Westfield, IN, April 2, 2024 —Taranis and Mississippi-based Steward Link have teamed to provide farmers with simplified application and practice validation opportunities for USDA conservation funding programs.
Taranis, the global leader in AI-powered crop intelligence, is at the forefront of agricultural innovation, creating engagement and transparency within the agricultural production value chain. To better serve ag retailers and farmers, the Taranis-Steward Link partnership helps present a complete and comprehensive picture of what’s happening on a designated acreage, creating a higher quality and more complete program application.
Steward Link founder, Nick Thomas, shares his excitement for the partnership and notes the results the high-quality applications are yielding farmers.
“I couldn’t be happier with our relationship with Taranis,” Thomas says. “With 2024 being the first year, what we are seeing is a high-level of technology and practice adoption amongst Taranis customers. Technology and documentation position them well for many conservation opportunities. The technology has also helped us to open the door for new programs, and the applications we have been able to complete for Taranis customers have been extremely high-quality.”
Launched in 2015, Steward Link is a nationwide initiative founded by Nick Thomas, a former USDA Natural Resources Conservation Services employee who witnessed the opportunities farmers were missing to apply for private, federal, and state-level conservation funding because of timing and cumbersome paperwork processes. The company works to understand what a farmer is currently doing within their operation and then matches those practices to the federal, state, and private funding opportunities that exist.
“Farmers often don’t know about all of the programs available,” Thomas says. “We make it our job to know about every program and then to streamline the application process by taking on the practice alignment and paperwork burden. Steward Link’s mission is to find and secure the best opportunities available for farming, ranching, and forestry operations.”
Opher Flohr, Taranis CEO, explains that partnerships that advance the financial and stewardship positions of the farmer are a win for the entire value chain and an outcome Taranis, as a company, seeks to advance.
“Taranis is redefining how crop input and management decisions are made on the farm. Our service aligns perfectly with USDA’s mission to promote conservation, while maximizing profitability for growers, and therefore we have an edge on obtaining funding from USDA programs for our growers,” Flohr explains. “I believe this is just the start—as USDA continues to add funding for precise application practices that are unlocked by technologies like Taranis, we will be vigilant to make sure our growers are first in line to receive those funds.”
To learn more about Taranis and Steward Link and begin a conversation on how your farming operation may align with current opportunities, visit taranis.com/conservation.
