In the coming months the USDA Agriculture Marketing Service will be releasing an RFP focusing on Pinpointed Organic Market Development as part of their Organic Transition Initiative. This program will develop new and expanded markets for targeted domestic organic products by providing more resources and market certainty for producers and processors transitioning to organic or initiating new organic production and processing capacity.
There will be approximately $75 million for grants and $25 million for commodity procurement. The goals of this project are:
- To develop new and expanded organic markets by providing more resources and certainty for business transitioning to organic or initiating new organic production and processing capacity.
- Create more new and better markets for targeted domestic organic products.
- Drive demand for domestically- produced agriculture products by investing in certified organic processing and product development.
The current concept for the $75 million grant program is as follows:
- Investments will be primarily regional and or crop specific.
- The Program will target key markets to ensure meaningful impact.
- Investments will fund activities outside the organic certification process to avoid duplicating cost share program.
More information can be found here.
To apply, applicants must have an active grants.gov account and a unique entity number. This can take up to a month or more to process.
Please email Willow Aray at waray@ccof.org with questions about this initiative.