Santa Cruz, California, USA
October 27, 2009

Beginning immediately, and for the next two weeks, farmers are urged to comment on-line regarding their perspectives on the Natural Resource Conservation Service’s $50 million Organic Initiative, says the Organic Farming Research Foundation, the survey sponsor.

The Organic Initiative, offered through the federal Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP), debuted in May 2009. It targeted organic and transitioning producers for financial and technical assistance to either improve existing organic acres or bring new acres into organic transition.

There’s a high level of urgency to quickly gather farmer opinions on the Organic Initiative because the NRCS will soon define the program for next year, says Mark Lipson, OFRF senior policy analyst. Deadline to complete the survey is November 10. OFRF will report the survey results to NRCS in mid-November.

“We feel that the NRCS is very open to hearing our recommendations on ways to make the program more farmer-friendly next year. We encourage any producer who is thinking about using the EQIP Organic Initiative to take this opportunity to register their views on ways to improve the program,” says Lipson.

Producers can link to the survey from http://ofrf.org/action/ofan/091026_alert.html. The short survey requires an average of about eight minutes to complete.

The Organic Farming Research Foundation was founded in 1990 to foster the improvement and widespread adoption of organic farming systems. OFRF sponsors organic farming research and education projects, disseminates the results to organic farmers and to growers interested in adopting organic production systems, and educates the public and policymakers about organic farming issues. The majority of OFRF’s board members are working organic farmers.

Website: http://www.ofrf.org

Published: October 27, 2009