Federal grant programs / Department of Agriculture

Farm to School Grant Program (10.575)

• Awarded, FY 2021 to 2025$49.9 million
• Grant awards548
• Typical award$64,931
• Awarded in FY 2025-$1.2 million
• Size rank1,042 of 1,823
• Type of assistanceCooperative agreements, project grants, dissemination of technical information, training

Key findings

• It is the 1042nd largest of 1,823 federal grant programs by five-year awards.
• The 20 largest recipients received 32% of the money.
• Awards went to recipients in 52 states and territories.

What the program funds

The Farm to School program exists in order to assist eligible entities, through grants and technical assistance, in implementing farm to school programs that improve access to local foods in the USDA Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) Child Nutrition Programs. The program objectives for the implementation and State agency track grants include improve access to local foods in eligible Child Nutrition Program sites through comprehensive farm to school programming that includes local sourcing and agricultural education efforts. Objectives for the turnkey track grants include: development of an action plan to facilitate launching or scaling farm to school activities; plan, implement, and evaluate a food production operation (e.g., school garden) that produces food for Child Nutrition operator activities; plan, implement, and evaluate the integration of farm to school topics into Child Nutrition program sites' curriculum.

From the federal Assistance Listing. Read the full listing on SAM.gov.

Open opportunities

No opportunity under this program is open or forecast on Grants.gov right now. Programs often post once a year, so the funding history below shows what to expect.

Rules from the program listing

Who can apply

State Agencies, local agencies, Indian Tribal Organizations, small- and medium-sized agricultural/groups of agricultural producers, schools/school districts, Institutions participating in the Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP) and/or Summer Food Service Program (SFSP), and non-profit entities (excluding institutions of higher education and hospitals) may apply for the Farm to School Grant.

What the money can and cannot pay for

Assistance in improving access to local foods in eligible schools can take the form of: (i) Training; (ii) Supporting operations; (iii) Planning; (iv) Purchasing equipment; (v) Developing school gardens; (vi) Developing partnerships; and (vii) Implementing farm to school programs. No more than 10 percent of the grant funds may be used for food purchases in the grant budget. Food purchases are limited to food for educational or development purposes, such as taste tests or the development of new recipes. ;

Matching requirements

This program has no statutory formula. The applicant must provide at least 25 percent of the costs of the grant project as the federal share of costs for this grant cannot exceed 75 percent of the total cost of the project.MOE requirements are not applicable to this assistance listing.

Deadlines

There were several grant tracks and the application deadline varied by track. Refer to the NOFO for each.

Award range and average, in the agency's words

Implementation grants will range from $50,000 - $500,000; State Agency grants range $50,000 - $500,000, and Turnkey grants can be up to $50,000 with no minimum amount. FY24 average awards: Implementation grants - $117 thousand; State Agency grants - $234 thousand; Turnkey grants - $41 thousand

Examples of funded projects

Fiscal Year2025: Examples of projects include: aggregating local food supply to more effectively meet the needs of school districts; testing products or conducting school food market feasibility analyses; training agricultural producers on how to access the school food market; organizing field trips to agricultural operations; developing new local food products or formulations to meet the needs of schools; improving infrastructure to accommodate new ingredients or menu items; forming statewide or regional networks or coalitions of varying kinds; and more.

Quoted from the program's federal Assistance Listing. The notice of funding opportunity is the official source for each competition's rules.

Who usually wins

Nonprofits received 66% of the money, state and local governments 29% and tribes 2.2%.

By state

23 states have a page for this program: those that received at least $1 million or 10 awards.

Award amounts are federal obligations reported to USAspending.gov for fiscal 2021 to 2025; see how our data works.