American Farmland Trust

In subtropical preserve ecosystems, natural factors combined with anthropogenic activities have led to significant seasonal changes, including distinct dry and rainy seasons. These changes can potentially impact soil health indicators, which are keystone properties that control ecosystem services across terrestrial landscapes. Few studies have evaluated the impact of seasonal changes on soil health within non-agronomic landscapes, such as preserves. As part of this study, we collected topsoil samples (0-15 cm) from twenty-three land cover types within a 109 km² preserve in central Florida during two different seasons (dry and wet) to advance the understanding of how soil health responds to seasonal changes and to explore the environmental factors controlling soil health within non-agronomic landscapes. Ten soil indicators were analyzed and incorporated into the total dataset (TDS). From the TDS, a minimum dataset was derived using Principal Component Analysis, which was then used to calculate the Soil Health Index (SHI) for soil health assessment. Our findings showed that changes in soil indicators, their relationships, and the SHI across seasons depend on land cover type. Based on soil health classification grades, soil health status either improved, declined, or remained constant between seasons, depending on land cover type. The regression analysis of eight selected environmental factors, such as soil profile moisture (SPM), surface soil wetness (SSW), precipitation (P), soil temperature (T), elevation (El), slope gradient (S), global horizontal irradiance (GHI) and surface albedo (ALB), showed that only slope gradient significantly explains variations in SHI during wet season, whereas other environmental factors do not show significant explanatory power for SHI variations in either dry or wet season. These findings highlight the dominant influence of slope gradient on soil health within non-agronomic landscapes, while indicating that other evaluated environmental factors may have limited relevance in this context. Furthermore, the non-significant findings among soil indicators across seasons may be attributed to the study's small sample size (i.e., three replications), a limitation stemming from constrained funding. This highlights the importance of future research incorporating larger sample size to validate the findings of this study.

Black and Indigenous women farmers face con­current complex challenges in their farming opera­tions such as a changing climate, institutional discrimination, and a historic wealth gap. The compounding nature of these challenges provides opportunities for agricultural technical assistance providers to create innovative educational approaches to support and build capacity towards greater resilience. American Farmland Trust, North Carolina Extension, and Black Family Land Trust piloted a “Get Climate Smart Food and Agricul­tural System’s Resilience Training” with 30 Black and Indigenous women farmers in North Carolina during 2023 and 2024. The training’s focus was to engage historically underserved women producers to (a) actualize conservation skills and climate smart practices, including monitoring and imple­mentation; (b) improve technical skills regarding diversifying production and marketing systems for greater economic and food system resilience; and (c) develop leadership and mentoring skills to build community and social resilience around food and agriculture. All sessions were structured using a learning circle model that fostered collaborative, participant-driven learning compared to traditional instructor-led sessions; enrolled participants engaged in virtual, in-person, asynchronous, and hands-on activities. After the program concluded, the team conducted 18 in-depth semi-structured interviews with a subset of participants. Findings revealed that the program’s learning circle model and cohort network were highly effective for beginning and experienced Black and Indigenous women farmers, particularly by sustaining rela­tionships and implementing climate smart practices on their land beyond the program timeframe. This article will review the program’s model and discuss how this type of program and its learning out­comes foster social sustainability by boosting individual, farm-scale, and local food resilience.

Since 1983, legislators and advocates have introduced Land Access Policy Incentives in twenty of the fifty United States. These bills share a demographic goal: to fund land rental or purchase for young and beginning farmers and ranchers. States’ efforts to facilitate land access are part of a global movement to support farmers’ entry into agriculture and to resist farmers’ increasing exclusion from land. We examine the policy creation processes of nine states to describe how coalitions and government leaders are translating their values around land access barriers into policy tools whose political appeal is broad. The bills often pass unanimously, and enrollments are strong: about 2,000 young and beginning US farmers and ranchers will purchase or rent farms this year through a few states’ land access policy programs. We trace the themes from interviews with 66 of the bills’ authors and advocates, and their documentation and media coverage, to demonstrate the values that bipartisan coalitions enlist to construct successful bills and the compromises that make them politically feasible. The coalitions’ values turn on the threats of rising land costs, farm expansion or consolidation, and land conversion out of agriculture. As a group, the policies serve broadacre farming operations while leaving specialty crop farms largely unserved. Two states have endeavored to include all farmers of color among their policies’ beneficiaries. Our findings demonstrate tradeoffs of states’ current Land Access Policy Incentives and suggest next steps for research and advocacy to inform policy development to support next generation farming opportunities.

The US agricultural sector is proposed as one opportunity to contribute to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reductions—reductions that are needed to limit atmospheric warming to be more in line with the US Nationally Determined Contribution to the Paris Agreement. Improved management of agricultural soils can both mitigate GHG emissions and increase carbon (C) sequestration, but disagreement exists regarding what levels of adoption are possible and to what extent they may mitigate net GHG emissions. In this paper, we provide a framework for setting reasonable, short-term conservation practice adoption targets and quantifying the associated net emissions reductions. Our framework was constructed using USDA-based publicly available inventory data and mitigation potentials from the COMET-Planner tool scaled to nine farm resource regions. The framework includes 2017 levels of conservation practice adoption and two 10-year growth scenarios: business-as-usual (BAU) and accelerated adoption rates. We evaluated six cropland management practices and practices associated with Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) establishment. Based on existing (2017) census data, we estimated that 134.2 million tonnes (Mt) carbon dioxide equivalents (CO₂e) per year have been or continue to be reduced through the adoption of conservation management practices on a cumulative total of 133.5 million hectares (Mha) of cropland. Under the BAU scenario, we estimated an additional 6.2 Mha y⁻¹ of adoption could result in a reduction potential of 48.7 Mt CO₂e y⁻¹. Under the accelerated scenario, we estimated an additional 13.1 Mha y⁻¹ of adoption could result in a reduction potential of 118.5 Mt of CO₂e y⁻¹ over the next 10 years. This framework highlights three key outcomes: (1) agriculture has had a substantial impact on GHG mitigation through existing/historical adoption of six cropland management practices and conversion of lands to the CRP; (2) these shifts in adoption provide an important baseline to make future projections of changes in practice adoption given regional trends and the resulting GHG mitigation potentials; and (3) disaggregating national estimates to the farm resource region level can help to inform and prioritize programs and policies consistent with existing climate goals. Estimates reported here reflect the current state of national modeling efforts and agricultural inventory sources. As new data such as the pending 2022 Ag Census report and model enhancements are made, the framework we outline here can be used to revise and update the estimates to improve accuracy and applicability.

There is increasing enthusiasm around the concept of soil health, and as a result, new public and private initiatives are being developed to increase soil health-related practices on working lands in the United States. In addition, billions of U.S. public dollars are dedicated annually toward soil conservation programs, and yet, it is not well quantified how investment in conservation programs improve soil health and, more broadly, environmental health. The Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP) is one of the major U.S. public conservation programs administered on privately managed lands for which public data are available. In this research, we developed a multi-dimensional classification system to evaluate over 300 EQIP practices to identify to what extent practices have the potential to improve different aspects of soil and environmental health. Using available descriptions and expert opinion, these practices were evaluated with a classification system based on the practice's potential to exhibit the following environmental health outcomes: (i) principles of soil health to reduce soil disturbance and increase agrobiodiversity; (ii) a transition to ecologically-based management to conserve soil, water, energy and biological resources; and (iii) adaptive strategy to confer agroecosystem resilience. Further, we analyzed nearly $7 billion U.S. dollars of financial assistance dedicated to these practices from 2009 through 2018 to explore the potential of these investments to generate environmental health outcomes. We identified nine practices that fit the highest level of potential environmental health outcomes in our classification systems. These included wetlands and agroforestry related practices, demonstrating that ecologically complex practices can provide the broadest benefits to environmental health. Practices with the greatest potential to improve environmental health in our classification system represent 2–27% of annual EQIP funding between 2009 and 2018. In fiscal year 2018, these practices represented between $13 and 121 million, which represented ~0.08% of total annual USDA expenditures. These classifications and the subsequent funding analysis provide evidence that there is tremendous untapped potential for conservation programs to confer greater environmental health in U.S. agriculture. This analysis provides a new framework for assessing conservation investments as a driver for transformative agricultural change.

Plants, and the biological systems around them, are key to the future health of the planet and its inhabitants. The Plant Science Decadal Vision 2020–2030 frames our ability to perform vital and far‐reaching research in plant systems sciences, essential to how we value participants and apply emerging technologies. We outline a comprehensive vision for addressing some of our most pressing global problems through discovery, practical applications, and education. The Decadal Vision was developed by the participants at the Plant Summit 2019, a community event organized by the Plant Science Research Network. The Decadal Vision describes a holistic vision for the next decade of plant science that blends recommendations for research, people, and technology. Going beyond discoveries and applications, we, the plant science community, must implement bold, innovative changes to research cultures and training paradigms in this era of automation, virtualization, and the looming shadow of climate change. Our vision and hopes for the next decade are encapsulated in the phrase reimagining the potential of plants for a healthy and sustainable future. The Decadal Vision recognizes the vital intersection of human and scientific elements and demands an integrated implementation of strategies for research (Goals 1–4), people (Goals 5 and 6), and technology (Goals 7 and 8). This report is intended to help inspire and guide the research community, scientific societies, federal funding agencies, private philanthropies, corporations, educators, entrepreneurs, and early career researchers over the next 10 years. The research encompass experimental and computational approaches to understanding and predicting ecosystem behavior; novel production systems for food, feed, and fiber with greater crop diversity, efficiency, productivity, and resilience that improve ecosystem health; approaches to realize the potential for advances in nutrition, discovery and engineering of plant‐based medicines, and "green infrastructure." Launching the Transparent Plant will use experimental and computational approaches to break down the phytobiome into a "parts store" that supports tinkering and supports query, prediction, and rapid‐response problem solving. Equity, diversity, and inclusion are indispensable cornerstones of realizing our vision. We make recommendations around funding and systems that support customized professional development. Plant systems are frequently taken for granted therefore we make recommendations to improve plant awareness and community science programs to increase understanding of scientific research. We prioritize emerging technologies, focusing on non‐invasive imaging, sensors, and plug‐and‐play portable lab technologies, coupled with enabling computational advances. Plant systems science will benefit from data management and future advances in automation, machine learning, natural language processing, and artificial intelligence‐assisted data integration, pattern identification, and decision making. Implementation of this vision will transform plant systems science and ripple outwards through society and across the globe. Beyond deepening our biological understanding, we envision entirely new applications. We further anticipate a wave of diversification of plant systems practitioners while stimulating community engagement, underpinning increasing entrepreneurship. This surge of engagement and knowledge will help satisfy and stoke people's natural curiosity about the future, and their desire to prepare for it, as they seek fuller information about food, health, climate and ecological systems.

Climate change is expected to have heterogeneous effects on agriculture across the USA, where temperature and precipitation regimes are already changing. While the overall effect of climate change on agriculture is uncertain, farmers’ perceptions of current and future climate and weather conditions will be a key factor in how they adapt. This paper analyzes data from paired surveys (N = 817) and natural variation from baseline weather across the inland Pacific Northwest (iPNW), to determine if long-term, gradual changes in precipitation, and temperature distributions affect farmers’ weather perceptions and intentions to adapt. We note that some areas in the iPNW have experienced significant changes in weather, while others have remained relatively constant. However, we find no relationship between changes in temperature and precipitation distributions and individuals’ perceptions and intentions to adapt. Our findings provide evidence that gradual, long-term changes in weather are temporally incongruous with human perception, which can impede support for climate action policy and adaptation strategies.

Abstract Large temporal and spatial variability in soil nitrogen availability combined with economic risk avoidance leads many farmers across the United States to generally over‐apply N fertilizers in corn ( Zea mays L.) production systems. Various static N rate calculators are promoted in the United States, but new dynamic model‐based decision tools allow for adaptive recommendations that account for specific production environments and weather. This field study quantified N leaching losses from a crossed design involving two tillage practices, plow and no‐till, and two N management tools: (i) the Corn N Calculator (CNC), a generalized static N tool for New York State, and (ii) Adapt‐N, a model‐based tool that uses soil, crop and management information with real‐time weather data. Corn was grown for four growing seasons on lysimeter plots on clay loam and loamy sand soil, and drain water samples were collected on 14 dates. Adapt‐N and CNC showed identical yields despite an overall higher N input of 66 kg ha −1 (46%) for CNC. Concentrations of NO 3 +NO 2 in drainage water varied by sampling date, but overall were impacted by soil type (loamy sand > clay loam) and N tool, with CNC‐associated N losses 58 and 68% higher than Adapt‐N for the clay loam and loamy sand, respectively. Plow till resulted in marginally higher NO 3 +NO 2 concentrations in drainage water than no‐till. Overall, this study offers field‐based evidence on the agronomic and environmental benefits from N management that is adapted to growing environments (soil, management, weather).

This study is about adult learning and empowerment in a challenging context. The data from this study comes from interviews with women non-operating landowners who attended a learning circle event designed to inform them about conservation opportunities on their land. The findings show there were several aspects of the learning circles that resonated with the women – the type of learning that occurred (hands on and visual), the networking (with other female landowners) and specific conservation information (cover crops). The findings also show how the structure of the learning circle allowed for a Community of Practice, and the resultant environmental and social impacts that occurred from such a community.