This spring, NOFA-VT awarded our fifth annual round of Resilience Grants to fund projects aimed at improving long-term resilience on farms and in communities across Vermont. We received a record 171 applications and just over $453,000 in requests from farmers around the state - marking a 10% increase in requests from 2023. Ultimately, we awarded 56 grants –benefiting a total of 61 producers including multi-farm projects – totaling $150,443.84 in awarded funds. These grants provided up to $2,500 per farm, with multi-farm applications receiving up to $2,500 per participating farm or organization. Thirty-two (57%) of the grants were awarded to farm businesses that are Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC)-led, LGBTQ farmer-led, and/or disabled farmer-led, with 18 (32%) of our recipients identifying as BIPOC.
We continued to learn this year about the ways that farmers define resilience and continued to see a significant need for a funding structure that offers more flexibility than traditional grant programs are typically able to provide. We saw many recurring themes from past grant rounds, demonstrating some shared resilience needs, including:
- Soil health-building practices such as organic fertility inputs, permanent no-till beds, and rotational grazing infrastructure.
- Agroforestry practices and biodiversity-supporting efforts, including plantings of native trees and shrubs, perennial cropping systems, and silvopasture.
- Water improvement projects such as rainwater catchment, irrigation supply, and monitoring systems for production resilience to drought.
- Community food security efforts, including community garden projects, sliding-scale offerings, produce grown specifically for area food shelves and meals-on-wheels programs, and educational programming on growing and preparing foods.
- Economic viability and farm diversification improvements including post-harvest storage, farm stands for expanding markets, and equipment to launch new ventures.
This year’s Resilience Grants were funded with donations to the NOFA-VT Resilience Fund as well as generous support from Canaday Family Charitable Trust, M&T Charitable Foundation, One Hive Foundation, and WaterWheel Foundation. If you're interested in supporting the resilience of local farms, please consider donating to our Resilience Fund today.
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2024 Resilience Grantees
Dandelion Farm, Westford
This farm will use funds to purchase and plant many native perennial shrubs. These shrubs will serve as vital pollinator habitats for overwintering, and an abundant food source in the spring. By creating an ideal environment for native bees, butterflies, and beneficial insects, we promote pollination and natural pest control leading to higher yields and better food for our community.
Hurricane Flats Farm, South Royalton
Broadbrook Mountain Trees, South Royalton
This farm & nursery are working in tandem to fund the propagation, trial research, and eventual stocking of native tree & shrub species. There is a local dearth of readily available native shrub stock, which can be essential in conservation efforts to promote habitat for native pollinators.
Inch by Inch Permaculture, Lyndon Center
This farm is using funds to expand their perennial fruit and flower operations, furthering habitat and food sources for native pollinators.
NewGrass Farmstead, Wolcott
This farm will use funds to build a swale behind their barn, diverting water away from their barnyard and to a previously droughty section of their farm. This once-droughty area will be planted with native trees & shrubs, utilizing a variety of flowering dates & growth habitats, to support native wildlife and pollinator habitat/food sources.
La Montañuela, Bristol
This farm & vineyard will use funds to contract a local shepherd to graze their flocks throughout the vineyard. This silvopasture collaboration will improve the fertility of the vines, while reducing pest pressure, and the fossil fuels needed to maintain vineyard rows.
Hobby Hill Farm, Newfane
This farm will use funds to build permanent raised beds for their organic saffron operation. Most of their 2021 field bed crop was lost to flooding, and their 2023 crop suffered from rot - raised beds will provide the necessary drainage to allow their crops to survive extreme precipitation.
Ezili’s Respite Farm & Sanctuary, Groton
This farm will use funds to build an accessory on-farm business to sell their products on-site. Their mission is to feed the growth and resilience of rural Black and transgender people, while addressing the rural food desert in the Upper Valley/NEK, by offering a sliding-scale payment option at their store.
Under Orion Farm, Marshfield
This farm will use funds to purchase additional rotational grazing equipment for their grass- fed sheep operation, allowing them to increase the frequency of their pasture rotations - reducing parasite loads and improving soil organic matter.
Lower Notch Farm, Bristol
This farm will use funds to rent the necessary equipment to excavate a waterway that was destroyed by the severe flooding in 2023. This project is necessary to divert excess water from future flooding events away from their blueberry fields.
Willing Hands Farm, Norwich
This farm will use funds to purchase certified organic compost, soil amendments, and cover crop seed in an effort to return nutrients to & bring into production a field that has been fallow for nearly a decade.
Feast Farm, Montpelier
This farm, who grows food for a senior meals-on-wheels-program, will use funds to complete the construction of a permanent wash/pack station. The 2023 flooding forced the farm to move locations, and this funding will allow them to more quickly return to previous levels of production.
Blackmore Farms, Georgia
Bedrock Farm, Georgia
These two farms will use grant funds to purchase a Kooima Ag Skid Trner Composter attachment for their tractors, allowing them to significantly increase the volume of sellable compost produced from manure on their farms, in almost half of the time it currently takes with a conventional tractor bucket.
Kunsi Keya Tamakoce, Huntington
This farm & community gathering site will use grant funds to pay for the purchase and labor installation of fruit & nut trees around their property.
Stone’s Throw Farmstead, Shrewsbury
This farm will use funds to purchase and install a fertigation system on their land, ensuring consistent and reliable fertilization & irrigation of their crops. Additionally, after suffering a bacterial contamination of their well during the July 2023 floods, they will purchase and install a UV filter to ensure water quality for their irrigation systems.
New Village Farm, Shelburne
This farm will use funds to cover the labor and equipment needed to establish & support a host if community garden plots on their land. Their aim is to lower common barriers (e.g., time, finances, & land access) that often inhibit people from growing their own food.
Thistle Down Farm, Corinth
This farm will use funds to supplement the purchase and construction of a 16' x 40' high tunnel, to be retrofitted to provide winter shelter for all of their livestock, and storage, workshop space, and plant growing space in the summer months.
West Shore Farm, Alburgh
This farm will use funds to purchase and install a drainage pipe to the lower sections of a vegetable field that has seen consistently poor yields in our increasingly wet years.
The Growing Peace Project, Topsham
This educational farm & orchard will use funds to cover a suite of expenses associated with their summer and fall workshops series over the coming year. Their workshops cover a variety of topics, from growing a vegetable or pollinator garden, to family cooking classes, building a solar oven, or constructing bat boxes.
Green Mountain Girls Farm, Northfield
This farm will use funds to subsidize the offering of a series of Community Cooking workshops and demos, both on-farm and at the Northfield Farmers Market, enabling hands-on learning and community building centered around food & farming.
Shepherd Moon Farm, Corinth
This farm will use funds to purchase a solar-powered water system that will allow us to pump water from a well to a storage tank and use an existing gravity-fed livestock watering system. This project will eliminate the need for a fossil fuel-powered generator, thus making their farm more resilient and less reliant on unsustainable and expensive fuel sources.
The Darling Homestead, Williamstown
This farm will use funds to renovate (remove brush, add organic fertilizer, reseed, etc.) scrub pasture into usable, fertile hay land. This improves their long-term resilience as they’ll improve the quality and organic matter of their soil, while developing economic viability as they increase the amount of organic hay they produce.
Burke Hill Farm, South Royalton
his farm, who focuses on researching pre-industrial cultural practices and the crafting of locally made hand-tools, will use funds to purchase the necessary materials to host a wood-shed building workshop.
Bottomless Well, Corinth
This farm, who rotationally grazes a small herd of goats and provides a reliable source of meat for communities where goat is a cultural staple, will use funds to increase the size of their herd and access new electric fencing equipment.
Solidago Farm, East Calais
This farm, which primarily operates as a seed farm, will use funds to diversify their business by purchasing the equipment necessary to set up a small pastured poultry processing operation on their farm.
Stori a Hafen Farm and Orchard, North Hero
This farm will use funds to subsidize the purchase of a greenhouse, enabling the farm to extend its growing season, thereby diversifying its crop production and increasing financial resilience.
Abenaki Tribal Garden, Braintree
This community garden, focused on growing traditional foods to distribute to the community, will utilize funds to purchase compost, seeds, and canning equipment for their workshops.
Our NEK of the Green Farmstead, East Hardwick
This farm, which has thus far had to haul water from their home to their pastured livestock, will use funds towards the establishment of a professionally dug spring & pump system.
Small Step Farm & Drift Farmstead, Roxbury
These farms will use funds to invest in infrastructure that supports the efficient & proper handling and distribution of their vegetables. Additionally, they plan to purchase & set up an outdoor community shed and refrigerator for the upcoming season, as a place to offer vegetables for sale by donation.
Mama Tree Farm, Worcester
This new farm, which currently rents equipment to shape and manage their low/no-till vegetable beds, will use funds to go towards the purchase of a BCS walk-behind tractor, greatly increasing the productivity of their business.
Old Road Farm, Granville
This farm would use funds to purchase a point-of-sale (POS) system, a security camera, and a display freezer, so that they can offer more products, much more efficiently, in their self-serve farmstand.
Homecoming Seeds, Northfield
This farm, focused on seed-saving carefully stewarded, open-pollinated varieties of locally adapted seeds, will use funds towards digging an irrigation pond on their farm.
Humble Heart Homestead, Morrisville
This small farm will use funds to purchase the necessary equipment to create a closed-loop poultry production system on their farm - from hatch to processing.
Grassroots Center, Marshfield
This farm, working in conjunction with the White River Conservation District, is in the process of developing a hickory nut oil business. They will use funds to purchase additional hickory saplings, fertilizer, and irrigation equipment.
Maple Wind Farm, Richmond
This diversified livestock farm will use funds to purchase the materials needed to build a new fencing system for their pastured-based hens. The fence will be attached to the mobile range coop the birds live in, thus significantly reducing the labor necessary to move electric fencing.
Bread & Butter Farm, Shelburne
Chrysalis Landworks, Shelburne
These neighboring businesses, after struggling recently to find reliable contract haulers for their livestock, will use funds to purchase a livestock trailer that they will use collaboratively.
Moon and Stars, South Royalton
This organization, in an effort to eventually involve local school children in the educational growing of heirloom crops on their land, will use funds to acquire the necessary equipment (seed, tractor rentals, soil tests, etc.) to remediate land leased to them by the town of South Royalton.
Folk Fauna, Wolcott
This farm, intending to offer sliding-scale workshops on the cultivation of native plants & medicinal herbs, food processing and preservation, small animal processing and pelt tanning, seed saving, and more, will use funds to build a covered outdoor learning space and a storage shed for workshop related supplies and materials.
Greybar Farm, East Randolph
This farm, in an effort to expand their offerings and accept SNAP/EBT at their farmstand, will use funds to expand the display infrastructure and electrical & internet access at their store site.
The Farm Upstream, Jericho
Bone Mountain Farm, Jericho
These farms, who recently collaboratively purchased a farm to grow their diversified organic vegetable operation, will use funds to access the equipment & labor necessary to build a farm stand, creating a new point of access for local, healthy food.
Sylvan Moon Farm, Putney
This farm, having recently moved from leased to owned land and interested in transitioning away from tillage to a low-till system, will use funds to purchase a significant amount of compost to aid in the establishment of fertile permanent beds.
Full Circle Heritage Acres, Benson
This farm will use funds to complete a number of resilience-building projects, including building a berm to direct water away from their vegetable beds, increasing their capacity for cold storage of crops, and expanding their fencing for rotationally grazing livestock.
Miss Weinerz, Burlington
This small farm and cottage kitchen will use funds to purchase the necessary materials to build a space for processing produce, packing goods, & hosting workshops.
Wild Woods Maple, Walden
This sugaring operation will use funds to purchase a customized, waterproof, and durable 10'x10' canopy to help advertise their business at the market. The canopy will also be utilized at community events hosted at their sugar house.
Agrigorial, Jeffersonville
This farm will use funds to purchase a walk-in cooler to service both the needs of their commercial kitchen and farm stand. At the front of the cooler, a three-door display section will hold produce, value-added products, and products bought in from other VT producers.
Montpelier Farmers Market, Montpelier
The Montpelier Farmers Market will use funds in order to offer a scholarship program for our 2024 summer market season to help subsidize vending fees for underserved & minority farmers.
Clearfield Farm, Granville
This farm, who are involved in a SARE (Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education) study on the impacts of delayed potato planting on the population of Colorado Potato Beetle (CPB), will use funds to upgrade from hand planting specialty potatoes on a waterwheel transplanter to a small 2-row mechanical planter.
The Sole Connection Farm, Arlington
This farm, which produces mushrooms in indoor cultivation chambers, will use funds to purchase a solar generator, warding their business against the power outages associated with increasing extreme weather events.
Sandy Bottom Farm, Isle la Motte
This farm, after experiencing bigoted vandalism to their greenhouses this summer, will use funds towards installing a perimeter 8ft fence on their small farm.
Calabash Gardens, Wells River
This organic saffron farm will use funds to finish building and outfitting their certified commercial kitchen, allowing them to diversify their business into value-added products.
June Farm, Burlington
This cut flower farm will use funds to purchase and install a walk-in cooler on their farm, allowing them to hold more product and for a longer period of time, thus extending their season and increasing their economic resilience.
Uphill Farm, Rochester
This farm will use funds to purchase a walk-in cooler for their produce storage, increasing their flexibility to harvest and store crops before extreme weather-related events, extend our growing seasons, and increase inventory in an attempt to create a more profitable, sustainable business.
Westminster Wagyu, Westminster
This farm, utilizing a cost-share with the State's Best Management Practices (BMP) program, is using funds to cover the remaining costs associated with building a 3 sided concrete manure stack pad. Additionally, they will be taking a borderline wetland out of grazing production and establish a 50-foot vegetated buffer to reduce total farm nitrate and phosphorus runoff.
Hampshire Hill Homestead, Worcester
This small farm will use funds to expand their pastured poultry operation, purchasing the materials to build new mobile chicken tractors, and the necessary feed, water, & fencing equipment.
Tanglebloom, Brookline
This cut flower farm, now expanding into on-farm workshops & educational activities, will use funds to construct a covered outdoor space to hold such events.
Hestholl Icelandics, Richmond
This small Icelandic sheep dairy will use funds to outfit a newly built milk parlor with the necessary milking equipment needed to certify them for selling raw milk to the public.
New Leaf Organics, Bristol
This farm will use funds to cover the seed, fertilizer, & labor costs associated with growing & donating thousands of dollars worth of organic produce to Bristol’s Have a Heart Food Shelf.
Learn more about Resilience Grants >