News

Over the winter to early spring of 2025, members of Cornell’s Climate Smart Farming team (Allison Chatrchyan, Yolanda Gonzalez, and Savanna Shelnutt) began working with the USDA Northeast Climate Hub (Kristin Benson) to run an Urban Climate Adaptation & Mitigation Program in New York City.

The Urban Climate Adaptation and Mitigation Program (Urban CAMP) is a peer-to-peer-based learning and training opportunity for urban farmers and technical service providers who are interested in climate change adaptation and mitigation. This program is for urban producers who are thinking about climate change, are interested in learning about climate impacts, and are motivated to pursue climate adaptation and/or mitigation on their farms in NYC and the Metropolitan area. The program is also for service providers working with urban farmers interested in strengthening their abilities to provide climate-focused support.

Over 60 urban farmers and advisors completed the five week, in person training, and a subset of the group are working to develop ten urban farm adaptation or mitigation plans for a farm they work with.

CAMP is a partnership between Cornell’s Climate Smart Farming Program, Cornell Cooperative Extension’s Harvest NY Program, and the USDA Northeast Climate Hub.

The Urban CAMP curriculum draws heavily from the Climate Adaptation and Mitigation Fellowship (CAMF), which was developed in response to farmers’ need for information and technical assistance related to climate change.

Program Goals

• Provide geographically specific climate change information relevant to urban farmers – primarily vegetable and small fruit production – including cut flowers, herbs, mushrooms, and value-added products
• Empower urban farmers and agricultural advisors to become climate leaders in their communities through peer-to-peer learning
• Create opportunities for farmers to create farm-specific climate adaptation and mitigation plans with support
• Strengthen agricultural advisor knowledge and abilities in climate adaptation and mitigation planning
• Support the development of outreach and education products that reach farmers and agricultural advisors beyond the program

How does this program work?

This program consists of five in person workshops, additional online expert speakers, an independent work period with regularly scheduled check-ins, and a closing workshop. The in person workshops will consist of five, two-hour sessions  (see below), followed by field trips to farms over the summer. The independent work period will be from March 2025 through December 2025 with regular check-ins with the CSF and Harvest NY Team. The closing workshop will take place in December 2025

2025 Urban Climate Adaptation Program

In February and March 2025 there were a series of five workshop sessions for the Urban Climate & Mitigation Program with  62 urban agricultural stakeholders. The farmers learned about climate science and impacts, climate adaptation, climate mitigation, climate planning, and how to gain funding to support climate mitigation and adaptation. Below is a chart of the Urban Climate Adaptation Sessions.

Urban Climate Adaptation & Mitigation Program Sessions