The California Department of Food and Agriculture selected 33 organizations for Climate Smart Agriculture Technical Assistance awards, totaling $2.1 million. Recipients, including several conservation districts and the California Land Stewardship Institute, will provide technical assistance to the applicants and awardees of CDFA’s Alternative Manure Management Program (AMMP) and the Healthy Soils Program (HSP). A summary of the 2019 technical assistance awards is here. CDFA says that, during the application phases for these programs, the technical assistance award winners will perform outreach for the programs and assist farmers in many application-related tasks such as developing a project design, estimating the benefits of proposals, and submitting applications. After the AMMP and HSP projects have been awarded, technical assistance providers will continue to work with farmers to implement the projects and meet reporting requirements.
"These technical assistance grants are so important to supporting farmers and ranchers of every size and in every region of our state understand the application requirements as well as the kinds of climate smart agriculture projects that qualify,” said CDFA Secretary Karen Ross. "We are pleased to partner with so many different organizations and technical experts to help our agricultural community mitigate greenhouse gases and adapt to climate change.”
For every appropriation to Climate Smart Agriculture Programs, CDFA devotes at least five percent of the funds to technical assistance grants through a competitive request for proposals. Technical assistance efforts are prioritized to farms of less than 500 acres, and at least a quarter of the funding will be spent on assistance to Socially Disadvantaged Farmers and Ranchers. The Climate Smart Agriculture Technical Assistance Funding is part of California Climate Investments, a statewide program that puts billions of Cap-and-Trade dollars to work reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. For more information, visit the California Climate Investments website at www.caclimateinvestments.ca.gov
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