Progress 09/01/11 to 08/31/14
Outputs
Target Audience: Target Audience included Deans and Directors of the land grant universities in the Northeast, professionals at USDA and within NIFA, faculty and educators across the regions, policymakers, planners, citizens and other audiences, depending on the topic. Changes/Problems:
Nothing Reported
What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided? The Center continues to reach a growing number of individual stakeholders in the Northeast US and beyond. About 60 professionals and farmers attended the climate change meeting, 40 leaders were at the Joint Summer Session and approximately 15 faculty or educators attended the 4-H and AAEA/CAEA presentations. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest? As indicated, results of our work were presented at formal meetings. In addition, PowerPoints are made available through the website of the Northeast Regional Center for Rural Development. The newsletter is sent to more than 1,000 individuals What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?
Nothing Reported
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
The Center Director was invited to make a presentation on collaboration networks at the joint Northeast/Ontario (Canada) conference on implications of climate change for agricultural adaptation, organized by Cornell University and held in Syracuse, NY, on December 9-10 of last year. In addition the Center conducted a network survey of participants at that event, subsequently analyzed the results and then shared the findings with the conference organizers. Invited presentations on network analysis were also made at the AAEA/CAEA joint annual meetings held in DC, emphasizing how to put in place a large-scale interdisciplinary project. The Director was also invited to present at the Joint Summer Session of the Land Grant University Leadership, held in Ithaca, NY. In addition, he was invited to make a presentation to the NE leadership group of the 4-H program leaders, in Sandwich, MA, on implications of socio-demographic change for youth and related programming.
Publications
- Type:
Books
Status:
Published
Year Published:
2014
Citation:
Harris, T.R., S.C. Deller and S.J. Goetz (2014) Linkages of the Agricultural Sector: Models and Precautions, in Neal Val Alfen, editor-in-chief. Encyclopedia of Agriculture and Food Systems, vol. 4, San Diego: Elsevier; pp. 148-155.
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Accepted
Year Published:
2013
Citation:
Goetz, S.J. Economic and Socio-Demographic Trends in the Northeast US, Presentation to NE 4-H leadership group in Sandwich, MA: July 30, 2013.
http://aese.psu.edu/nercrd/presentations/Northeast-US-demographic-trends/view
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Accepted
Year Published:
2013
Citation:
Goetz, S.J. Building Capacity and Resilience in the NE Agricultural and Food System: An Update from the NE Center, Northeast Joint Summer Session, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY July 8, 2013: http://aese.psu.edu/nercrd/presentations/building-capacity-and-resilience-in-the-ne/view
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Progress 09/01/12 to 08/31/13
Outputs
Target Audience: Our primary target audience during this period included the Deans and Directors of the land grant university colleges of agriculture within the Northeast U.S. An invited presentation was given at the Joint Summer meeting of NERA and NEED in Ithaca, NY. Other audiences included individuals on our listservs who recieve the Center's quarterly newsletter and who visit our website (over 12,000 since March, 2013). Changes/Problems:
Nothing Reported
What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided? The Center-sponsored webinar series on local and regional food systems development efforts provided a forum for training and professional development as well as greater sharing of programming among key Northeast Center constituencies in the region. The Foundations of Practice workshop series has attracted over 65 participants from across the nation, not counting multiple participants in some sites who attended from a classroom setting (e.g., at the University of Maine). A number of registrants for this series is completely new to Extension, underscoring the value and importance of this effort. In addition, the project provides training and professional development opportunities for graduate students, including a post-doc. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest? As noted, the results of this project have been disseminated via conference presentations, scientific publications including one book chapter, and a set of webinars accessible to individuals from across the nation. In addition, results are shared through the Northeast Center's website as well as its quarterly newsletter, which has over 1,000 subscribers. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals? We will continue to refine the work on community development indicators by working with educators at the University of New Hampshire, Cornell University and Penn State University. The research on optimal hub locations for fresh fruits and vegetables will continue, along with efforts examining the vulnerabilty of the U.S. food system (both on-farm and post-farm gate transformations). This effort will use a network approach and draw on the national input-output transactions table. We are also in the midst of planning for a May 2014 conference on food supply chains -- better connecting farmers and their consumers, to be held in Baltimore, MD.
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
We have initiated a discussion among community development extension professional in the Northeast region on how to more thoroughly measure the impact of our work both in each of the states as well as the region as a whole. The Center's board of directors also recently approved allocating a small amount of funds to an individual in the region who will be tasked with moving this initiative forward. Under the leadership of the Center's Scholar Doolarie Singh-Knights of West Virginia University and the Technical Advisory Commitee Chair, Kathleen Liang, we held two regional webinars that were attended by over 100 stakeholders from the region and beyond. By all accounts, and as reported in our 2013 Annual Report, this webinar series was very well received. The Center continued its effort in support of the USDA's KYF2 initiative by developing a presentation on the Capacity and Resilience of Northeast Agricultural and Food System, building on the 2012 presentation on the Scale and Diversity of Northeast US Agriculture. A scientific paper was written and presented examining optimal hub locations within the national food supply chain. The Center Director also participated as a lecturer in the Foundations of Practice national webinar series for Community Developers, with a presentation on Community Economic Development on October 24, 2013.
Publications
- Type:
Conference Papers and Presentations
Status:
Other
Year Published:
2013
Citation:
Goetz, Stephan J. "Building Capacity and Resilience in the NE Agricultural and Food System," invited pres. at the 2013 Northeast Joint Summer Session, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, July 8. [powerpoint presentation]
- Type:
Book Chapters
Status:
Awaiting Publication
Year Published:
2014
Citation:
Goetz, S.J. (2014) Ch. 6 in "Labor Market Theory and Models" in M.M. Fischer and P. Nijkamp (eds.) Handbook of Regional Science, Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg. DOI 10.1007/978-3-642-23430-9_6
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Progress 09/01/11 to 08/31/12
Outputs
OUTPUTS: The Northeast Regional Center for Rural Development continued to carry out its mission by encouraging and facilitating integrated research and extension activities to enhance the social and economic well-being of rural people and their communities in the Northeast. The Center developed and communicated research on rural development policy issues to decision makers in the Northeast and was actively engaged in bringing together researchers and educators to develop various grant applications in the area of regional foods systems development. One of these grants involved an application to eXtension of a community of practice entitled Community, Local and Regional Food Systems, which seeks to provide objective, peer-reviewed information on a topic that is of growing interest to consumers in the Northeast as well as elsewhere. Center staff were able to make significant scientific advances on the subject of optimal food hub locations in the Northeast, using mathematical optimization models. The models can be used to locate hubs optimal at the county-level as various key parameters change, including hub processing capacity, fuel prices, maximum distances over which foods are to be shipped, etc. In tandem with this effort, research progressed on examining the implications for the food system and energy utilization of a gradual shift towards a diet that is based on greater consumption of fruits and vegetables, consistent with USDA daily nutrient and dietary recommendations. The Center held a meeting in Portsmouth, NH of its Board of Directors as well as its Technical Advisory Committee comprised of deans and directors, private sector representatives, faculty and educators from the Northeast region. At that meeting the Center's current mission and efforts were reaffirmed unanimously. PARTICIPANTS: Participants include faculty, educators, graduate students and other stakeholders from around the Northeast region as well as the nation, representing land grant universities as well as private agencies. Professional training opportunities are provided through conferences as well as through the web. TARGET AUDIENCES: Target audiences include deans and directors of extension and agricultural experiment stations as well as other policy makers concerned with impacting rural areas, suburbs and cities. The Northeast Regional Center for Rural Development provides information to faculty and educators who in turn deliver that information to their stakeholders throughout the region. PROJECT MODIFICATIONS: Nothing significant to report during this reporting period.
Impacts
The Center brought together various stakeholders from the land grant universities and the private sector in the Northeast, an activity that is highly valued by its stakeholders because it allows for more efficient sharing of information as well as the generation of new ideas, including research and extension programming. More financial resources were brought into the region in the form of a $50,000 grant from eXtension, and a first national project meeting was held in Pittsburgh during the month of October to launch the community of practice. Twenty-five individuals representing ten states, the federal government and private foundations attended that meeting. One foundation representative remarked that this meeting was a unique effort because it included such a large number of individuals who were able to approach the problem of food distribution from a robust, disciplined and scientific perspective, something that he did not normally encounter in his other interactions. The state-of-the-art research on optimal hub locations based on mathematical optimization models was presented at the American Agricultural Economics Association annual meeting in Seattle, WA, where it received a special honor by being chosen as part of the Selected Poster Tour. This tour included the President of the national association. This particular study was also selected for presentation at the annual Transportation Review Board annual conference in 2013, and it is being considered for publication in the associations Record. This underscores not only the applied relevance and importance of the Center's work but also the quality of the work that is being carried out.
Publications
- No publications reported this period
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