RIPE is focused on delivering a program that fairly rewards producers for the public benefits they provide and at rates that surpass climate policy costs. With this in mind, the RIPE approach would scale to work with any range of funds Congress chooses to invest and leverage private markets to further bolster practice adoption.

A key RIPE  principle is not to compete for current funding from existing program buckets. Instead, we see the Farm Bill as a great option to insert a small program to demonstrate proof of concept while ultimately using other vehicles to invest in the full program.

The cost of a climate policy on agricultural inputs plus the cost of adopting stewardship practices will total around $67 per acre for many producers. Carbon farming payments will only deliver around $17 per acre to producers (at a carbon price of $50 per ton), leaving them with a net loss. However, farmers and ranchers who adopt stewardship practices deliver public benefits around $100-$300 per acre when stacking the ecosystem services such as soil health, climate, water quality, biodiversity, and more.

RIPE advocates for allowing producers to earn the stacked ecosystem service value of their voluntary practices, delivering value to the public and the grower.

Across the biggest U.S. commodities, the average cost of a climate policy would be $52 per acre. Looking across the spectrum of carbon farming practices, the average value is around $48 per acre, leaving most growers with a net loss. But that includes practices that most producers would likely not implement, such as biochar. If we only include practices that are popular with producers, then the average per-acre payment drops to $12. For most farmers and ranchers, the math of carbon farming payments alone simply doesn’t work.

RIPE’s approach does not conflict with private markets but rather depends on leveraging private markets to further scale key conservation practice adoption. RIPE insists that farmers retain their environmental assets and are allowed to sell them to private market interests. RIPE builds on the work of the private market by:

1. Encouraging a guaranteed price 

2. Reducing  intrusive farm-level monitoring 

3. Creating pathways for early actors to participate

Yes. RIPE’s approach  is designed to allow all farmers and ranchers to participate, including those who use Bureau of Land Management (BLM) lands for grazing.

BLM requires renters to specify their practices in the lease, so ranchers must check their lease to ensure the allowance of new practices they would like to adopt. RIPE’s approach includes practices that have been approved by BLM in ranching leases, when requested, such as: cover crops on grazing lands, riparian forest buffers, filter strips, livestock forage and biomass planting, riparian herbaceous cover, nutrient management plans (state or national protocols), and maintaining native grasslands. If the lease does not include these or similar practices, ranchers can integrate them when renegotiating their lease with BLM, thus enabling participation in RIPE’s program.

Additionally, RIPE supports partnering with ranchers and ranching associations to engage BLM in amending its regulations to allow ranchers to add conservation practices prior to their lease renewals, based on the precedent that BLM encourages permit holders to be stewards of the land they rent.

Yes. RIPE’s approach includes farm practices that mitigate flooding and would compensate farmers fairly for their implementation. 

Flood mitigation practices compensated by RIPE’s plan include cover crops, reduced tillage, rotational grazing, silvopasture and riparian buffers. These practices:

• Increase water infiltration into the soil rather than allowing the water to run across the land, reducing flood depth and duration on frequently flooded lands, especially in alluvial river valleys and areas with hydric clay soils.

• Hold soil in place during flooding. This prevents sedimentation in waterways and overland flow, and it reduces the amount of standing water on fields and pastures.