New England Climate-Smart Forest Partnership Project

Notice: On April 14, 2025, USDA canceled the Partnerships for Climate-Smart Commodities (PCSC) and announced that qualifying projects would continue under Advancing Markets for Producers (AMP). The New England Climate-Smart Forest Partnership is continuing under AMP as a $32-million pilot project. Forest landowners interested in the Landowner Incentive Program can contact New England Forestry Foundation (dhohl@newenglandforestry.org) to check eligibility.

This project will implement forest management practices with large commercial producers and smaller woodlot and Tribal owners to store more carbon in the forest, quantify the resulting carbon gains, and build markets for climate-smart forest products to store carbon in wood products and substitute wood products for fossil fuel-based materials. The project aims to include Climate-smart forestry practices like reduced impact logging, timber stand improvement thinning, maintaining legacy trees and brown ash as a component of New England's forest, as well as maintain cultural integrity and economy of First Nations.

This project plans to utilize the monitoring and verification program created by AFF and TNC for the Family Forest Carbon Program (FFCP) that provides a sophisticated methodology for determining carbon stocking and can differentiate between areas treated with practices and the surrounding landscape. The program plans to advance markets for climate-smart forest products with a focus on high-value wood in the mass timber sector.

The project plans to engage affordable housing agencies across the region in utilizing mass timber construction. The project aims to include a combination of small landowners and tribal representatives.

Practice implementation incentives should increase the demand for climate-smart forest products, over time, improve the economics of climate-smart forest management and wood production.

Forest landowners — and how much land you own decides which door you use. NEFF's own framing: "While all New England forest landowners will be eligible and encouraged to apply for NEFF's AMP project, the previous specialized landowner outreach and engagement programs for smaller-acreage landowners and Tribal Nations will no longer be funded through AMP given new USDA parameters."

• Fewer than 5,000 New England acres: there is no application round for you, only an inquiry. "Landowners who own fewer than 5,000 New England acres are encouraged to contact Daniel Hohl" (dhohl@newenglandforestry.org).

• More than 5,000 New England acres: "Landowners who own more than 5,000 New England acres must submit a project proposal during one of NEFF's commercial landowner RFP cycles. Our second cycle closed in summer 2025. Please check back in for information about a potential third cycle." Landowners accepted under the earlier 2024 RFP "will not need to reapply."

The commercial RFP publishes hard selection tests: "Commercial forestland owners holding more than 5,000 acres located in the New England region"; "Projects involving approximately 500-5000 acres of land"; and additionality — "Projects that are additional to the level of timber stand improvement already being practiced by the landowner, i.e. above and beyond their typical acreage treated using an average from the last three years." Projects must also be "ready to go within a short time frame (ideally within several months) once the RFP process is complete" and offer transparency on costs and long-term financial benefits.

Registration and citizenship: "Enrolled landowners will need to apply for a USDA Farm Services Agency number by filling out form CCC-901." Landowners "identified as a 'foreign person' by USDA" are "not eligible to receive funding under Advancing Markets for Producers." "Sovereign Tribal Nations are welcome to apply." One unusually favourable term: "Commercial landowners enrolled in this program are exempt from the adjusted gross income limits typically applicable to USDA cost-share programs."

What you must accept as a condition of participating: measurement, monitoring, reporting and verification — quantification of timber growth and forest health, confirmation the practice was implemented, sharing results, and "Independent verification that measurement, monitoring and reporting information is complete, accurate and reliable"; the NRCS CPA-52 environmental evaluation; and Endangered Species Act Section 7 consultation, under which "we expect that any cutting of trees greater than 4” dbh will be prohibited during the months of June and July for landowners implementing practices in Maine and March – September in Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Vermont."

This is a forestry program, not a farm program. Eligible practices are timber stand improvement and the related forestry practices in the RFP's Appendix I, and they "may be implemented in all native forest types of New England."

Incentive payments for qualifying forestry practices — no per-acre rate and no per-landowner cap is published.

What is published about the money:

• NEFF received a "$32 million" USDA Advancing Markets for Producers award, replacing the cancelled Climate-Smart Commodities grant. "NEFF's AMP project will run through March 2028 and seeks to incentivize improved forest management on approximately 50,000 acres across New England and grow markets for regional wood."

• The share reaching landowners is stated: "Under AMP, a full 65 percent of funds received by NEFF from the USDA will be passed directly on to these producers as incentives."

• NEFF's commercial-landowner RFP sizes the incentive pool: "This program is anticipated to provide approximately $21.28 million in forestry incentives on forestlands across the region."

• Incentives also go to loggers and foresters, not just landowners: the grant "will also support incentives to and workshops for logging contractors and foresters on topics like safety, market-driven decision making, and improved forest management."

How you get in — the acreage threshold is the real gate:

• Under 5,000 acres: "Landowners who own fewer than 5,000 New England acres are encouraged to contact Daniel Hohl" (dhohl@newenglandforestry.org).

• Over 5,000 acres: "Landowners who own more than 5,000 New England acres must submit a project proposal during one of NEFF's commercial landowner RFP cycles. Our second cycle closed in summer 2025. Please check back in for information about a potential third cycle." That second RFP's deadline was July 15, 2025, and landowners accepted under the earlier 2024 RFP "will not need to reapply."

Two changes worth knowing: the specialized outreach and engagement programs for smaller-acreage landowners and Tribal Nations that existed under the cancelled PCSC grant "will no longer be funded through AMP given new USDA parameters." And 23 commercial, conservation and public forest landowners had already enrolled across Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts and Connecticut, with smaller-acreage landowners in the queue — so the 50,000 acres are being taken up.

Request for Proposal 2024