Farmer Conservation Leader Subaward Program: Supporting Changemakers in the Mississippi River Basin

Overview

Wallace Center’s Farmer Conservation Leader Subaward Program is a competitive subaward program for the Mississippi River Region (HUCs 07 and 08), that aims to address the diverse needs of historically underserved farming communities, center networking and co-learning among subawardees, and resource underserved farmers as conservation leaders. This program will work with an advisory group to support eight to 20 organizations collaborating with underserved farmers on water quality, habitat, or forestry improvements, thus reducing phosphorus and nitrogen loss.

The goals of this subaward program are to:  

• Work directly with Native American, Black, Hispanic or Latino/a/e, Asian, and/or other historically underserved farmers on novel or innovative techniques, methods, or approaches that reduce nonpoint source pollution and increase the sustainability and resiliency of their operations; 
• Leverage partnerships to increase knowledge sharing and collaboration within and among historically underserved communities; 
• Collect and analyze data to demonstrates the results of funded projects; 
• Disseminate results to communities to inform future conservation or management practices and expand adoption of the most cost-effective and sustainable approaches.

Proposed activities for this program must fall entirely within the Upper and Lower Mississippi River Region (Gulf drainage portions of Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Missouri, Arkansas, Mississippi, Louisiana).  

Overall Process and Timeline

Given that many application processes offer timelines that reinforce inequities and prevent intentional relationship-building, the Wallace Center is using a multi-phase project design process: 

Initial concept phase. Applicants will submit brief concept notes (requirements detailed in Section 4 of the RFA) by May 15, 2023, to be assessed competitively against other applications received by a review panel of project advisors and Wallace Center staff. The review panel will select applicant to move to the next phase and provide feedback to all applicants by June 2023. 

Project co-design phase. Applicants selected to move forward will receive initial awards of up to $8,000 to complete the collaborative co-design phase through approximately September 2023 (see RFA for additional details).  

Award phase. Applicants will submit finalized implementation workplan, evaluation plan, and communication plan along with requested contractual information and EPA data quality assurance documentation, where required. Contracting is expected to take place between October and December 2023. 

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