DES MOINES – Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Bill Northey today (Wednesday) announced that the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship will be awarding grants to twelve Iowa projects to help enhance the competitiveness of specialty crops grown in Iowa. The Department received slightly more than $296,720 through the Specialty Crop Block Grant Program from the USDA Agricultural Marketing Service to support the program.

Included among the grant recipients is Prairie Moonwort Hops Farm, LLC. The business will receive a $9,100 grant to determine the viability of hops plants, within the small plot (less than 10 acre) field common in the Loess Hills region of western Iowa, and to prove the marketability of “locally grown” hops to the emerging craft beer industry.

Iowa agricultural non-profit organizations, cooperatives, specialty crop industry associations or organizations, and producer groups were eligible to apply for funding. The maximum grant award from the Department to sub-grantees is $24,000 and administrative and indirect costs were not allowed.

Grant funds will be used for projects that benefit and enhance the competitiveness of specialty crops industry as a whole, and cannot be for projects that directly benefit a particular product or provide a profit to a single organization, institution, or individual.

“Specialty Crops” are eligible under the program include fruits and vegetables, tree nuts, dried fruits and horticulture and nursery crops, including floriculture. The funds not passed through will be used by the Department to administer the grant.

The rest of the grant recipients are as follows:

• Iowa Department of Public Health – WIC – $24,000 to increase the sales of fruit and vegetables at Iowa farmers markets and the consumption of various specialty crops resulting from an advertising campaign promoting the usage of the farmers market checks distributed to WIC participants.
• Iowa Lakes Community College – $20,000 to educate community youth, adults with disabilities, college students, and community patrons on specialty crop gardening, the nutritional benefits of locally-grown food, the physical benefits of gardening, and the economic resourcefulness of local produce programs.
• Practical Farmers of Iowa – $24,000 to enhance collaborative on-farm research and farmer to farmer knowledge sharing for successful specialty crops in Iowa.
• Iowa Food Hub dba Allamakee New Beginnings – $10,500 to enhance the Good Agricultural Practices (GAP)/Good Handling Practices (GHP) cost share program for Iowa fruit and vegetable producers.
• Iowa Honey Producers Association – $8,581 to establish an online searchable bee law website for general public use.
• Lutheran Services of Iowa – $24,000 to help refugees in Iowa improve their production of specialty crops and increase the availability of their produce to the public and to begin to transition their specialty crop businesses to independent operations.
• Iowa City Parks and Rec – $23,990 to create and teach within edible classrooms in order to promote specialty crops in Iowa City for community involvement at the Robert A. Lee Recreation Center.
• New Hope Community, Inc. – $22,643 to establish and create the Mahaska County season extension demonstration project for specialty crop production.
• Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship’s Farm to School Program – $14,900 to teach students through hands-on lessons about all aspects of gardening and healthy environmental alternatives to composting in a specialty crop environment.
• Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship – $46,693 to conduct the Iowa commercial horticulture food crops survey and economic impact study.
• The Iowa Wine Trail – $24,000 to increase awareness of specialty grape crops in Iowa through a marketing campaign.