Little Rock nonprofit aims to standardize climate benefits for farmers

Farmers may soon have a way to get paid out of thin air, or rather what they don't put into thin air.

What's happening: Little Rock nonprofit Winrock International will lead a $20 million pilot project to develop a standardized climate-impact reporting platform for farmers.

• It'll be tested through suppliers to Arkansas' Riceland Foods and the Intertribal Agriculture Council of Montana.
• The platform is one of 70 climate-smart projects valued at $2.8 billion announced by the USDA last week.

Why it matters: It's estimated that agriculture contributes about 11% of greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S., or about 24% globally.

• While farmers have been adopting more climate-friendly practices in recent years, they lack a standard mechanism to record and capitalize their good works, Winrock's Mary Grady told Axios.

How it works: Grady leads Winrock's American Carbon Registry, the first private voluntary greenhouse gas (GHG) registry.

• The new online registry will use standardized USDA data so when a farmer reports planting a cover crop on 50 acres, they'll get the same credit as a peer down the road.
• Credits will accumulate into GHG certificates that can be issued and tracked.
• A farmer will be able to sell those — much like a carbon offset — or they can package certificates with their commodity when sold, effectively giving the buyer and the buyer's buyer — Tyson Foods or Walmart, for example — credit that can be applied to corporate emissions goals.

What they're saying: "Our objective is to reduce the cost burden on farmers to adopt a wide variety of climate-smart practices and to streamline the verification of climate results," Grady said in a news release.

• "The project will demonstrate how markets can deliver value directly to farmers by putting them in the driver’s seat," Grady added.