Southern Piedmont Climate Smart Project

In 2023, Georgia Organics began partnering with the Rodale Institute on a historic research grant, funded by the USDA, to expand resilient farming practices in the Southeast. As a partner in the Southern Piedmont Climate Smart Project (SPCSP), Georgia Organics continues its commitment to pursue impactful, climate-conscious research opportunities for farmers. By examining four years of controlled on-farm production systems, the SPCSP will define the critical roles that reduced tillage, cover crops, and crop rotations play in the regeneration of Southern Piedmont farmland soils.  

Healthy, living soils are the backbone for securing a future of sustainability and prosperity for producers and local food systems. This project aims to understand if reduced tillage along with consistent cover crops that are roller crimped into a natural mulch barrier have a greater impact on soil and crop health, greenhouse gas emissions, and carbon cycling compared to a production system based on mechanical cover crop termination, tillage, and plasticulture.  

Eddy Covariance Tower

Greenhouse Gases and Carbon Sequestration

For the first time, on-farm Eddy Covariance Towers will continuously monitor all four greenhouse gases (carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, ammonia) on the enrolled production acreage at site-specific, eligible farm partner properties to quantify the potential to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and increase carbon sequestration by the implementation of climate-smart practices.   

Why are cover crops important? 

Implementing cover crops into a production system has far-reaching benefits, including the ability to forage nutrients and reduce compaction in subsoils, convert atmospheric nitrogen into a bioavailable plant food source, increase the organic matter composition, suppress weed pressure and pathogens, sequester atmospheric carbon, reduce runoff and erosionm as well as provide key habitats for beneficial insects and pollinators. These all contribute to building a holistic system, rich in biodiversity, that enhances production over time. 

Project Timeline

  • A cohort of Georgia based Certified Organic and Certified Naturally Grown farmers will join with diversified vegetable producers in Alabama, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia to participate in a four-year research-based production cycle that will lay the groundwork for the SPCSP. Over the course of the project, our Georgia farmer cohort will receive direct technical assistance from our Climate Smart Specialist in areas such as:

    • Crop planning

    • Production systems

    • Equipment training (including scheduling and maintenance)

    • Data collection (soil and production-based)

    • General farmer support

    Farms contribute to the research project by:

    • Adhering to a set crop rotation (as a control group)

    • Filling out weekly production data surveys

    • Working with research partners to perform additional soil testing and gather relevant data

    Cash incentives and production reimbursements are provided to all participating farmers through the Rodale Institute and the SPCSP. Additional education sessions, focus groups, and networking opportunities are optional benefits to the farmer cohort members for the duration of the program.

  • Georgia Organics joins a team of project partners across the Southern Piedmont Region, including Rodale Institute, Carolina Farm Stewardship Association, Clemson University, Emory University, North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, North Carolina State University, Soil Health Institute, The Connect Group, University of Georgia, University of Tennessee, University of Wisconsin, and Virginia Association of Biological Farming.