The Beginning Farmer and Rancher Development Program (BFRDP) is a competitive USDA NIFA grant program that provides funding for the education and training of beginning farmers and ranchers. The BFRDP supports the belief that there are many types of assistance beginning farmers may benefit from when starting out in agriculture. The explicit goal of the program is to “enhance food security by providing beginning farmer and rancher producers and their families in the U.S. with the knowledge, skills, and tools needed to make informed decisions for their operations and enhance their sustainability.” (USDA, National Institute of Food and Agriculture).  

 Dr. Sid Dasgupta, Kentucky State University 1890 Land Grant Extension,  has been the project director for KSU's beginning farmer training program (aka, Farming for Cash) since 2012.  He had focused on assisting minority, socially-disadvantaged, and military veterans succeed in small-scale farming.  He contacted a group of African beginning farmers in Lexington, called Empucate International, and offered training to become more effective.

 Simultaneously, The Farming for Cash team met with Global Lex, a multilingual and multidisciplinary center in Lexington, where local residents and foreign-born population obtain information, access programs, and services.  Global Lex has been working with Empucate International for many years and provides them with meeting spaces, translation services, and interpretation services.  After discussions with both Empucate International and Global Lex, the Farming for Cash team prepared and submitted a new Farming for Cash BFRDP project to the USDA, which was subsequently funded in June 2019.  Starting in October 2019, the Farming for Cash team will be training Empucate International and other immigrant groups in Lexington about farming.