As the president and chief executive officer of Noble Research Institute, a not-for-profit agricultural research organization (ARO), I am regularly asked: "What is an ARO?" In this article, I'd like to share some foundational information about this type of charity and some of its nuances.

An ARO is a type of 501(c)(3) public charity that conducts scientific research and innovation in agriculture to advance the public good and improve the quality of life for people and the planet. Our organization was instrumental in the development of the designation within the U.S. Tax Code in 2015 and was the second ARO formed in the United States.

As an additive complement to academic and industry-sponsored research, AROs play a vital role in developing and delivering innovative solutions to improve agricultural productivity, sustainability and profitability. These organizations are addressing some of the most pressing challenges and opportunities facing agriculture today, including resiliency in response to climate variability, food security, biodiversity, water quality, soil health, ecological restoration, wildlife management and rural development.

As a nonprofit leader in the agriculture industry, I've personally seen the growing value that AROs provide to society. Their value is delivered to multiple stakeholders, including the scientific community, agricultural practitioners and consumers. They offer new partnership opportunities for our nation’s agricultural universities by bringing the potential for new sources of funding and collaboration. Further, in many instances, today’s AROs bring their own private lands to the table to enable landscape-scale research and studies—from the edge of the Gallatin Canyon in Montana to the Texas Gulf coastline.

The public policy behind requiring broad-based support for public charities was to empower public donors to determine which organizations provided the greatest public benefit. For AROs, Congress defined alternative measures to ensure these charitable organizations contribute to the public good:

  •  First, AROs must directly conduct research, which differs from a private foundation that simply funds other organizations to conduct research. ARO research may encompass a broad range of agriculture-related matters—for example, soil, plants, livestock, water, wildlife, markets, food production, economics and education, to name a few.
  • Second, AROs must commit a substantial portion of their resources to this research endeavor. This commitment is evidenced by the use of the organization’s assets or annual expenditures. For research-focused organizations, this is a reasonable and appropriate standard.
  • Third, AROs must work with at least one of the nation’s land-grant universities or non-land-grant colleges of agriculture.

Read the full article about agricultural research organizations by Steven Rhines at Forbes.