Bayer Crop Science says it plans to “substantially expand” its Carbon Initiative Incentive Program for this season, according to Lisa Streck, carbon program grower lead.
“We were in just eight states in 2020, so we’re looking at greatly expanding our geography for our 2021 offer,” she says.
Last year, Streck says the company saw a lot of interest in the program from growers and had a waitlist of farmers wanting to join.
“We reached our target earlier than we had anticipated and saw huge demand from farmers wanting to participate,” she notes.
Streck adds that the company received positive feedback on how simple its carbon program was for farmers to implement.
“They also liked the fact that in our program, we pay per practice on a per-acre basis,” she notes.
Last year, the company compensated farmers $10 per acre or provided product discounts for implementing no-till or strip-till or for planting cover crops on acreage where those practices had not been used before. Streck says those aspects of the Bayer plan are the same for 2021.
“We are looking at opportunities to potentially add new practices in the future,” she adds.
To help with that, the company has developed a farmer-based carbon advisory panel to provide feedback on the program and offer recommendations for changes and additions.
Farmers wanting to participate in the Bayer program need to sign up for a Climate FieldView account. Through the account, farmers in the program can log data about their practices and their claims are then verified by satellite imagery.
“Having this digital connectivity between the data coming in through the FieldView platform, the use of satellite imagery, we can really start getting at how we quantify greenhouse gas emissions on the farm, and also enable that verification and reporting,” says Pamela Bachman, digital agriculture and sustainability manager at The Climate Corporation.
Bayer has committed to achieving a 30% reduction in field greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 in regions where the company operates.
More information is available at www.bayercarbon.com
This article will be updated with specific program information as it becomes available.
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