New York Farm Viability Institute

What We’re About The New York Farm Viability Institute is a nonprofit grantmaking organization. We run a competitive grant program seeking to fund agricultural research and education projects that will create and share knowledge to improve the economic viability of New York’s farmers. Our Mission Our mission is to help New York farmers become more profitable and improve the long-term economic viability and sustainability of our state’s farms, the food system, and the communities which they serve. We strive to achieve our mission through a farmer-driven grant making process connecting farmer-identified needs to practical research and education solutions. We amplify our efforts and the efforts of others through leadership and collaboration. This creation and sharing of knowledge results in positive farm-level impact. Three Programs We administer three grant programs: FVI–our largest program by far awards approximately $1.5 million each year through a competitive process. Dairy Program–is a smaller program that provides support to individual farms through Dairy Profit Teams, and to groups of farms that work with a Topic Specific Team organized by an educator. USDA Specialty Crop Block Grant–we administer a competitive program on behalf of New York State Department of Agriculture and Markets. Farmers Decide We believe that our selection process, which favors proposals that engage producers even before a project is funded, creates more valuable work. The producer involvement continues as farmer review panels evaluate the proposals, and the NYFVI farmer board makes all the final funding decisions. If you are considering developing a proposal for our program, we encourage you to explore this website and learn more about our strategic priorities.