Perennial agriculture uses crops that do not need to replanted each year, which results in a number of environmental and climate benefits.330

As discussed above, current perennial crop production in the United States typically

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focuses on fruit- or nut-bearing trees for specialty markets or perennial forages for grazing livestock.

Federal agricultural research, extension, financing, and safety net programs rarely meet the needs of farmers with perennial crops. Agricultural research, even within public universities, is increasingly focused on the priorities of private-sector corporations,³³⁴ which sell inputs that are used less intensively—or not at all—in perennial systems.

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Perennial producers also face heavy hurdles when trying to process, market, or distribute their products, while producers of common annual crops, like corn, wheat, and soy, benefit from decades of government support for such infrastructure. FSA and Farm Credit System loans are not designed for perennial farmers, who often have higher upfront costs—even if their average annual costs are the same or even lower than similarly positioned farmers with annual crops. Federal subsidy programs likewise fail to take into account the higher upfront costs of perennial production, or, in some cases, simply exclude perennial crops.

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While USDA does not track how much support perennial practices or systems receive, available data indicate that they receive an incredibly small share of federal funding for agriculture. An analysis of USDA’s 2014 research budget found that less than 0.1% of USDA’s research, education, and economics budget went to agroforestry research.³³⁸ Similarly, only a tiny amount of USDA’s conservation funding goes to perennial production practices. EQIP provided almost $1.4 billion in financial assistance to farm operations for conservation practices in FY 2018,³³⁹ but less than.05% of that amount went to the only two eligible perennial production practices, silvopasture and alley cropping.³⁴⁰ This low level of funding undercuts climate-neutrality goals since these two practices have the greatest potential for carbon sequestration among contemporary agricultural practices.

Federal farm subsidies are generally distributed through commodity programs, crop insurance, and conservation programs. Most subsidy programs only support a limited range of perennial monocultures, such as almond trees, if they support any at all. They are designed to support production of a single crop on a field at any given time, limiting their utility for farms using alley cropping or silvopasture, which integrate multiple agricultural products on a single field. A Missouri producer that grows winter wheat in a monoculture, for example, could choose from a number of programs to subsidize their operation in 2019, including both of the main commodity programs,³⁴¹ the MFP,³⁴² and a range of crop insurance options.³⁴³ However if that same producer wanted to intercrop Chinese chestnuts with their winter wheat, their chestnuts would not be eligible for either of the two main commodity programs or the MFP, and it would be much more difficult for the producer to receive crop insurance.

Given the lack of funding that perennial agriculture receives, and the challenges that perennial farmers face, it is notable that farmers have expressed a growing interest in perennial practices in recent years. For example, regional agroforestry groups have been organized throughout the country,³⁴⁴ while many farmers have enthusiastically embraced the perennial

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grain Kernza, despite the fact that its breeders at the Land Institute note that it is not yet “economical for farmers to produce at large scale.”³⁴⁵ Farmers are clearly looking for perennial options. However, agricultural policy will need to offer perennial agriculture the same type of support it currently provides annual farming in order for it to be viable for most farm operations. This will require specialized programs ensuring long-term land tenure for perennial farms; funding for research, development, and extension; financial support for individual operations; and institutions capable of coordinating these efforts. The remainder of this section addresses each of these needs in turn.