State and Private Forestry Program

The Department of Agriculture Forest Service State and Private Forestry Program is a civilian sub-agency that funds forestry research, technical assistance, and community forestry initiatives through grants and, to a much lesser degree, contract procurement. The program operates within USDA's Forest Service and administers federal support for state and private forest management, forest health, and wildfire resilience work.

Grant activity dominates the program's footprint. Since 2012, the program has awarded 252 federal grants totaling $74.3 million in federal obligations (part of $121 million in combined federal and non-federal funding). Grant awards peaked in 2019 with 96 awards, following activity at 26 awards in 2015, 35 in 2016, 25 in 2017, and 41 in 2018. The most recent grant award closed on 26 September 2019, indicating no new grant activity on record for the past seven years. Project Grants dominate the assistance-type mix at 93 percent of awards, with Cooperative Agreements comprising the remaining 7 percent.

Among grant recipients over the last five years, concentration is highly fragmented across 113 distinct recipients—the portfolio records no recipient concentration data by award count or federal dollars, signaling a distributed model favoring diverse state and private forestry organizations. The program's grant-making remit targets a broad base of state forestry agencies, academic institutions, nonprofits, and forest landowner associations rather than concentrating funding among a few dominant recipients.

Contract awards are minimal by comparison. The program has issued 9 federal contracts totaling $959 thousand in combined potential value since 2009, with $926 thousand obligated (97 percent of potential). Recent contract activity accelerated slightly: 1 award in 2021, 2 in 2022, and 4 in 2024, with the most recent award closed on 1 October 2024. The program has engaged 7 distinct prime contractors. Over the last five years, the Regents of University of Minnesota leads by award count with 3 recent awards totaling $78 thousand, while Oneida Engineering Solutions LLC holds the largest single contract at $147 thousand. Competitive concentration is highly fragmented by both award count (100 percent coverage spread across four distinct vendors) and potential value (25 percent coverage among top vendors). No set-aside restrictions govern 78 percent of awards; one 8(a) sole-source award and one small-business award account for the remaining 22 percent.

No recent contract opportunities or grant opportunities are recorded against the program in the source material. The most recent grant activity closed in 2019, signaling that grant-funding cycles may not currently be active.