrive in all growing regions of the U.S. Cornell University researchers are also developing varieties of hemp that will deliver higher yields, especially at lower latitudes in the U.S. The research team is developing new hemp cultivars using marker-assisted selection that show promise in southern latitudes and have specific desirable traits. Cornell breeders are selecting for late-flowering individuals grown in trials in New York, North Carolina and Florida that also produce high yields of CBD, which has never been achieved before.

Researchers Investigate the Promise of Food Procurement

Year Awarded  2023

FFAR award amount   $954,556

Total award amount   $2,023,732

Location   Fort Collins, CO

Program   Tipping Points

Matching Funders   Colorado State University, Cornell University, Glynwood Center for Regional Food and Farming, NY Farm Viability Institute and The Rockefeller Foundation

Grantee Institution   Colarado State University

Building upon the Tipping Points research, researchers at Colorado State University aim to co-create a replicable and adaptable model that municipalities can use to guide food procurement decisions.

Increasing Motivation and Promoting Persistence in Farmer Conservation

Year Awarded  2023

FFAR award amount   $120,238

Total award amount   $246,924

Location   Columbus, OH

Program   Achieving Conservation Through Targeted Information, Outreach and Networking (ACTION) Program

Matching Funders   Walton Family Foundation

Grantee Institution   The Ohio State University

Almost half of growers who do not implement conservation practices have positive attitudes about those practices. This project is testing the effects of interventions meant to close this gap. Researchers will develop targeted engagement that addresses farmers’ needs, including plans for overcoming challenges and maintaining motivation to continue conservation practices when financial incentives end. The team is developing interventions that target the gap between valuing conservation and implementing practices, assessing their effectiveness and creating guidance for scaling up the proposed interventions.

Novel Farmer-to-Farmer Learning Approaches to Cultivate a Culture of Conservation in the Mississippi River Basin

Year Awarded  2023

FFAR award amount   $127,676

Total award amount   $262,200

Location   Sparta, WI

Program   Achieving Conservation Through Targeted Information, Outreach and Networking (ACTION) Program

Matching Funders   Walton Family Foundation

Grantee Institution   University of Wisconsin-Madison Division of Extension

This project is testing two engagement approaches to increase farmer willingness to adopt conservation practices. These approaches facilitate peer learning among farmers. The first approach is a series of virtual meetups for farmers to foster peer-to-peer conversation about implementing conservation practices. The second approach is a mini-grant program that will support pairs of farmers and farm advisors to implement edge-of-field practices, learn how to become opinion leaders and develop multimedia to encourage other farmers to adopt conservation practices.

Equipping Conservation Professionals and Farmers with Tools to Deliver Edge of Field Practices

Year Awarded  2023

FFAR award amount   $226,636

Total award amount   $480,426

Location   Ames, IA

Program   Achieving Conservation Through Targeted Information, Outreach and Networking (ACTION) Program

Matching Funders   Agricultural Drainage Management Coalition, Illinois Sustainable Ag Partnership, Walton Family Foundation

Grantee Institution   Iowa State University

The cost and complexity of technical assistance is a major barrier to large scale adoption of edge-of-field conservation practices. This project is equipping professionals and farmers to deliver edge-of-field practices at scale in the Upper Mississippi River Basin. Researchers are studying models being used to implement these practices and are compiling intervention and engagement strategies that can be tailored to local conditions and target audiences. The project is using these studies to produce data-driven decision support tools that will allow farmers to scale up practices.

A Multi-Source Remote Sensing-Based Framework & Decision-Support Tool for Flash Droughts & Floods Under Climate Change

Year Awarded  2023

FFAR award amount   $434,038

Total award amount   $966,119

Location   Knoxville, TN

Matching Funders   University of Tennessee, Knoxville

Grantee Institution   University of Tennessee, Knoxville

Ninety percent of crop losses in the United States occur due to extreme weather. Flash floods and droughts are increasing in severity, but farmers have limited information on how to manage crop, soil and water in response to changing climate conditions. Researchers at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville are developing and testing a weather-based tool to bolster field operations across the Tennessee River Basin in the face of both long- and short-term weather hazards.

Integrating Genomics, Milk Spectrometry & Microbial Manipulations to Mitigate Enteric Methane Emissions from Dairy Cattle

Year Awarded  2023

FFAR award amount   $2,301,499

Total award amount   $3,301,496

Location   Madison, WI

Matching Funders   Innovation Center for U.S. Dairy, ADM, the Council on Dairy Cattle Breeding (CDCB), Elanco, Genus plc, JBS USA, the National Dairy Herd Information Association, Nestlé and the New Zealand Agricultural Greenhouse Gas Research Centre (NZAGRC)

Grantee Institution   University of Wisconsin–Madison

Cows and other ruminant animals produce enteric methane as part of their natural digestive process. This methane is the single largest source of direct greenhouse gases in the dairy sector. University of Wisconsin–Madison researchers are combining interventions addressing breeding, data on milk composition and rumen microbes to selectively breed U.S. dairy cattle with lower emissions.

Hydrogen Production and Hydrogen Utilization in the Rumen of Beef & Dairy Cattle: Key Rumen Microbiome Measurements to Understand Mechanisms Controlling Methanogenesis & Mitigating Enteric Methane Emissions

Year Awarded  2023

FFAR award amount   $1,066,820

Total award amount   $3,221,254

Location   Champaign, IL

Matching Funders   Innovation Center for U.S. Dairy, ADM, the Council on Dairy Cattle Breeding (CDCB), Elanco, Genus plc, JBS USA, the National Dairy Herd Information Association, Nestlé, the New Zealand Agricultural Greenhouse Gas Research Centre (NZAGRC) and the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

Grantee Institution   University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

Cows and other ruminant animals produce enteric methane as part of their natural digestive process. This methane is the single largest source of direct greenhouse gases in the beef and dairy sectors. University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign researchers are studying how diets and different additives affect hydrogen production, which is essential to producing enteric methane, and how changes in hydrogen affect the amount of enteric methane produced.

Using sensors & psychological profile to increase compliance of wean to market barn biosecurity

Year Awarded  2023

Total award amount   $125,930

Location   St-Hyacinthe, Canada

Program   Wean-to-Harvest Biosecurity Program

Matching Funders   Swine Health Information Center & Pork Checkoff

Grantee Institution   Pork Checkoff

One of the biggest farm biosecurity challenges is the enforcement of safe and hygienic behaviors from barn workers and visitors. To better understand biosecurity compliance, this research is using social and behavioral sciences to adapt interventions and establish improved biosecurity behaviors.

Development of an effective & practical biosecurity entrance system

Year Awarded  2023

Total award amount   $179,933

Location   Columbia, MO

Program   Wean-to-Harvest Biosecurity Program

Matching Funders   Swine Health Information Center & Pork Checkoff

Grantee Institution   University of Missouri

A common practice to minimize the introduction of disease in swine barns is for everyone entering a swine facility to use a shower-in and shower-out system. However, it is a challenge to enforce the use of these systems across all farm workers and personnel. This research is evaluating the effectiveness of an innovative, easy-to-use biosecurity-effective entry system for commercial pig farms to replace the laborious shower-in and shower-out system to provide a simplified, effective alternative for barn entry and exit.