Center for Agriculture

Fostering science-based, market-focused approaches enabling the evolution of our food systems toward sustainable futures that meet the needs of all stakeholders.

The Keystone Value

Keystone’s Center for Agriculture grows solutions from the ground up, leading coalitions of producers, agribusinesses, food and retail companies, NGOs, researchers, and public sectors leaders to identify strategies, partnerships, metrics, and best practices to pilot and scale through collective action. Our initiatives:

  • Create living networks and organizations tackling complex sustainability approaches in US agriculture.

  • Work across disaggregated supply chains to identify actions and practices to meet mutual sustainability goals.

  • Tackle issues and challenges for applying market-based approaches to mitigate climate change in the agricultural context.

  • Build shared understanding between bee keepers, pollinator advocates, and growers to create shared practices that protect pollinator health and productive agriculture.

  • Create shared science-based and outcomes-oriented sustainability metrics to help farmers make better decisions and improve agriculture outcomes.

  • Develop socially responsible governance of emerging technologies like gene editing in food and agriculture.

Our Impact

Farm Labor Practices Group

The Farm Labor Practices Group is a multi-stakeholder initiative committed to improving farm labor practices on farms and thereby enhancing the farm worker’s experience. The Farm Labor Practices Group brings together key industry stakeholders, including growers/farmers, farm worker member organizations, manufacturers and others who sell agricultural products, U.S. Department of Labor, and non-governmental organizations. Keystone Policy Center facilitates the work of the Farm Labor Practices Group. Learn More

Decarbonization Dialogue

Keystone partnered with Great Plains Institute to convene leaders from the power, transportation, and agriculture sectors to develop comprehensive policy recommendations to phase out carbon emissions throughout the economy. The recommendations were developed by stakeholders with diverse interests and reflect months of dialogue between and among sector-specific working groups. They have bipartisan, cross-sectoral support, priming them to be advanced by lawmakers in Congress. Learn More

Honey Bee Health Coalition

Honey bees support more than $20 billion in U.S. and Canadian agriculture annually. Faced with recent declines in honey bee health, the Keystone Policy Center brought together representatives of beekeepers, growers, researchers, government agencies, agribusinesses, conservation groups, manufacturers and brands, and other key partners. Officially convened in 2014, the Honey Bee Health Coalition is working to help improve honey bee hive management and nutrition, increase forage for bees, control crop pests while safeguarding pollinator health, and enhance public-private outreach, communications, and education. Learn More

Farmers for Monarchs

Following recent declines in monarch butterfly populations, the Keystone Policy Center brought together a diverse group of committed stakeholders, including scientists, conservationists, farmers, and the private sector, to find collaborative solutions to strengthen monarch populations and habitat. Initial conversations were held in spring of 2015 by a group that became the Monarch Collaborative. In 2021, the group changed its name to Farmers for Monarchs – a Keystone Collaborative. It leads ongoing efforts to develop collaborative strategies to promote and implement actions that will support monarchs in agricultural landscapes. Learn more

Field with tractor

Field to Market

Our ability to feed future generations depends on developing better, more sustainable way to produce food — throughout the supply chain. Recognizing this challenge, the Keystone Policy Center convened Field to Market®, the Alliance for Sustainable Agriculture in 2007 as a collaborative dialogue aimed at improving the sustainability of the U.S. commodity agriculture supply chain. Since then and through Keystone’s stewardship, Field to Market grew into a diverse, collaborative nonprofit with a membership comprised of grower associations, agribusinesses, food packagers and retailers, conservation organizations, universities, and federal agency partners. Learn More

Agricultural Climate Markets Collaborative

The Agricultural Climate Markets Collaborative is a voluntary group of climate program providers, NGOs and other select advisors facilitated by the Keystone Policy Center to identify collective, precompetitive actions that could create more transparency and build trust in the marketplace; provide more coordinated and consistent feedback to protocol bodies, USDA, and others; and ultimately contribute to a clearer marketplace that can scale towards meaningful impact. The Collaborative will continue to address issues and challenges specific to applying market-based approaches to climate change mitigation in the agricultural context – with the intention to engage with stakeholders such as growers, carbon registries, supply chain companies, and the USDA. Learn More

FarmSim STEM Program Consultation

Keystone experts were asked by Epic-Reach to provide consultation in the development of an educational program to accompany the Farming Simulator game that will be able to inform Minecraft and Roblox farming simulations. The educational program used the Farming Simulator digital platform to transform the mode and reach of STEM education in agriculture globally. It can help reach a new generation and audience with an opportunity to understand the systems that support sustainable agricultural production systems.

Protein in a Changing Environment (PRICE)

This multi-stakeholder, interdisciplinary scientific effort was designed to examine the intersection of protein nutrition, health, and food systems domestically and globally in a changing environment.  PRICE was organized by the American Society of Nutrition (ASN) in partnership with Keystone Policy Center.  It originated in thought leadership by National Institutes of Health and USDA Agricultural Research Service. In the pursuit of set goals, a Scientific Steering Committee was convened, including representatives from the government, academic, non-profit, and private industry sectors.

NGO Gene Editing Roundtable

The NGO Gene Editing Roundtable is an informal network of U.S.-based food-, agriculture-, and/or conservation-focused NGOs concerned with the responsible governance gene editing and other biotechnologies recognizes the potential societal benefits of gene editing technologies, while acknowledging their potential risks. The roundtable provides a forum for peer-to-peer engagement on gene editing policy and science to enhance organizational knowledge and capacity as well as identify and advance shared interests. Learn More

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Center for Agriculture Featured on the Keynotes Podcast