Corteva Inc. recently announced the payments to farmers who have credits from participating in the 2021 Corteva Agriscience’s Carbon Initiative in its pilot year, according to a release.
This is a massive step towards validating carbon markets in the agriculture space, as creating solutions that assist and incentivize farmers to reduce emissions is crucial to the food system at large.
The initiative – first launched in April 2021 for corn and soybean farmers across Illinois, Indiana and Iowa – was developed to determine if the company could deliver scalable scope 3 emissions results for food company buyers that are consistent with climate accounting guidance. The commercial pilot is paired with fundamental research, such as soil sampling acres beyond the current agency requirements to create a dataset that acts as a baseline for monitoring progress over time.
“In partnership with our strategic collaborators, Corteva Agriscience is moving the needle when it comes to delivering carbon solutions at scale in agriculture,” said Emma Fuller, Corteva Agriscience’s carbon and ecosystems program leader. “Soils are a high-potential pathway for reducing and sequestering carbon to address greenhouse gas emissions – but these programs must deliver real outcomes and work at scale on millions of acres to make an impact. That is where pilots, such as the scope 3 work through Corteva’s Carbon Initiative, are critical.”
Corteva’s Carbon Initiative also fulfilled its first significant expansion in August 2021 in a collaboration with Indigo Ag. The two companies’ missions align, as Indigo Ag’s investments in science and technology continue to expand eligibility and enhance the measurement, reporting and verification necessary to create high quality carbon outcomes.
“Scientifically rigorous quantification is the key to success for both sides of the agricultural sustainability market – from growers looking to translate their efforts to the most value, to the companies looking to reduce their scope 3 emissions with confidence and trust in the realness of the results,” said A.J. Kumar, vice president of sustainability sciences at Indigo Ag. “Our use of the DayCent-CR model to estimate soil organic carbon changes in agriculture in this pilot is a powerful demonstration of how this best-in-class science can be implemented at scale.”
There are currently more than one million acres enrolled in the program. Corteva Agriscience plans to release the next round of payments to farmers in the coming months.
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