Farmers can earn incentives by implementing new practices
By Diego Flammini
Staff Writer
Farms.com
Farmers now have the opportunity to earn rewards for their environmental stewardship efforts.
In July, Bayer launched a pilot program in the U.S. and Brazil aimed at paying producers for capturing carbon.
In the U.S., the pilot focuses on corn and soybean producers within nine states who adopt cover crops, no till or strip till as new practices.
“The incentive that we put in place for growers if they meet those requirements and are in the focused geography, we’ll provide them a $10-an-acre (payment),” Chad Bilby, U.S. commercial experimentation lead with Bayer CropScience, said during an informational webinar Thursday morning.
Producers must also use Climate FieldView to be a participant.
This requisite allows farmers to share field data with Bayer and helps Bayer validate that farmers are meeting the program requirements.
“Let’s say this past year (a farmer) wasn’t doing no till or cover crops,” Bilby said. “They could then add both of those as new practices going forward that would allow them to qualify (for the program).
“Let’s say they were doing no till last year. They could continue to do no till and still qualify but would need to add cover crops as a new practice.”
Bayer can use digital technology to verify historic and continued use of program practices to provide the $10-per-acre payment.
Producers enrolled in the program could receive their payments by harvest 2021, Bilby added.
Once Bayer verifies the credits from producers, the company could use the credits in different ways.
Bayer could put the carbon credits towards its own use to lower emissions, or connect companies looking for carbon credits with farmers, said Leo Bastos, head of carbon business model with Bayer.
Some companies have already started to buy carbon offsets in the marketplace.
In April 2018, for example, ride-sharing organization Lyft began purchasing offsets to lower the amount of carbon it emits into the atmosphere.
Since then, the company has purchased more than 2 million tons of carbon offsets.
Bayer sought to enroll about 1,200 farmers between the U.S. and Brazil in the fall 2020 program. That number has been exceeded and other enrollment opportunities could be available in spring and fall 2021 as well as spring 2022, Bilby added.
Jason Lay, who grows 2,650 acres of cash crops in Bloomington-Normal, Ill. is among the U.S. participants.
He utilized strip tillage on his corn acres for the last nine years and implemented no till on his soybeans in 2011. He’s since added 200 acres of cover crops as well.
Signing up for the program provided different potential opportunities, Lay said.
“I was extremely excited about the opportunity to uncover an additional revenue stream and also uncover the multitude of benefits that (the program) not only presented me as a farmer but also all of society and the industry,” Lay said during the webinar.
Some of the benefits Lay has noticed since signing up for Bayer’s program include better soil health, nutrient-holding capacity and less fertilizer leeching out of the soil, he said.