June 2015 | Agroecology and Sustainable Agriculture Program | College of Agricultural, Consumer & Environmental Sciences

Ceres Trust Organic Research Initiative

The Ceres Trust launches the sixth year of their Organic Research Initiative (ORI) program to support research that helps the region contend with “the loss of our beneficial weather patterns, severe degradation and loss of our soils, dwindling and contaminated water resources, widespread loss of pollinators, and the collapse of entire ecosystems.”

They fund organic projects that might show us a way forward by providing grants of up to $60,000 per year for up to three years in the region (Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota and Wisconsin). Grants must be submitted on or before September 25, 2015.

For more information see the RFP

The View from Europe: the Common Agricultural Policy and Small Farms

The European Coordination Via Campesina has released a new briefing outlining some concrete proposals for how the CAP could support small-to-medium sized family farms – and why it should.

Originally published June 25, 2015 on www.eurovia.org:

How can public policy support small-scale family farms?

In the frame of the European project “New CAP, new horizons”, 2014-00116, European Coordination Via Campesina, Confederation Paysanne and Envie de Paysans ! have produced a booklet entitled “How can public policy support small-scale family farms ?“.

The initiative has been co-financed by the European Commission, Directorate General for Agriculture and Rural Development.

The booklet explains what small scale-farm entails, through three dimensions : the economic, the social and the environmental one. It also reminds the definition of « peasants » : peasants are men and women, including the landless, who have a direct relation with land and nature through the production of food and agricultural products by working the land.

The booklet continues giving concrete and viable political proposals to maintain and develop small farms, to promote short distribution circuits and local economies, to guarantee fair practices in the whole food chain, and to favor seed autonomy to ensure biodiversity.

To read the full booklet, please click on the link below :

http://www.enviedepaysans.fr/suppor…

National Wildlife Federation Cover Crop Team is hiring!

We’re looking for a knowledgeable and talented person to add to our cover crop team! Position is to be based in Minnesota, Wisconsin, or Michigan.

https://nwf.applicantpro.com/jobs/237724.html

Feel free to contact me with any questions.

Best,
Ryan

Ryan Stockwell
Ph.D.Senior Agriculture Program Manager
stockwellr@nwf.org
Twitter: @rjstockwell
715-965-2538

Avian Influences: The Politics of the Mid-West Bird Flu Outbreak

Robert Wallace is an evolutionary biologist and social epidemiologist, and co-author of the groundbreaking Farming Human Pathogens (2009). In a recent blog post he addresses the recent – and ongoing – outbreak of avian influenza in the US. In this short essay he dissects the public discussion and institutional response to the outbreak, and lays bare the economic and ecological issues surrounding them. Wallace doesn’t pull any punches, so consider yourself warned – he makes a very compelling case that industry and government are both responding in ways that serves industry first, and the public not at all.

Originally posted June 10, 2015 on Farming Pathogens:

Made in Minnesota

Industrial turkey and chicken in Minnesota, and other states Midwest and South, have been hit by a highly pathogenic strain of avian influenza A (H5N2). Millions of birds have been killed by the virus or culled in an effort to control the outbreak.

The epizootic began with a soft opening, hitting a handful of backyard farms and wild birds in December in Washington and Oregon before spreading east. Suddenly in early March, H5N2 wiped out 15,000 turkeys on an industrial farm in Pope County, Minnesota, the first of what would be nearly 9 million birds and counting killed or culled across 108 farms over 23 counties.

Go to original: Made in Minnesota

Hey Students Abstracts are Due for the ASA,CSA, SSA Meeting

Graduate students, abstracts are due for the trisociety meetings and there are MANY graduate student competitions that provide monetary awards. For a list of these click here https://www.acsmeetings.org/files/meetings/2015-student-competition-descriptions.pdf

Competitions include a poster session on Organic Management Systems, oral and poster sessions on Sensor Based Nutrient Management, and Evapotranspiration Measurement and Modeling, poster sessions on Soil Health and Biomedical and Health-Benificial & Nutritionally Enhanced Plants, oral and poster sessions on Pedology, a poster session on Soil Biology and Biochemistry, and much much more.

The following competition and travel award provide a nice example of how these efforts are organized to attract research to important areas.

SSSA Division – Soil Physics and Hydrology Soil Physics and Hydrology will hold its “Soil
Physics and Hydrology Student Competition: Lightning Orals with Poster Presentations” comprised of 3-minute talks plus 2 minutes questions to be linked with the Student Poster Competition. Combined lightning oral and poster presentations will be evaluated by judges selected by the Soil Physics Division Executive Committee. Guidelines for high-quality posters can be found on theabstract submission website.
Oral presentations are limited to two slides only. To be included in this competition, abstractsmust be submitted through the ACS website, selecting Soil Physics Division as the preferred division and noting that you wish to enter the paper in the student competition. The lead author on the abstract and presenting author must be a graduate or undergraduate student at the time of the annual meeting. The top 3 students will be
recognized with cash awards of $300, $200, and $100 each. The awardees will be recognized during the Soil Physics Business meeting and via
email to the Division, and in a short article to CSA News and posted on soils.org
.
SSSA Division – Soil Physics and Hydrology:
Robert Luxmoore Student Travel Award The Robert Luxmoore Student Travel Award is
designed to support travel of students to the Annual Meeting of the Soil Science Society of America. This award is supported by a generous bequest made by Robert Luxmoore to the Soil Physics Mentoring Fund, which has been established through the Agronomic Science Foundation and is administered by the Soil Science Society of America. Two $750 awards will be given to undergraduate or graduate students as travel support. Details on application procedures and deadlines can be found at: https://www.soils.org/membership/divisions/soil-physics-and-hydrology/robert-luxmoore-travel-award

Join today if you aren’t already a member of the Soil Science Society of America, Crops Science Society of America or Agronomy Society of America You can join all three for just $35!