DARLINGTON — The Lafayette Ag Stewardship Alliance (LASA) recently released results from the fifth and final year of its Sustainability Project. This significant milestone demonstrates the group’s unwavering commitment to sustainability.
Over the past five years, this farmer-led watershed conservation group has used sustainability metrics to inform management decisions on its farms in collaboration with Farmers for Sustainable Food (FSF).
“We’re stewards of the environment and always challenging ourselves to do better,” LASA President Jim Winn said. “This project demonstrates that commitment and represents a significant milestone for our group in our ongoing sustainability efforts.”
The project, involving 15 farms managing over 40,000 acres, showed consistent, positive progress for several metrics, especially regarding water quality.
Key findings from five years of the LASA Sustainability Project include:
● Conservation practices: On average, farms use two or more conservation practices in each of their analyzed fields. The most used sustainable farming practices within the group include grassed waterways, contouring, cover crops, reduced tillage, strip-cropping and no-till.
● Water quality: Of the reported acreage, 83% has mitigated the risk of excessive nitrogen loss to the subsurface water.
● Soil erosion: The average rate of soil erosion for corn grain over the five-year project period was 1.7 tons per acre per year, significantly lower than the state benchmark of 3.5 tons per acre per year for corn grain.
● Energy use: The group’s energy use — 145,575 btu per ton for corn silage — measured 53% better than the national indicator.
Data is based on analysis by Houston Engineering Inc. using Field to Market: The Alliance for Sustainable Agriculture’s Fieldprint Platform.
“I am inspired by these farmers for their dedication to improving the environment,” Lauren Brey, Farmers for Sustainable Food Managing Director, said. “Their drive to continuously improve is evident through the completion of this project, and they are not stopping there. The group continues to expand on these findings through their new project within the FSF Climate-Smart Program.”
Expanding on findings from the LASA Sustainability Project, the FSF Climate-Smart Program gathers more data and information to help showcase a more holistic understanding of each farm’s sustainability progress, and, if the farmer chooses, this program also helps facilitate conversations about sustainability throughout the supply chain, including connections between farmers and processors.
Learn more about Lafayette Ag Stewardship Alliance and the group’s ongoing sustainability efforts at
lafayetteagstewardship.org.
