At the Ohio Soybean Association’s (OSA) March meeting, our board decided to partner with our counterparts on the Ohio Soybean Council’s (OSC) board to form a joint committee focused on carbon. It seems like carbon has become the hot button issue in agriculture over the last year and we wanted to explore ways that our boards could support Ohio farmers through this unfamiliar issue.

Our boards have long had a focus on science-based practices that help farmers improve sustainability on their farms while maintaining yield potential. OSA has advocated for programs like H2Ohio and the Ohio Agriculture Conservation Initiative at the Statehouse. Meanwhile, OSC has invested thousands of checkoff dollars in research regarding nutrient management and other conservation practices. We see our work involving carbon programs as an extension of this effort.

One of the things our board leaders wanted to accomplish was pushing out information about carbon programs to farmers. We accomplished this through a new website about carbon market programs, which you can view here.

While we recognize that deciding to participate in a carbon program is a highly individual choice that must be made by each farmer, we wanted to equip farmers with the knowledge they need to make an informed decision. I am still deciding whether participating in a carbon program makes sense for my farm, but I feel better prepared to make that decision after viewing the resources available on our website.

If you have further questions about carbon that are not answered on our site or suggestions for how it can be improved, please reach out to our Communications Manager Julia Brown at jbrown@soyohio.org. We want to continue to improve the website so that Ohio soybean farmers can make the decisions that are best for their farm.

Ryan Rhoades

Ohio Soybean Association President

Marion County