The Nature Conservancy Joins Groundbreaking Effort to Mobilize Agriculture to Fight Climate Change

WASHINGTON

AgMission™, a global collaboration to develop and implement climate-smart farming solutions, announced that The Nature Conservancy is joining the initiative as a Founding Partner. As such, the conservation organization is committing $5 million over the next five years to advance innovative agriculture-climate solutions that will meet the mutual goals of AgMission to reach net-negative greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) in the agriculture industry.

The Foundation for Food & Agriculture Research (FFAR), U.S. Farmers & Ranchers in Action (USFRA) and the World Farmers’ Organisation (WFO) founded AgMission, which brings together farmers, ranchers and scientists to co-create and rapidly expand innovation, adaptation and the adoption of climate-smart technologies. This unprecedented initiative centers on the development and deployment of a comprehensive, interoperable data-driven framework.

FFAR and The Nature Conservancy have jointly worked on conservation agriculture and climate issues since 2018. The Nature Conservancy’s partnership with AgMission represents the next step in advancing their collaborative efforts to achieve the mutual goal of driving climate solutions in agriculture.

While many scientists around the globe are advancing our understanding of agriculture, there’s no central force to mobilize this work to address climate change with farmers and ranchers – until now. The unprecedented collaboration and scale of this initiative is what makes AgMission different. It’s truly a privilege to have The Nature Conservancy’s valuable insight and vast network to move AgMission forward. Allison Thomson
AgMission Program Director

Agricultural activities within the farm gate contribute roughly 13 percent of global GHG emissions, yet have the potential to be a powerful climate solution. Agricultural research and data are critical to this solution, and AgMission’s strategy envisions a data-powered, climate-action framework that bolsters productivity and resilience, while enabling rapid-response adoption of farmer-driven, climate-smart solutions.

“Climate change is the greatest environmental challenge of our time,” said Kris Johnson, director of agriculture for The Nature Conservancy in North America. “Farmers and ranchers are on the frontlines and have an important role to play in driving solutions that could deliver a host of benefits, including improved water quality, enhanced biodiversity and a resilient food system. We need to help bring natural and technological innovations forward to tackle climate change together.”

The Nature Conservancy’s $5 million commitment, which will be matched by FFAR, will advance a number of innovative, data-driven projects designed to help farmers reduce GHG emissions and build more climate resilient operations:

  • Create, test and deploy incentives for durable soil health practice adoption in row crops;
  • Expand technologies that can increase adoption of regenerative practices;
  • Advance climate, nature conservation and socio-economic goals in range and pasture lands; and
  • Invest in research to advance adoption of regenerative agriculture as a climate solution.

The Nature Conservancy joins PepsiCo and McDonald’s USA as Founding Partners of AgMission.

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Foundation for Food & Agriculture Research

The Foundation for Food & Agriculture Research (FFAR) builds public-private partnerships to fund bold research addressing big food and agriculture challenges. FFAR was established in the 2014 Farm Bill to increase public agriculture research investments, fill knowledge gaps and complement the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s research agenda. FFAR’s model matches federal funding from Congress with private funding, delivering a powerful return on taxpayer investment. Through collaboration and partnerships, FFAR advances actionable science benefiting farmers, consumers and the environment.

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