Reaching High Value Markets: Resources and Grants
Value-Added Production | High Value Markets | Marketing and Business Management | Other
Value Added Producer Grant Program (VAPG)
- Competitive grants program
- Administered by the Rural Business Cooperative Service at USDA
- Helps producers move into value-added agricultural enterprises
- Assistance to farmers and ranchers in planning and capital investment for value adding enterprises
- Information about federal grant programs available to farmers and ranchers
- Templates for writing federal Value-Added Producer Grants (VAPG).
High Value Markets
USDA Report: Emerging Market Opportunities for Small-Scale Producers (PDF)
Growing Markets
- Information on how to tap your community’s market potential
- Tools to reach a unique high value market
- Programs to help advance farming systems that are profitable, environmentally sound and good for communities
- Competitive grants program providing grants to researchers, agricultural educators, farmers and ranchers, and students
- Provides financial assistance to farmers and ranchers who are transitioning to organic systems and those already conducting organic practices and want to add acres and/or livestock
Marketing and Business Management
The Agriculture Marketing Resource Center
- Broad range of information on value-added, direct marketing initiatives
- Links to Innovation Centers around the country at the state level
- ATTRA's guide on organics, value added processing, cooperatives and more
- General information and instruction about grants, legal guides, how to start a cooperative, how to write bylaws and articles of incorporation, exempt vs. non-exempt cooperatives, new generation cooperatives, patronage, etc
- Provides education, training, and technical assistance to cooperatively owned businesses
- Many resources available on website
- Primer on direct marketing, government programs and resources, success stories and more.
Other
USDA Rural Development
- Information about current programs available to individual producers, cooperatives and producer groups
- Funding opportunities and grants
- Agritourism: Increase Farm Income by Hosting Others on the Land
- Barn Restoration: Preserving the Past, Opening Opportunities
- Farm to School Program: Bringing fresh, local foods into schools
For more information on our work to create high-value markets, contact Wyatt Fraas, wyattf@cfra.org.
