The RIPE100 Plan
RIPE100 is a proposal to directly pay farmers a minimum of $100 per acre or animal unit for voluntary land stewardship that can provide a greater benefit to the public through carbon sequestration, improved soil health, cleaner water, water conservation, flood mitigation, pollination, biodiversity and other environmental services. This approach is supported by many program precedents, volumes of peer-reviewed research, and offers producers adequate incentive to adopt key conservation measures.
RIPE100 is designed to remedy many of the shortcomings of carbon farming payment programs, which are a net economic loss for most farmers, and allows farmers to participate in both systems. It also promotes diversity, equity and inclusion by addressing barriers that have often kept farmers of color, smaller diversified farmers, women farmers and young farmers from participating in previous conservation programs.
The RIPE100 plan:
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- Enables all farmers and ranchers to participate with a producer-friendly program that is simple and practical. The list of qualifying practices includes realistic options, such as utilizing cover crops and nutrient management, on farms of all sizes and types. The simple enrollment program would not include ranked applications, ensuring all producers can participate.
- Rewards early adopters and demonstrates greenhouse gas “additionality,” allowing all producers to be compensated for the environmental benefits they deliver regardless of when they adopted conservation practices.
- Compensates voluntary stewardship at levels that align with the combined environmental values delivered, including mitigating climate change, conserving water and improving water quality, enhancing soil health, preserving biodiversity, protecting endangered species, mitigating floods and improving air quality.
- Promotes equity and inclusion by addressing barriers that have often kept producers of color, smaller diversified producers, women producers and beginning producers from participating in agricultural programs.
- Does not compete for funds against existing safety net programs. The program will be appropriated as part of new funding streams for climate change and environmental benefits, such as a new title in the Farm Bill or a climate bill. (A pilot or initial phase may be authorized and appropriated within standard funding vehicles.)
- Complements existing markets and programs by allowing stacking payments up to the public value delivered by the practice. Program will leverage biofuel markets and other conservation programs and policies, such that producers may receive benefits from multiple programs so long as the total payment does not exceed the value the public receives from the practices.
- Allows producers to receive a reasonable return, with payment levels that surpass policy costs, including the full cost to implement voluntary stewardship practices plus indirect costs impacted by climate regulations such as higher fuel and fertilizer prices. This payment is $100 per acre for the pilot and first phase of the program.
This plan is uniquely designed to ensure that climate policy will not hamper farmer profitability, offering a path to involve farmers as true champions of climate policy as part of a broader bipartisan climate coalition to improve American farmers’ financial and environmental sustainability.
RIPE100 Phases 1 & 2
The program is designed in two phases. The goal of Phase 1 is to leverage the Democratic commitment to quickly launch climate policies and programs with a proposal that can benefit farmers’ profit opportunities through voluntary stewardship on a per acre or AU basis. If the first phase is successful, agricultural representatives can advocate for expanding the program to allow farmers and ranchers to include a greater share of their operations in the voluntary program.
In Phase 1:
- Producers enroll, attend a conservation workshop and adopt high-value conservation practices that are compensated at $100/acre or animal unit. The workshop provides information on best practices to address climate and other priority environmental resource concerns. Producers will select and adopt one stewardship practice that is practical and suitable to their operations and be compensated at $100/acre or AU.
- Producers self-certify practices and USDA oversees program integrity. Following the established precedent of existing NRCS programs, farmers and ranchers will self-certify the adopted conservation practices using established NRCS protocols. Self-certification will be required annually and submitted to the NRCS for validation.
- Annual payments continue once participants develop comprehensive conservation farm plans. The program is intended to provide annual payments to producers at $100 per acre or AU with increasing acreage enrolled for farm or ranch, as the program budget grows. Technical assistance will be provided to producers at no cost to them to develop ongoing conservation farm plans and to support successful implementation.
- Enrollment is a simple and equitable process that does not penalize early adopters. To ensure that producers of all types have equitable access to the program, RIPE100 integrates equity principles and rewards farms and ranches of all sizes and types. Early adopters who have previously adopted stewardship will not be penalized and will fully qualify for the payments.
- USDA will manage the program. USDA shall receive the funding for administration, educational programing, farm plan development and technical assistance. USDA will receive funds to oversee the program, including an audit of up to 5% of participants.
- Augments private sector payments for carbon farming, maximizing producers’ options. Private carbon farming payments only work for a small portion of farmers, due to the small size of the market, low carbon price, and high transaction costs. RIPE’s proposal complements private carbon markets with a public program that offers producers a direct and reliable investment without middlemen. It also allows farmers and ranchers to participate in both programs, maximizing their options.
Phase 2 aims to:
- Expand the program budget to allow enrollment of all producers who wish to participate with as many acres as they wish
- Refine payment terms to reflect the latest science and give incentives for performance-based practices that maximize farmers’ options
- Have funding that will fairly compensate producers for their voluntary stewardship at rates that are profitable above all policy costs, including fertilizer and other input cost increases. The RIPE100 program can be adapted to work with any size fund that Congress deems suitable to appropriate.
The specific policy design elements are being co-designed with agricultural producers and stakeholders.