Recipient Organization
SPROUT CITY FARMS, INC.
6700 E VIRGINIA AVE
DENVER,CO 802241346
Performing Department
(N/A)
Non Technical Summary
Sprout City Farms' proposed Agrivoltaic Incubator Project is an extension of our educational mission to support beginning farmers in entering the challenging small-scale specialty crop farming industry in Colorado. For the past decade, we have heard from our Farmer Training participants that more support is needed for them to advance from farm worker to farm owner. The goal of the project is to build a strong foundation for an Incubator Program that provides access to land and essential business and agricultural skills training, in a novel practice co-locating solar energy and food production ("agrivoltaics"), to enhance the success of new farm businesses and train them in a new source of revenue generation. The target audience is beginning farmers with limited access to land, especially Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) and low-income farmers, who are interested in furthering their skills in small-scale, sustainable crop production in preparation for owning their own business. Sprout City Farms will collaborate with Colorado State University's (CSU) Building Farmers Program, Flatirons Young Farmers Coalition, and the Incubator Farm at Fort Lewis College (FLC), in addition to our on-site partners which include CSU, University of Arizona, National Renewable Energy Laboratory, and Colorado Agrivoltaic Learning Center. Alongside our partners, Sprout City Farms will do significant research and outreach to understand the landscape of farmer training programs across Colorado's Front Range; build the infrastructure at Jack's Solar Farm, our newest site in Longmont, CO where we are producing food organically underneath solar panels; and create a responsive curriculum and toolkit for the Agrivoltaic Incubator Program, as we are trailblazing agrivoltaics with the construction of the largest agrivoltaics site for specialty crop production in the United States.
Animal Health Component
25%
Research Effort Categories
Basic
25%
Applied
25%
Developmental
50%
Goals / Objectives
The overall goal of the Agrivoltaic Incubator project is to build the content and partnerships necessary to create a responsive agrivoltaic incubator program, to launch in 2023. It is critical that Sprout City Farms spends considerable time understanding the strengths and weaknesses of our own Farmer Training program, joining the network of and reviewing programs across Colorado's Front Range to assess gaps and best practices, and engaging with our target population to understand needs. To achieve this, Sprout City Farms has identified two objectives that will contribute to the success of this project:Objective 1 - Conduct an in-depth review of farmer training and incubator programs across the Front Range of Colorado and audit Sprout City Farms' current farmer training curriculum.Anticipated outcomes of Objective 1 include:Conduct three focus groups with past Sprout City Farms interns/apprentices, Building Farmers students, GoFarm interns/externs/incubator farmers, and Fort Lewis incubator graduates to assess needs and wants of beginning farmers in an agrivoltaic incubator programConduct an in-depth audit of Sprout City Farms' Farmer Training Curriculum and review of regional incubator programs to identify strengths, weaknesses, and additional content necessary using indicators from focus groupsObjective 2 - In collaboration with project partners, develop an incubator program that is responsive to the needs of beginning farmers, especially BIPOC and low-income farmers-in-training in Boulder County.Anticipated outcomes of Objective 2 include:Construction of at least 6 fully functioning, quarter-acre agrivoltaic incubator plots, outfitted with proper irrigation, soil amendments, and co-located on a working farm with established infrastructure, tools and supplies;Creation of a formalized agrivoltaic incubator curriculum and farmer training program;Creation of a comprehensive outreach and marketing plan to recruit six farmers of our target population of BIPOC and low-income farmers.Sprout City Farms projects that the skills participants gain in the Agrivoltaic Incubator Program will leave participants with greater understanding and hands-on experience on how to operate a small-scale sustainable farming operation and therefore, will have a greater chance at success as they enter the agriculture industry as small-scale farmers. We expect that Agrivoltaic Incubator Program participants will complete the program with formalized business plans that are less prone to risk. Agrivoltaic Incubator Program participants will be integrated into the growing network of farmers, ranchers, and producers at all levels of experience across the region to rely upon as a safety net for technical assistance, resource sharing, and support.
Project Methods
Objective 1 - Conduct an in-depth review of farmer training and incubator programs across the Front Range of Colorado and audit Sprout City Farms' current farmer training curriculum.Sprout City Farms will work with our third-party evaluator to conduct focus group discussions with a variety of stakeholders from our intended audience to inform topics and skills to be covered in the curriculum. Focus group discussion participants will consist of past and present participants in Sprout City Farms' apprenticeship and internships programs; current students and graduates of the Building Farmers Program at Colorado State University Extension and GoFarm's Farmer Assistance Program; and past graduates of the Farm Incubator Program at Fort Lewis College. Focus group discussions will cover topics including: strengths and weaknesses of farmer training programs they have participated in; aspects of farmer training programs they felt best fit their needs; and topics they would like to see covered in an incubator program. After the completion of the focus groups, Sprout City Farms' evaluation specialist will complete a report detailing the needs and wants of beginning farmers as it relates to incubator programs. Our focus group discussions will also be used to gauge beginning farmers' comfort level with agrivoltaics, which will inform the nature of our outreach and recruitment efforts surrounding the Agrivoltaic Incubator Program.The focus groups will also inform indicators to be used when conducting an audit of Sprout City Farms' Farmer Training Curriculum and review of farmer training programs across the Front Range of Colorado. Sprout City Farms' Program Manager, alongside our three Farm Managers, will use indicators gleaned from focus groups to identify what resources are readily available for beginning farmers, where there are gaps in resources, and what barriers exist to BIPOC and low-income farmers to utilizing available resources.Through this analysis, Sprout City Farms will have a clear understanding of how to best frame and implement our Agrivoltaic Incubator program that relieves barriers to BIPOC and low-income farmers and addresses their specific needs in an incubator program, but does not create unnecessary duplication of efforts in our region. We expect our focus groups to occur from September 2021 through November 2021 and our audit and review to occur from December 2021 to February 2022.Objective 2 - In collaboration with project partners, develop an incubator program that is responsive to the needs of beginning farmers, especially BIPOC and low-income farmers-in-training.Once the evaluation report is completed and we have a good understanding of the needs and wants of beginner farmers, Sprout City Farms will consult with the Farm Incubator Program at Fort Lewis College to create a curriculum informed by reports from the focus group discussions, program reviews, and curriculum audit. Fort Lewis College has been running a successful Incubator Program in Southwest Colorado for over ten years, and will provide the necessary knowledge, skills, and capacity to assist us in building a well-rounded Agrivoltaic Incubator Program that integrates information learned from our focus groups. To assist with training and workshops related to solar panels, Sprout City Farms will work with the land owner of Jack's Solar Garden. Curriculum development will occur over the course of March 2022 - May 2022.A critical piece of our project is ensuring that we create a responsive curriculum that is tailored to the needs of low-income and BIPOC farmers in Boulder County. As Jack's Solar Garden is a new farm site, we want to make sure that our participants are testing out their business plans on quality land that will support their needs as beginning farmers. Sprout City Farms will construct six quarter-acre incubator plots outfitted with everything a beginning farmer needs to get the most out of their time in the program. This includes an initial till, soil amendments, drip irrigation installation, access to a wash station and cold storage, and one year of prior cultivation to prepare the plots for successful crop production.To reach our targeted audience, we must implement an intentional recruitment and outreach plan focused on our intended audience: beginning farmers who are low-income and/or identify as Black, Indigenous, or People of Color. From our focus group discussions, we will gain a better understanding of our target audience's familiarity with agrivolatics and its benefits. This will be crucial to providing outreach and educational materials to potential participants that will adequately address our target audience's concerns and questions about the program.Our partners Flatirons Young Farmers Coalition and the Building Farmers Program at Colorado State University Extension will be critical players in our outreach plan to recruit low-income and BIPOC beginning farmers, who will broadcast the program throughout their networks of coalition members and recent class graduates. Sprout City Farms prioritizes Spanish language communication for our staff members and will ensure that all recruitment materials are translated into Spanish. A great deal of recruitment will also occur in Longmont, Colorado, the same city where Jack's Solar Garden is located and has a 25% Hispanic population (U.S. Census Bureau). Potential outreach efforts include: town hall meetings, presentations at regional Coalitions that Sprout City Farms is a participating member in (Mile High Farmers, Flatirons Young Farmers Coalition, Larimer County Farmers Alliance, etc), flyers, social media outreach, and presentations for students participating in the Building Farmers Program at Colorado State University.We expect the Agrivoltaic Incubator Program to open in April 2023, once six farmers have been recruited to participate and the weather conditions are favorable. Sprout City Farms will follow curriculum and training modules with participants until the end of the season.Upon the completion of this project, results along with lessons learned and best practices gained from the project will be disseminated among partners and collaborators in the form of a report. This report will be presented to Coalitions that Sprout City Farms regularly collaborates with, including Mile High Farmers, Flatirons Young Farmers Coalition, Larimer County Farmers Alliance, Rocky Mountain Farmers Union, and National Young Farmers Coalition. As we continue to implement this program in subsequent years, we aim to develop a toolkit for farmers and organizations across the region interested in creating an incubator program or agrivoltaic incubator program of their own.