
Grass-based farmers in Wisconsin just got a big boost in the form of three grants to Wisconsin organizations from USDA’s Grazing Lands Conservation Initiative (GLCI). USDA announced earlier this week the 38 groups around the nation that received 2024 GLCI awards.
In Southwest Wisconsin, the Valley Stewardship Network got funding to increase managed grazing acreage through outreach and education, including mentorship by area grazers, matchmaking between landowners and custom grazers, and education to promote bird-friendly beef. The Network will also provide technical assistance on mapping, modeling, funding application assistance, and grazing plan writing and will monitor the project’s impacts on water quality, soil composition, and biodiversity.
Glacierland Resource Conservation & Development Council, Inc. has been working in recent years with several producer-led watershed groups, including building collaborations between farmers with cover crops and nearby graziers whose livestock can terminate those cover crops through grazing. The GRCD Council’s $1 million GLCI grant will let them expand this work as well as build programs on Champion Graziers, Grazing Mentors, pasture walk/workshop events, develop grazing management plans and help farmers implement climate smart agriculture practices.
GRCD Resource Conservationist, Kirsten Jurcek, says, “We love our work with watershed groups, and this funding will help us expand it greatly. It’s exciting to train more, younger grazing planners and passionate staff. And it’s wonderful to see younger people from local community colleges and schools come out to grazing farmers to see what grazing does for the environment, for farmers’ bottom lines…and for people’s hearts.”
Golden Sands Resource Conservation and Development Council, Inc., received funding to hire one full-time Grazing Specialist and a summer intern. Their Building the Buzz about Grazing in Central Wisconsin project will address local grassland habitat concerns in priority grassland bird areas, provide improved managed grazing technical assistance to family farms across central Wisconsin, and improve access to this technical assistance in underserved communities.
MFAI’s Policy Director, Margaret Krome, says, Wisconsin can take pride in having three such excellent proposals. We can also be proud and grateful that our own Senator Tammy Baldwin led the nation in fighting for funding for the Grazing Lands Conservation Initiative. In July, the Senate passed a funding increase in the Fiscal Year 2025 appropriation for GLCI, from $10 million to $20 million. We will have to protect that funding next year in negotiations with the House, but meantime, this week’s awards show clearly why graziers in Wisconsin and across the nation have reason to be very grateful for her leadership!
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