Fernando Candia 

It’s about outcomes, right? It’s about delivering reductions in tons of CO2. 

 

Justin McAllister 

Farmers in the US, they’re already sustainable, but we can always be better when it comes to sustainability.  

 

Scott Manley 

We are here to make good, productive, profitable farms good waterfowl areas.  

 

Dusty Weis 

Welcome to the FARMSMART Podcast, presented by Nutrien Ag Solutions, where every month we're talking to sustainable agriculture experts from throughout the industry.  

As the leading source of insight for growers on evolving their sustainability practices while staying grounded in agronomic proof, FARMSMART is where sustainability meets opportunity. 

We don't just talk change. We're out in the fields helping you identify products, practices and technologies that bring the future to your fields faster. I'm Dusty Weis.  

 

Sally Flis 

And I'm Dr. Sally Flis, Director of Sustainable Ag Programs.  

And Dusty, I’ve been here at Nutrien Ag Solutions for five years now.  

One of my biggest takeaways from that time is that building partnerships—both in and outisde the agriculture industry, and in and outside our business—is what we need to move the needle on sustainability outcomes across the country.  

It’s certainly become a big part of the work I do, but it’s also something I’m really proud of.  

 

Dusty Weis 

And Sally, we’ve gotten to chronicle some of those partnerships over the last 70 episodes of this podcast… And I guess I didn’t realize when we started just how far outside the ag industry some of those partnerships stretched. But it’s been really cool for me to see the innovative ways you all have come up with to advance your goals.  

 

Sally Flis  

Yeah, Dusty, it's been a big group of people that we've brought into our programing over the years. We've got other conservation groups, we've got other industry partners, we've got other non-governmental organizations that are part of what we're doing.  

But one of our biggest successes that we've been able to celebrate is our ongoing sustainability initiative with Bunge, the world leader in oilseed processing. 

And when we announced that partnership a few years ago, we had the opportunity to discuss it with Fernando Candia, Bunge’s Head of Global Carbon Solutions.  

 

Fernando Candia 

We're quite an old company. We were established in 1818, so a long time ago. We started in Europe and have been kind of migrating to South America now headquartered in the US. We're a publicly-traded company with about 23,000 employees. We got about 350 facilities globally, and we operate in over 40 countries. But our purpose when you think of Bunge is we connect farmers to consumers basically to deliver essential and sustainable food, feed and fuel. That's our purpose. We're currently the world's leading oil seed processor by in terms of crush volume, and we're also a leading producer and supplier of specialty plant-based oils, fats, and also proteins.  

Our products are used in a wide range of applications such as animal food, cooking oil, flowers, bakery confectionary, dietary alternatives, plant-based meat, et cetera, et cetera.  

We also now, and this has been one of the key new drivers in the industry, we have a very important role to play in using our crop infrastructure to help basically expand the renewable energy industry.  

So that’s us in a nutshell, and what I do, Dusty, in Bunge is I've been in the company for 22 years, mostly as a trader in commercial roles. And up until recently I was running our business in Mexico, which we divested, and now I'm focusing on basically all our growth initiatives around novelty, regenerative ag, and also the origination partnerships that drive it. 

 

Dusty Weis 

Fernando, we hear the terms regenerative ag and sustainability a lot out in the world today, and there seem to be a lot of different definitions and motivations when those terms come up. So from Bunge’s perspective, what are the company’s interests and goals when it comes to sustainability? 

 

Fernando Candia 

So I'll start with the overall macro and then get into a little bit more of the strategy, how we're seeing it. We've been in this journey for more than 20 years. We have always focused on sustainability and as it evolved. But now we truly see this climate lens as it's fully integrated and as part of our business strategy. And the way we look at it is basically through a lens of three, call it pillars. One is action on climate, the other one is focusing on responsible supply chains. And then lastly is the accountability that comes with doing those three.  

So these are the three pillars. And then when you think about what are we doing about it, how do you do these three pillars? Well, we're focusing on four things that are driving a lot of these action on climate. One is regenerative ag, which I'm sure we're going to get into novel seeds and cover crops, which you think play a key role. Renewable fuel feed stocks, we feel we have a role to play. So it's not just about... We provide a lot of soy oil and canola oil from our crush plants for the renewable fuel industry, but we also provide a lot of the oils that end up turning into EUCO to a lot of the customers that use the vegetable oils. 

We sell a lot of the proteins to a lot of the customers that ultimately produce animal fats that come out that also are used for the renewable fuel industry. So we're a key part of this supply chain. And then lastly, plant-based foods, lipids and proteins, which we also see as one of the pillars of making sure we have an action on climate. And in these four pillars, if you want to think of these strategic pillars we're working on with many partners to make sure that we can deliver on that and ultimately drive our action on climate, making sure we have responsible supply chains and the accountability around it. 

 

Sally Flis: 

Fernando, looking at what we put forward for the program that we've announced with Bunge, can you describe that offering in a high level to the audience? Where are we going to be operating? What are the crops we're looking at and what are some of the outcomes that we plan to calculate working in this program? 

 

Fernando Candia: 

Sure. I mean, the initial program, we'll be focusing on soybeans grown in regions that are close to two crush facilities. One is our Council Bluffs, Iowa facility, and the other one is our Decatur, Indiana. And then obviously it's part of the future and seeing how our partnership evolves and how this program evolves, we have a lens on potentially expanding this to other locations and also expanding other crops, or at least that's the ambition and hopefully that's where we can get.  

We ultimately don't want to just focus on two plants. We want to do it at scale. That has always been one of the key principles of how we look at solving for regenerative ag.  

And basically what we're initially focusing on is on practices so basically cover crops, reduced tillage, nutrient management, and responsible pesticide use. Those are going to be the target that we're going to focus on initially, but ultimately we want to focus on outcomes.  

At least through the lens that we have at Bunge, and I think we share that vision, it's about outcomes. It's about delivering reduction in tons of CO2. These practices obviously are key drivers of that, and we're going to be starting by paying for those practices, but ultimately we want to move on to outcomes.  

We're going to be using your platform, your experience in driving this. We're going to be using Agrible to basically collect the data, track the data, but more importantly, and I think this is why we're excited about it, is using your expertise and your advice that you're going to be driving ultimately with a grower in how to achieve this and how to work on this. And I think that's one of the key anchors of our partnership, at least that we see it is your expertise combined with our franchise to be able to move these products and these environmental attributes. We really think it’s going to be very attractive for the grower to sign up. 

 

Dusty Weis 

Sally, that conversation with Fernando set the stage for a collaboration that’s still going on to this day. But in any first-time team up, there’s a lot of growing and learning together that needs to happen.   

 

Sally Flis 

For sure Dusty, and the Bunge team is really great to work with. I think I talk to somebody from Bunge probably almost every day, and Justin McAlister is generally that person.  

So we spent some time looking back on what we've done with them over the last four years. This is a program that I helped establish with Bunge. It's a program that we've had in the field for four cropping seasons. We'll have available again in 2026 for the 2027 cropping season in the US, and it's looking at what are those conservation practices around soybeans that we're able to get growers to implement, like cover crops, reduced tillage, improved nutrient management, so that we can see continuous improvement in the field and connect to those end users that are bringing it to consumer shelves. 

Additionally, we've added work with Bunge in Canada around canola oil, where we're working on, again, those regenerative practices that are really very unique for growers in regions of Canada, because practices like no-till have been widely adopted for 10 or 20 years. And so we're asking growers to try cutting edge things like interceding cover crops into the barley crop that comes before their canola, so that we can get at some of these sustainable impacts in the field for our growers and for Bunge's customers in the purchasing of canola and soybean oil. 

 

Dusty Weis 

We had the opportunity to speak with Justin McAllister, Bunge’s Regenerative Agriculture Lead, about a year into the program. And he told us that farmers were really buying in and contributing to the effort. 

 

 

Justin McAllister 

So in our efforts to support our customers, to promote low carbon growth, decarbonize their supply chains, we had a great mix of growers engaged on the program. 

You know, we've primarily been targeting new practices, but got a decent amount of existing practitioners into the program, so it's awesome to see a campaign come full circle to completion. 

 

Sally Flis 

Justin, what are some of the ups and downs that we've seen in this first year? You know, I'm not as involved on the ground. I work with you guys a lot on the program planning stuff, but I've got team members that are out there on the ground with you and your merchandizers. So what's working and what's not in this program at the moment? 

 

Justin McAllister 

There's a couple of things here, so I'll start with the things that could use a little work. And it's not necessarily because of anybody, it's just the nature of what we're trying to achieve here.  

But as we go to farmers and ask them to change their practices, there's a lot of data around what they're doing for their practice change. And so that data lift is very big and not all the data comes in a nice, clean form. So getting the data into a usable platform, Agrible, tends to be a little bit heavier lift and taking up a lot of time in the field.  

I think also getting farmers to understand why we're doing this and why we're collecting all this data. I think, you know, when you show up to the farm gate and start asking what products they’re using and how much they’re putting on their field and telling their whole field story, you know, sometimes they tend to shy away from sharing that information, not because it's top secret or anything, but just because they want to know what it's going to be used for. 

And so as we're trying to tell the narrative around how we’re decarbonizing, this data is very important and telling that story and producing these outcomes. So I think, you know, we have to be very transparent with our growers to help them understand that aspect of the program, and that this data collection piece is what's core to telling their sustainable story on their farm. 

 

Dusty Weis 

Now, Sally, I know this isn't your first rodeo, so to speak, as far as sustainability programs with other downstream partners, certainly Nutrien Ag Solutions has set up a few of these now, but as you hear Justin talk about what have been, from their perspective, some of the growing pains in the first year of this program, how does that stack up to the other experiences that you've had with other downstream partners, and what are the lessons that you can apply from those previous experiences? 

 

Sally Flis 

A couple of different things there, Dusty. Justin mentioned data. I don't know if we've had an episode where we haven't talked about data. If we can't show what a grower has done and what the practice changes that they're making, we can't measure that impact. 

So the data is always the key, and it's always a struggle when we were just having on a previous call today a discussion of, well, can't we just standardize the way we collect field boundaries and tell every grower that if they want to participate, this is the way we're going to collect field boundaries. And we had to have a bit of a discussion about, well, I mean, if you do, we can… we can say, we’ll only accept field boundaries that we get as shapefiles or that are in a farm management software system, but then we're going to limit who can participate, because not every grower is in the position to have that. 

Yeah, we have everything from data coming in from a farm management software system to having to sit down at the kitchen table with a grower, go through a book, having them point to a map on the field, outline it. And so really, in trying to be as inclusive of every type of producer on the ground, we've got to have lots of options for how that data gets collected. 

And that's one of the things we've really tried to do here at Nutrien Ag Solutions is offer multiple different pathways, whether it's with our crop consultants or our customer success team or our regional sustainable ag managers, to be there to help the growers understand how to do the data collection and get in the information that we need so we can make those measurements. 

But that data piece is always going to be critical because without the data, we can't get to those outcomes that Justin mentioned us being able to measure. 

Justin, what are the practices that a grower can implement or already be implementing, as you mentioned, we're signing up growers that are both doing practices already and growers for doing new practices. So what are the practices that can participate in this program? 

 

Justin McAllister 

Sure. One thing when we started this journey, we wanted to make sure we had a wide casting of a net to get anything different that a farmer's doing to be more sustainable, because, I mean, farmers in the US, I mean, they're very innovative. A lot of them have been around for generations, so they're already sustainable. But, you know, we can always be better when it comes to sustainability. 

So we wanted to hear and see what everyone's doing on their farm that's maybe a little different than the what we call traditional in the farming sense. And so we kind of settled on four primary categories. But within those categories there's a lot of flexibility.  

So first off it's reduced tillage. If the farmer is moving from conventional to no tillage. But we're also looking at going from conventional tillage to vertical tillage or strip tillage or some sort of variation in the middle there.  

We're also targeting cover crops. So if the farmer is planting a new cover crop or had planted cover crops in the past, we want to engage them to participate in the program.  

We also have an offering around rotation diversification. So if they've been producing one crop in their rotation and then they introduce another one, that can be a change. Or if they're a traditional Midwestern corn bean rotation and they introduce small grains or something, you know, we want to engage those growers or provide them an incentive to maybe make the investment to explore that possibility on their farm. 

And then the last main category is nutrient management. So once again, one reason why we wanted to work with Nutrien Ag solutions is that you're experts in fertility and solutions around managing crop nutrients better on the farm. And so we want to provide incentives for growers to explore other innovative products, whether it's, enhanced efficiency fertilizer or some sort of product in your portfolio that helps growers cycle their nutrients better. 

But also, we want to incentivize growers to not over-apply to make sure that they're monitoring their soil fertility and only applying what the plant’s going to need, not overdoing it, and then accidentally getting excess into the environment around them. 

 

Dusty Weis 

Now you're calling from the family farm in Missouri here, Justin… in fact, I think I hear some of the family in the background. Little kids, little critters running around in the background there. But being as you in addition to having this job with Bunge, work on the family farm as well. What have you been able to take from your experience at Bunge and implement as practices on your own farm? 

 

Justin McAllister 

Yeah, Dusty. So a lot of what I like to do on the farm, I kid my wife, I don't like to sleep. So between Bunge and farming, it keeps me very busy. 

 

Dusty Weis 

But that's why tractors have lights, right? 

 

Justin McAllister 

Exactly. And auto steer and all the other good stuff. Right.  

You know, one thing that I want to take away, or I always try to do on my own farm, is how can I put regenerative ag at scale on a commercial farm? Because we're talking to a lot of customers that this is their business. They do everything at scale. 

And so if I can't make it work, then why should I expect them to make it work? So I'm always looking for efficient ways to seed cover crops, which species work well in our program. I do multi-species cover crops across multiple fields and soil types. Also work with our nutrient management, be sure not to over apply and always looking for solutions, whether it's solutions to help with my nutrient cycling. 

I'm looking at biologicals as well, which is a new space in this arena. And then of course, the almighty one: reduced tillage. So when you don't have a lot of time but you also have some slopes that you don't want erosion to take over, you look for opportunities to be better at no-tilling. And so most of our ground is no-tilled these days. 

Something that my dad actually started doing a lot of the new innovative tools have come out with seed genetics and crop chemistry, but something that I've been able to take and run with and improve across a lot of our fields and seen very good results, not just in time management, but in keeping the soil in place. Being in north central Missouri, we have some decent ground, but, you know, we don't have the best, so we want to keep it all that we can. 

And then also getting back to the reduced tillage, no-till. And also that cover crop piece, you know, it's very important to us to try and keep the soils covered for most of the year as possible to help build organic matter, but also to keep that erosion in check. So and we've seen some great results from it.  

It's just working with growers. It's an investment. It's not free. And so I always like to think about that when we're asking our farmer customers to take on these practices, knowing that this isn't free, that they will see some, you know, some efficiencies gain, some cost savings, hopefully. But it's an investment and we're trying to help them justify that investment and make their farms better for generations to come. 

 

Sally Flis 

Justin, you mentioned a few of them there. But as we think about where does this program go after the first three years, what are some of the other practices that you're excited about to introduce, either on your own farm or to the growers in this program that'll keep driving the sustainability metrics year over year and that continuous improvement pathway? 

 

Justin McAllister 

Yeah, we're mainly concentrating on soy today. You know, I think there's some very interesting technologies coming out from a nutrient standpoint. Products out there such as nutrients, Titan additive that helps with phosphate cycling. You know, I've seen some good results on my own farm from that product. I think there's a place for it and in everyone's portfolio, but also biologicals. 

I mean, this is a space that we don't know a whole lot about yet. And I think it's going to continue to grow and open up a lot of opportunities for farmers to unlock some secrets in their soil. So adding those products in, but also adding that piece to the program to help farmers understand what's going on in their soil. 

So doing more analytics, you know, we keep finding new ways to measure the biology that's happening below the surface. And I think growers are going to be able to find a lot of efficiencies as they learn more about what's going on subsurface on their fields. So, you know, I think that's an exciting new frontier within this regenerative ag program. 

You know, I don't have a timeline yet on when we might be thinking about introducing some of these things, but I think these are some items that we're going to have to definitely consider going forward and then expanding outside of soy. I mean, Bunge's a handler of other grains as well. So corn, wheat. And so as we mature our program and look to provide solutions to our downstream and upstream customers, you know, there's definitely going to be some opportunities for us to start looking to implement programs that would also encompass those crops as well. 

And then from there, I mean, we're a global company, so we're looking at regenerative programs on a global scale and our South American and Europe footprint. And then also definitely looking at Canada as well. 

 

Dusty Weis 

A ton of lessons to parse from that ongoing relationship with Bunge, but a lot of sustainable success that we can point to and use as momentum for other such programs.  

And one of those partnerships got me really excited as a hunter and an outdoorsman… and involved a little field trip to a place I never suspected we’d get to visit for this show, Sally…   

And that is coming up in a minute, here on the FARMSMART Podcast. 

 

Dusty Weis 

This is the FARMSMART Podcast, and I’m Dusty Weis, along with Sally Flis… 

And Sally, I don’t like to play favorites with our podcast episodes. I think they’re all great. 

But there was one episode we taped where, when you told me about it, you probably remember being on that call with me, but I probably jumped out of my chair and ran around like a kid on Christmas morning.  

 

Sally Flis 

It was a really fun one to do, Dusty, when we went down to the Ducks Unlimited headquarters in Memphis, Tennessee. And we've done some great work with Ducks Unlimited in the 2025 cropping season for rice, where we're out helping growers measure soil, water and tissue testing in their rice production so we can figure out how do we tweak next year's 2026 nutrient management to continue to drive efficiency on these acres that are involved with the Ducks Unlimited programs that are trying to bridge the worlds of hunting and farming. 

And we spoke with Ducks Unlimited Agriculture Support Director Scott Manley when we made that trip to Memphis.  

 

Scott Manley 

Our formal mission, of course, is to take care of waterfowl habitat across all of North America so we fill the skies forever with waterfowl populations. And waterfowl are such a canary in the coal mine or a barometer of the health of the environment, especially wetlands.  

And like I said before, historical wetland areas are now modern-day agricultural areas. And you have to take care of them together. Farmers are good at that. And we are here to serve as a catalyst, a source of support, a source of information to make good, productive, profitable farms, good waterfowl areas. 

 

Dusty Weis 

Now, Scott, as a waterfowl hunter myself, I understand your mission. It's something that vibes with me very, very personally because I can speak from experience when I say it's hard enough to find good habitat to hunt duck in. 

So the Ducks Unlimited mission as far as preserving, protecting, and growing habitat for duck, that makes plenty of sense to me. 

But what about from a sustainability perspective? Why is protecting wetlands important from a sustainability perspective? 

 

Scott Manley 

Well, that's a great question, and I always try to simplify that down to convince people how related or intertwined or connected everything is. You know, when you look at a landscape that's busy producing food for the world, that landscape also is managing water, hopefully to the positive. It's managing soils, it's managing agricultural inputs. Those have greenhouse gas and environmental pluses and minuses. 

And then of course, you have that land for wildlife habitat as well. And it's actually all connected. So if you can get everything just lined up right, you can sort of have all wins, you know, the win-win-win type situation of a productive farm, great wildlife habitat, conserve soil and water and keep a really viable, profitable, sustainable landscape for farm communities going forward. 

So everything's connected. There's no separating the agriculture from the wildlife or the soil conservation from the water conservation. It's all connected. And that's what sustainability is all about. 

 

Sally Flis 

So, Scott, tell us a little bit about your background. What brought you to Ducks? What brought you to working in this agriculture/sustainability/wildlife intersection space for your career? 

 

Scott Manley 

Yeah, so I've been blessed. I actually didn't grow up on a farm. I'm not a farm boy, I grew up in Dallas, Texas, big city boy. Certainly Dallas is a lot bigger now than it was then, but surrounded by family who love the outdoors. So after I got out of high school, you know, went to college and got a wildlife degree and thought that I could travel the world as a wildlife technician and learn all kinds of things. 

And that's what I did. I actually worked everywhere from the South Pole, South America, up in Canada, Alaska. I've worked all over the world. My parents finally told me I needed a job that was enough to, you know, pay my car insurance. And so I went to graduate school at Mississippi State University and had a love for agriculture, even back in those days. 

Just realized that working lands, it's not like the set aside lands or the preservation lands, but as if you could learn to work with agriculture and you could learn to work with the oil and gas industry, those streams or those activities control or influence the land all over the world. If you can't work real good with agriculture and the oil and gas industry, then you're not going to touch but a fraction of the acres, you know, that are out there. 

And so one thing led to another. I went to grad school at Mississippi State University, did work on sustainability type stuff, looking at practices and dollars and profitability and all the things we still look at today. But, you know, I did that in 1995, 30 years ago. And I've been fortunate enough with Ducks Unlimited to carry that on till now. 

So I do think a lot of the things we do were a little ahead of their time. People would look at you kind of funny every now and then, but I enjoy that. So let's keep being a little bit ahead of the time. 

 

Dusty Weis 

You know, to that point, Scott, and you've been doing this for 30 years that you said, how has the conversation around sustainability evolved during that time? What have you seen change about the goals that we're setting and the way that we're talking about them? 

 

Scott Manley 

Oh, gosh, things have completely changed. And they continue to change. But, you know, I'd say 30 years ago, a statement from a producer or a farmer might be, “Well, yes, I'm sustainable or I still wouldn't be here farming today.” I'll take it about ten years later and you get statements like, hey, maybe an example was the oil spill, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf Coast. 

And the producers were, “We could band together and provide some habitat to keep these birds, most of these birds from getting into that oil. You know, here's a wildlife environmental stance we can make.” And they did. And then you go ten years later and you hear the talk was, “Well, people want to know more where their food comes from.” 

And they want to know more stories about the farms, farm families, rural development, economies, a story, a good sustainability story. What we have to have today is we have to have the data to back up the practices, the outcomes, the environmental benefits, data, data, data, data. So the journey continues to evolve and develop. But what we have to do is stay grounded in “it's farmer first.” 

They're the ones that control the land again as it would be in oil/gas industry, the other example I used, and all ideas, all progress has to start with a discussion with the man or woman making lots of decisions every day on how things will be operated and what we can do again to have all that, those interconnected wins I talked about earlier. 

 

Sally Flis 

Scott, the Rice Stewardship Program that Nutrien Ag Solutions just joined as a partner for, has been around for more than ten years. Where did it start? Why did it start? Who else is involved and how do you guys operate and get programs on the ground with growers? 

 

Scott Manley 

First of all, thank you all. Thank you to Nutrien Ag Solutions for believing in our work and joining us more formally. And I just can't thank you enough. Your participation in our project adds credibility to our project, I am confident of that and I can't thank you enough. But the stories on how Rice Stewardship started are many and so it's kind of fun sometimes. 

But the bottom line is the rice industry and its representative group, its advocacy group is called USA Rice. USA Rice, rice industry producer leaders, Ducks Unlimited, even some of the corporations like yourselves just realized that maybe we could do more together, more formally. Maybe we should structure things in the USDA, the Department of Agriculture, and what they call the Natural Resources Conservation Service we already worked with closely. 

Certainly we can get much more done together than we can sort of operating freely and apart. And so we put together a structure that was all about the mission to conserve working rice lands, water and wildlife. So there's the agricultural part, the conservation part, and the wildlife part, soil water conservation, the wildlife part.  

And then we wanted to use the strategies of on the ground improvements to farms, practices and infrastructure on farms, do a better job of communications, including policy work, and just a lot better job of promoting the synergy between Rice and Ducks. 

So we started by building a field staff team. As you know, with your field staff teams, that's very important to have folks on the ground interacting with the producers. We worked with USDA on lots of various funding mechanisms, and we have done a good job of publishing results, working on conservation practices, lots of communications work to get the word out as well. 

So it's a pretty big, well-rounded partnership. I could say it's the producers first, the on the ground field staff, U.S. Department of Agriculture, and the supply chain, which y’all are a giant part of, all coming together to uphold the rice industry. I think it's a model that could be used for any commodity. In fact, I'm certain it is. 

 

Dusty Weis 

So Sally, Scott did a good job there, sort of laying out the reasons why Ducks Unlimited would want to partner with an organization like Nutrien Ag Solutions, but let's flip that on its head a little bit. Why would Nutrien Ag Solutions partner with an organization like Ducks Unlimited? How is that helping Nutrien meet its goals? 

 

Sally Flis 

I think it brings us great opportunities, Dusty, for getting more conservation, more of our programs on the ground, whether they're directly tied to rice or, you know, as we were talking yesterday in our planning and strategy meeting, these growers are growing more than rice.  

And we have programs for corn, we have programs for soybeans where we can get conservation or sustainable outcomes happening on every acre on that farm, in addition to the rice.  

It also helps us get access to more value to every grower and every acre through those US government USDA funds that Ducks really has a better opportunity to obtain than Nutrien Ag Solutions does. And so how do we start bringing and stacking that corporate dollar, public dollar, private dollar together to bring the most value back to the grower for the practices and the impacts they're able to have on the ground. 

And so it's just a really great synergy between the two organizations for their goals and our goals, and putting the grower first as part of the programs that we're getting on the ground. 

 

Dusty Weis 

Scott, you guys have been doing rice stewardship for ten years now. What have been some of the big wins? What have been some of the things that you take back to the board and everybody says, “Holy cow, you managed to get that done? That's awesome.” 

 

Scott Manley 

Well, lots of things to be proud of. But if I sort of start with the most recent and work back, just recently, in the last couple of years, Tom Vilsack, who was the Secretary of the Department of Agriculture, announced what we call the Partnerships for Climate Smart Commodities Grants. This was about $3.5 billion made available to the conservation community for on the ground work with farmers that reduces the greenhouse gas footprint of agricultural production. 

And the Rice Stewardship Partnership applied for one of those grants, and he announced at Isbell Farms about two years ago from today that the grant proposal we turned in was the highest scoring, the highest ranking of 400 grants that were turned in. And I was so proud I could hardly believe what I had just heard. We actually asked for the cap of the grant application, which was 100 million, and we were awarded 80 million. 

And I'm certain there's a Lord above because he made me keep my mouth shut, I almost said, “Well, Tom, why did you only give us 80 instead of 100 if we were the highest scoring grant in the country?”  

So it was pretty funny. But that's something we're very, very, very proud of. We also have been recently just this past congressional cycle, our partnership was recognized by the host of senators and congressmen in all six rice growing states through a congressional resolution both in the Senate and the House. 

So being recognized by Congress! Six rice growing states, you know, all the congressional members put forth the resolution that was adopted and, you know, filed in the halls of Congress, that our partnership is an example or reflection of what can be done in this space. I think that that says a lot for all of us and says a lot for Nutrien joining forces with us. 

 

OUTRO 

That is going to conclude this episode of The FARMSMART Podcast. New episodes arrive every month, so make sure you subscribe to The FARMSMART Podcast in your favorite app and visit (nutrienagsolutions.com/FARMSMART) to learn more.  

The FARMSMART Podcast is brought to you by Nutrien Ag Solutions. 

And the FARMSMART Podcast is produced by Podcamp Media, branded podcast production for businesses. podcampmedia.com. I’m Dusty Weis. For Sally Flis and Nutrien Ag Solutions, thanks for listening.