Projects
Dairy Genetic Predictions: More Than Profitability
A collaborative project between FSF, Zoetis, and 8 aligned farms was executed to show how focusing on genetic improvement through CLARIFIDE® Plus correlates to not only lifetime profitability but reductions in methane intensity, antibiotic usage and feed needed for maintenance on the farm. This project focused on animals that were born in 2015 and genomically tested as heifers. Study results showed that this group of farms averaged $1,552 lifetime profit per cow, 43% reduction in antibiotic usage, 23% reduction in the number of replacement heifers needed and 15.8 metric tons of methane reduced per 1,000 cow herd. These outcomes were achieved by focusing on utilizing the Dairy Wellness Profit Index ® (DWP$) from CLARIFIDE Plus.
PPF Sustainability Project
Farmers for Sustainable Food partnered with Peninsula Pride Farms to analyze data from 11 farms for the 2020-2023 crop years to learn how their farmer members are impacting local water resources and identify how current and future in-field best management practices are influencing sustainability metrics.
LASA Sustainability Project
Lafayette Ag Stewardship Alliance has partnered with Farmers for Sustainable Food to complete a five-year project that analyzed data from 15 farms for crop years 2019-2023 to demonstrate the impact of local conservation on sustainability, farm finances and local water resources. The project is the first Farm-Level Sustainability Project, developed and supported by the FSF and other partners.
Farm-Level Sustainability Project – crave brothers
Supported by Farmers for Sustainable Food, Crave Brothers Farm LLC analyzed three years of crop data (2019-2021) to assess if their current farming practices are having a positive impact on local stream water quality. The study showed that through the various conservation practices adopted by Crave Brothers, they have on-farm sustainability scores that are improving year-over-year and, in many cases, are better than national indicators. For example, greenhouse gas emissions are 12% lower that than national indicator scores for their production of corn silage. By using cover crops and no-till in project fields in the watershed, the farm has reduced sediment loading from the sub-watershed that they farm in by 5% to Crawfish River. View more outcomes in this one-page overview.
The Dairy Stream Podcast
The Dairy Stream podcast talks with Rachel Rushmann, Producer-led Program manager at Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection; Steve Richter, director of agriculture strategies at The Nature Conservancy in Wisconsin; and Lauren Brey, director of strategic partnerships and sustainability for Farmers for Sustainable Food, who together created the Producer-led Group Roadmap: Finding Success in Farmer-Led Watershed Organizations.
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About how you can support a project
Farmers for Sustainable Foods continues to help grow a network of farmer-led watershed conservation groups—closely supporting seven of them in Wisconsin. They are expanding innovative farming practices that are proving, by science and data, to be reducing the risk to the environment. Want to learn more? You can request more information below.