Support our mission
Donate Today: Support Sustainable Farming Across the Upper Midwest
At Farmers for Sustainable Food, we support farmers who are leading the way in sustainable farming practices, which benefit not only their farms but also their entire communities. With farmers leading the way, we’re finding long-term solutions to today’s environmental challenges that collectively focus on environmental, economic and social good. We’re driven to create sustainable prosperity for the entire food system and the world as a whole.
Our Impact
In 2023, 254 farmers from six different farmer-led groups supported by Farmers for Sustainable Food participated in the annual survey, encompassing 249,628 acres and 353,037 head of livestock.
The sustainable practices measured in the survey include soil sampling, nutrient management planning, cover cropping, reduced tillage, no-tillage, low disturbance manure injection, planting green, grassed waterways and buffer strips.
Results show potential valuable benefits to climate health, soil health and water quality:
- Reduction of greenhouse gas emissions by 33,617 metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalents, equivalent to the emissions produced by 8,001 cars in a year.
- Prevention of sediment loss from farm fields of 338,391 tons, equivalent to 33,839 dump trucks’ worth of soil.
- Reduction of phosphorus runoff by 423,958 pounds of phosphorus, potentially preventing 211.9 million pounds of algae growth in local water bodies.
In 2024, we continue to make an impact and expand our efforts to unite, inspire and empower more farmers and their partners in conservation.
Meet the farmers
Sustainable farming practices, such as cover cropping and no-till usage, are prevalent on Grosskreutz’s farm today. The main benefit Grosskreutz noticed because of cover cropping was the increase in organic matter.
“Originally, we just tried cover crops on a small portion of our acres, and then eventually we did it on half of them. Now we’re doing it on all our acres,” Grosskreutz said. “Another thing we’re trying is putting rye on some of our acres, taking it off in July or early August, having more of a long season cover crop. It’s neat to see how the ground responds to this.”
Learn more about Skip here.
Seeing the environmental impact new sustainability practices are making on their farm encourages Sandy Larson of Larson Acres to keep discovering new conservation practices.
“We started seeding cover crops because we wanted to improve the soil erosion in our fields,” Larson said. “We believe this will continue to greatly improve soil health years into the future.”
Learn more about Sandy here.
A third-generation dairy farmer, Gault owns and operates Gault Valley Farms in Neosho with his brother, Dave, and their families. Although the brothers have been on the farm throughout their lives, they took ownership of the 79-year-old multi-generation family farm in 2004 when they purchased it from their parents.
“Through all those years, it was conventional farming,” Gault said. “In 2009 we started converting to no-till, and we planted our first cover crops in 2011. Now, we’re 100% no-till and nearly all acres have cover crops. My long-term goal is to have a five-year crop rotation.”
Learn more about Ken here.
We can't do this alone
Stand with us as we cultivate a brighter future for generations to come. Your support fuels our work as we empower farmers in their sustainability journeys.
We’re asking for your support as we continue our mission. We can’t do this alone – donate today!
Please note: FSF is a 501(c)(3) and donations to it may be tax deductible as allowed by law.