International fund announces new projects selected in South America
In a little over two years of activity, the Land Innovation Fund has built a portfolio of 36 projects with 44 partners and investments of US$ 11 million
Three new projects coordinated by seven partners will add to the Land Innovation Fund's portfolio of innovative solutions for sustainable, climate-smart, and deforestation-free agriculture. Reaching an estimated 220 farms covering some 266,000 hectares, the initiatives selected in the Fund's third round of funding provide integrated actions focused on farms, with a potential to scale up their impacts in the short term. With investments of USD$4.6 million, the proposals in regenerative agriculture, crop-livestock-forest integration, and sustainable territories cover some of the main agendas on today's climate and environmental agendas, contributing to the emergence of an innovation landscape for agricultural sustainability with a global reach. With the winning proposals, the Fund reaches a milestone of 36 projects with 44 partners, and total investments of US$ 11 million in South America.
The ILPF Network Association, the Environmental Institute for Research on the Amazon (IPAM), in partnership with Produzindo Certo and ProForest; and the Foundation for the Conservation of the Chiquitanian Forest (FCBC), with support from the Regional Consortium for Experimental Agriculture (CREA) of Bolivia and the Conservation Strategy Fund (CSF), are the newcomers to the Fund's portfolio. Of the three selected initiatives, two focus on innovation actions in the Brazilian Cerrado and the third on the Bolivian Chiquitanía, a region between the Gran Chaco and Amazon biomes.
All three highlight a broad, integrated combination of actions in different areas such as governance, nature-based solutions, restoration, and carbon markets associated with technological investments, with impacts on local territories. "The selected initiatives are aligned with the Fund's objectives of fostering integrated innovative farm-focused solutions that contribute directly to concrete actions for sustainable, low-carbon, deforestation-free agriculture on a large scale," says the Fund's director, Carlos E. Quintela.
In Brazil, the ILPF Network Association, an institution that works for higher, sustainable yields on farms, will implement a program to encourage the adoption of integrated crop-livestock-forest systems in the soy chain, adjusted to the needs of the Cerrado. Their proposal is to monitor environmental compliance on more than 30 farms, in an area of more than 60,000 hectares. Of this total, 30,000 hectares will also participate in certification processes and validation of sustainability criteria.
The Environmental Institute for Research on the Amazon (IPAM), in partnership with Produzindo Certo and ProForest, will expand the scope of its territorial approach based on the Produce, Conserve, and Include (PCI) initiative, adopted by the state of Mato Grosso to encourage soy production with no deforestation, with positive, long-term socioeconomic impacts. They will apply a territorial approach in the municipalities of Sapezal, Tangará da Serra, Campos de Júlio, Campo Novo do Parecis, Diamantino and Alto Paraguai, some of the country's largest soybean producers, all located in an area of the Cerrado biome with high rates of land conversion for agriculture. The project expects to reach 160 farms covering an area of 125,000 hectares.
In Bolivia, the Foundation for the Conservation of the Chiquitanian Forest (FCBC), in partnership with the Regional Consortium for Experimental Agriculture (CREA), and the Conservation Strategy Fund (CSF), will implement a project on innovative regenerative practices (PRIAS) for sustainable agriculture in the country's eastern plains. The project's strategy is to increase yields in agricultural areas by applying and disseminating technical knowledge about sustainable practices, such as restoring degraded soils and reducing the use of chemical pesticides, to avoid the conversion of new areas.
The selected proposals help forge an innovation landscape for sustainability, and provide technical and financial support to expand adoption of responsible agricultural practices, including potential synergies with other projects in the Fund's portfolio. "The three projects selected in this round bring an aggregate financial contribution of US$ 2.77 million to the portfolio, almost 50% of the value offered by the Fund to implement the proposals, thus enhancing the initiatives' scope and impact potential", says Quintela. "We want to be catalysts for transformation on the ground, attract investments and exchange knowledge conducive to a new approach to agriculture, in response to today's challenges," he adds.
Learn more about the selected projects:
Regenerative practices in the plains of eastern Bolivia | FCBC, CREA Bolivia and CSF: the plains of eastern Bolivia are under great pressure for deforestation in various parts of Chiquitania, an ecosystem located between the Gran Chaco and the Amazon. The objective of the project led by the Foundation for the Conservation of the Chiquitanian Forest (FCBC), in partnership with the Regional Consortium for Experimental Agriculture (CREA) in Bolivia and the Conservation Strategy Fund (CSF), is to promote regenerative agriculture practices through pilot experiments with groups of farmers in different soil conditions, who can scale up their results to other farms in the region. Thirty to 40 farms are expected to participate in the project, totaling an area of more than 81,000 hectares – about 53,000 of which are under cultivation.
Crop-livestock-forest in sustainable soy chains | ILPF Network Association: The proposal is to monitor environmental compliance by more than 30 farms, covering more than 60 thousand hectares, 30 thousand of which will also participate in certification processes and validation of sustainability criteria. The project's unique feature is its integrated approach to evaluation and validation of the integrated crop-livestock-forest system (ILPF), combining different methodologies in a single platform to allow for efficient monitoring and precise quantification of soil carbon. At the end of the project, a protocol aligned with guidelines set by Embrapa experts and voluntary carbon market institutions will be drawn up, aimed at validation of the service by an international certifier and approval of the GHG verification system on ILPF farms.
Climate-smart and sustainable landscapes in western Mato Grosso | IPAM, Produzindo Certo and ProForest: under the coordination of IPAM, in partnership with Produzindo Certo and ProForest, the initiative will bring together a combination of innovative solutions for sustainable, climate-smart farming – territorial governance, through new carbon credit mechanisms aligned with the state's jurisdictional system; greater agricultural yields, sustainable income and carbon stocks by implementing climate-smart solutions, with the provision of technical assistance to comply with the forest code and labor laws; and a restoration agenda with a potential for scale-up in six municipalities with high rates of land conversion to agriculture in the Brazilian Cerrado.