Notice of Funding Opportunity for NRCS’ Conservation Innovation Grants (CIG) National competition for Federal fiscal year (FY) 2019 | USDA NRCS NHQ CIG 19 GEN0010208

Opportunity Information: Apply for USDA NRCS NHQ CIG 19 GEN0010208

The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), working with the Commodity Credit Corporation (CCC), opened its FY 2019 national competition for Conservation Innovation Grants (CIG) under CFDA 10.912 (Environmental Quality Incentives Program). The basic goal of this funding is to push conservation forward by helping develop, test, and encourage the real-world adoption of new conservation approaches and technologies that fit alongside active agricultural production. In practical terms, the program is aimed at moving ideas beyond the concept stage and into field-ready tools, methods, and systems that producers can use, that NRCS can eventually incorporate into its technical references, or that can be picked up and scaled by the private sector.

NRCS announced up to $12.5 million available through this national competition. Individual awards could be as large as $2,000,000, and the opportunity anticipated making about 25 awards. Projects were allowed to run from one to three years, which signals that NRCS was looking for efforts that can plan, implement, and produce measurable results within a relatively tight timeframe, rather than long, open-ended research programs. The emphasis is on innovation with a clear pathway to broader use, meaning applicants were expected to think not only about testing something new, but also about how it will be transferred or demonstrated so it can be adopted more widely.

Eligibility was broad and largely unrestricted for U.S.-based applicants, covering non-federal entities and individuals, with one clear exclusion: federal agencies could not apply. The geographic scope was also wide. Applications were accepted from eligible entities operating anywhere in the 50 states and the District of Columbia, as well as U.S. territories and affiliated areas listed in the notice, including the Caribbean Area (Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands) and the Pacific Islands Area (Guam, American Samoa, and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands). This national reach reflects the program's intent to seed innovation across diverse climates, production systems, and conservation challenges.

The types of projects CIG typically supports were described as pilot projects, field demonstrations, and on-farm conservation research. The notice specifically defined on-farm conservation research as applied investigation designed to answer a specific conservation question using a statistically valid design while using farm-scale equipment on working lands such as farms, ranches, or private forest lands. That definition matters because it draws a line between general academic or laboratory research and the kind of practical, replicable, field-based work NRCS wants: research that is rigorous enough to be credible, but grounded enough to be used and evaluated under real operating conditions.

Applications had a firm deadline: they needed to be received by 5:00 p.m. Eastern Time on July 30, 2019. Submission was electronic only through Grants.gov, and late applications were not reviewed or considered. NRCS stated it would rely on the system-generated timestamp from Grants.gov as the official receipt record, which is a standard federal practice and effectively means applicants needed to plan around upload times, validation steps, and any last-minute technical issues. The notice also highlighted that Grants.gov uses the Workspace interface, which allows multiple people to work on an application package at the same time and to complete forms either online or via PDFs, but it also warned applicants to build in extra time for the multi-step registration process if they were not already registered.

Finally, the notice included an accessibility pointer for applicants who might need alternative communication formats, directing them to the USDA TARGET Center. Overall, this FY 2019 CIG national funding opportunity was structured to fund a relatively small number of sizable, time-limited projects that can prove out innovative conservation practices and technologies in the field, document results with credible methods, and actively support adoption by agricultural producers or integration into NRCS and private-sector channels.

• The Department of Agriculture, Natural Resources Conservation Service in the natural resources sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "Notice of Funding Opportunity for NRCS’ Conservation Innovation Grants (CIG) National competition for Federal fiscal year (FY) 2019" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 10.912.
• This funding opportunity was created on May 30, 2019.
• Applicants must submit their applications by Jul 30, 2019. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• Each selected applicant is eligible to receive up to $2,000,000.00 in funding.
• The number of recipients for this funding is limited to 25 candidate(s).
• Eligible applicants include: Unrestricted (i.e., open to any type of entity above), subject to any clarification in text field entitled Additional Information on Eligibility.

Apply for USDA NRCS NHQ CIG 19 GEN0010208

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