THE NORTHEAST REGIONAL CENTER FOR RURAL DEVELOPMENT - 2012

• Sponsoring Institution: National Institute of Food and Agriculture
• Project Status: TERMINATED
• Funding Source: OTHER GRANTS
• Reporting Frequency: Annual
• Accession No.: 0229043
• Grant No.: 2012-51150-19609
• Project No.: PEN04471
• Proposal No.: 2012-02629
• Program Code: UU.R
• Project Start Date: Jul 15, 2012
• Project End Date: Jul 14, 2015
• Grant Year: 2012

Project Director
Goetz, S. J.

Recipient Organization
PENNSYLVANIA STATE UNIVERSITY
208 MUELLER LABORATORY
UNIVERSITY PARK,PA 16802

Performing Department
Northeast Center for Rural Dev

Non Technical Summary
The Northeast Regional Center for Rural Development will focus on three key subject matter areas, which align with the priorities of NERA and NEED as well as USDA-NIFA: entrepreneurship and job creation; community, local and regional food systems; and land use and balanced use of natural resources. The national Stronger Economies Together (SET) initiative has been expanded to NY as well as NH/VT, where educators, faculty and federal RD staff are cooperating in delivering regional strategic programming to competitively-selected multi-county communities. This growing effort is part of the national initiative that has been funded by USDA/Rural Development, and it is one example of the Center's capacity to bring together a variety of public and private sector stake-holders in achieving critical objectives. The insights gained from this national effort are providing important lessons for future regional development strategy, and it is solidifying our network of key collaborators in the field. Lackluster employment growth continues to plague many rural communities. Further, recognition is growing that the federal government has essentially exhausted monetary and fiscal policy options at this time. This implies that entrepreneurship and self-employment may be one of the few -- if not only -- bright spots on the horizon, and we will invest heavily in understanding and documenting both the determinants of self-employment as well as the wider economic impacts within communities. We have also demonstrated that small local firms (i.e., independent entrepreneurs) are essentially the best if not only source of local economic growth, compared to big box stores. The fact that the NE Extension leadership (and USDA) is discussing the idea of networks within local food systems is strong evidence that the Center's work is having an impact in the region that will eventually filter down to educators within counties. Thus, in terms of shorter-term learning activities we expect to continue to see greater awareness among key stakeholders and decision-makers of the challenges and science-based solutions related to the forces and opportunities shaping the sustainability and profitability of agricultural and local food systems in the Northeast US. We also expect to see a better understanding and greater awareness emerge among decision-makers of the importance of self-employment and entrepreneurship within their communities; this also means reduced emphasis on industrial recruitment. The Center's recent work on the impact of small firms has attracted the attention of various media outlets and is being disseminated through these kinds of venues in addition to conventional pathways (conferences, webinars, etc.). We also expect, eventually, that there will be fewer false business starts; more knowledge regarding business potential; and greater interest in rural areas (including especially among youth) in self-employment and small business creation. Leaders within rural communities and colleague-stakeholders within the land grant system will have access to timely, science-based educational resources through our website and other vehicles (e.g., webinars).

Animal Health Component

(N/A)

Research Effort Categories

Basic

15%

Applied

85%

Developmental

(N/A)

Classification

Knowledge Area (KA)	Subject of Investigation (SOI)	Field of Science (FOS)	Percent
131	6050	3010	10%
605	6050	3010	10%
608	6050	3010	60%
608	6050	3080	20%

Knowledge Area
605 - Natural Resource and Environmental Economics; 608 - Community Resource Planning and Development; 131 - Alternative Uses of Land;

Subject Of Investigation
6050 - Communities, areas, and regions;

Field Of Science
3010 - Economics; 3080 - Sociology;

Keywords

regional development

rural development

industry clusters

small towns

small business

urban sprawl

ecommerce

egovernment

ecommunity

local government

rural/urban fringe

land use incentives

land use regulations

information technology

job growth

community vitality

entrepreneurship

poverty

local foods

migration

Goals / Objectives
The Northeast Regional Center for Rural Development will continue to build on the successes of the previous year outlined in the Annual Report 2011, and implement the programs and activities approved by the Center's Board of Directors. Increasingly, the leadership of NERA and NEED is also seeking out the Center and asking us to contribute to new regional initiatives. We will continue to network with and draw upon the advice of the newly constituted Technical Advisory Committee. We will leverage and document the Center's impact in the area of community capacity building, and extend knowledge acquired in these areas to colleagues and collaborators within the region. We will focus on three key subject matter areas, which align with the priorities of NERA and NEED as well as USDA/NIFA as follows: entrepreneurship and job creation, including within the green economy (NIFA priority 3); community, local and regional food systems, including their relationships to childhood obesity, food safety, food access and capacity to feed the region and world (NIFA priorities 1, 4 and 5); and land use and balanced use of natural resources, by addressing trade-offs between alternative forms of energy use and development, invasive species, and other issues (NIFA priority 2).1 The Center's relevance is evident from the fact that the Director has been invited to make presentations at two different regional meetings convened by NERA and NEED, held in Beltsville, MD: one on local and regional foods and the other on invasive species. He was also invited to present at a Federal Reserve Bank national conference. The project focuses on local and regional issues that, working collaboratively through the other RRDCs, also have a national impact. The Center is providing capacity-building expertise in designing and analyzing farm-level surveys and in conducting network analyses, through competitively-funded NIFA grants. With the recent re-launching of USDA's Know Your Food - Know Your Farmer campaign, we will expand our efforts to apply economic, social network and value chain analysis to small and medium-sized farms and their distribution systems in the region. We will draw both on theoretical advances as well as applied research on consumer choice and evaluation of multi-functional agriculture; the most recent work in this area places a value on consumers' willingness to pay for an agriculture with broader functions. As a contribution to family and consumer sciences, and to improve our understanding of food deserts, we will study the determinants of different kinds of grocery stores in different communities.

Project Methods
The NERCRD external review conducted by CSREES identified four distinct but complementary models that the Center could follow or apply as methods and procedures in the various issues areas. These continue to guide us in our work. Specifically, the Center: produces and disseminates research with no explicit Extension products; produces and disseminates research and produces Extension products; organizes initial and follow-up convenings that lead to Center commissioned and disseminated best practice Extension products; and sees the potential of developing Extension products from others' work, whether research or Extension, within the region or not, and commissions and disseminates Extension products. Concrete examples of each of the above are available from the Center upon request. The following general procedures will be used. The Center will: (1) Conduct, promote and extend through outreach both think tank-level and peer-reviewed studies of agricultural development, entrepreneurship, land use and community vitality, including work that addresses farm industry clusters and local/regional food systems development. This effort will receive a major boost once the Policy Research Center is functional, with two post-docs and faculty-consultant collaborators. (2) Organize and sponsor multi-disciplinary and multi-state educational efforts in the areas of community development impact assessment, entrepreneurship, balanced land use and vibrant and sustainable communities; as part of this, the Center will continue to expand its website as a tool for furthering the mission of the land grant system in the Northeast in community development. A transition to a new Content Management System will occur over this funding period; and (3) Continue to fulfill its other multiple networking responsibilities through strategic partnerships, conference calls, maintenance of listservs, conference participation, publications and by identifying leading edge programs that can be shared across the states (and nationally) via Webinars so as to reduce duplication of effort.

Progress 07/15/12 to 07/14/15

Outputs
Target Audience:The What Works III conference was attended by entrepreneurs, researchers and Extension staff. Of the total number of registrants, 87 were from within the Northeast, 46 were from US states outside of the Northeast; and 26 were from outside of the U.S. The local foods webinars organized by Local Foods Center Scholar Dee Singh-Knights (WVU) were attended by 160 people in 2014 and 130 people in 2013. Changes/Problems:FTE data is available, but the numbers are less than one REEport allows: 0.029 SY and 0.035 CY. What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?The Center supports a dedicated graduate student, leveraging in-kind tuition funds from the College of Agricultural Sciences. This student works closelywith the Center Director and receives training on regionaleconomic and related modeling. An undergraduate student intern is being exposed to projects and activities at partner institutions in the Northeast region. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?In addition to publications and reports, and the webinar, key results have been made available to the Center's newsletter subscriber base, which exceeds 800 individuals. They willalso be adopted in on-line classes in Summer 2014. Key results also were presented to the leadership of the land grant university system in the Northeast (NERA, NEED) as well as to stakeholders in Washington, D.C. 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 Northeast RegionalCenter for Rural Development continued to encourage and facilitate collaboration among researchers, educators and students across the Northeast Region. Accomplishments Included organizing of conference calls andwebinars and the writing of newsletters, reports and scientific papers and presentations. A presentation at Uddevalla Symposium on Entrepreneurship, that was held in late spring 2013 at the Kauffman Foundation Center in Kansas City, MO, examined the policy-related and other factors associated with the location of the fastest growing firms across the rural and urban U.S.; these firms are known as the INC5000. Research continued on the effect of the bigbox revolution on retailing and wider community in which stores are located. This was published in the journal of Economic Development Quarterly (Bonanno and Goetz 2012). The Center Director was invited by the leadership of NERA (Northeast Research Association) to organize a session on unique features of the Northeast food system and to make a presentation on the Scale and Diversity ofthe Northeast Agriculture and Food System to the jointly-held 2012 session between the Northeast and Northcentral Experiment Station Directors. At the direction of its Board of Directors, and under the advice of the Technical Advisory Committee, the Center sponsored a webinar in the area of foods systems designed to share research and outreach across the region. Jointly,with the Directors of the other regional rural development centers, the Director attendedvarious stakeholder meetings in Washington, D.C. over the last year, including a session sponsored by the Democratic Rural Caucus.

Publications

• Type: Websites Status: Published Year Published: 2014 Citation: http://aese.psu.edu/nercrd/publications/what-works-2014-proceedings

Progress 07/15/13 to 07/14/14

Outputs
Target Audience: Target Audience includes 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? Training opportunities are being provided for graduate students who are gaining experience with making professional presentations. The WW III conference in Baltimore, along with accompanying webinars organized by Local Foods Center Scholar Dee Singh-Knights (WVU) provided significant learning opportunities to 100 conference attendees, in addition to the webinar participants. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest? Results of our own work and that of our collaborators are being disseminated via conferences and webinars, as noted, in addition to publications in various outlets including the Center’s bi-monthly newsletter. The Yahoo Foods blog covered our research on the economic impacts of local foods. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals? In the next reporting period we will continue to work on rural development issues where we already have expertise and research to contribute, and in addition we will work in new areas as opportunities (e.g., mental health causes and effects; improving the grant applications of farmers to the FMLFPP) emerge. We are compiling an inventory of food-industry supporting services in the Northeast and also documenting, at the request of one of our TAC chairs, community development-related courses available in the Northeast and nationally.

Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals? A major highlight and accomplishment was the What Works III conference, held in May of this year in Baltimore, MD. The event, which had a theme of “Enhancing Food Security and Rural Viability through Innovative Food System Practices and Opportunities,” attracted about 100 participants from around the US and a few from foreign nations, and featured 33 workshops and breakout sessions. A selection of those presentations is available on the Center’s website. As part of the Center’s outreach, the director collaborated with the other three RRDCs in developing a presentation on Rural Vitality to senior leadership at NIFA. A graduate student was supported in presenting her research on determinants of farmer involvement in local food-related activities at the AAEA/CAEA joint annual meeting in Washington, DC. At the annual Board of Directors/Technical Advisory Committee meeting, held in Beltsville, MD and co-chaired by Dan Rossi (out-going) and Dennis Calvin (in-coming chair) center staff shared accomplishments of the previous year and also received directions for its Plan of Work for the ensuing year. The Center director also attended a public hearing in Clarion, PA organized by the Center for Rural PA and sponsored by PA State Senator G. Yaw to learn about growing mental health care issues in rural areas. Mental health is one of the national priority areas of the Centers, and we are also launching research in this area on the determinants and impacts of poor mental health.

Publications

• Type: Journal Articles Status: Published Year Published: 2014 Citation: Loveridge, S., Albrecht, D., Welborn, R. and S.J. Goetz (2014) Opportunities for Rural Development in Cooperative Extension's Second Century, Choices, 1st Quarter. http://www.choicesmagazine.org/choices-magazine/theme-articles/higher-educations-roles-in-supporting-a-rural-renaissance/opportunities-for-rural-development-in-cooperative-extensions-second-century
• Type: Conference Papers and Presentations Status: Accepted Year Published: 2014 Citation: Various authors, What Works III and National Value-Added Agriculture Joint Conference: A conference co-organized by the Penn State-based Northeast Regional Center for Rural Development and the National Value-Added Agriculture Conference, May 13-15, 2014, Baltimore, MD: http://aese.psu.edu/nercrd/presentations/what-works-value-added-joint-conference-2014
• Type: Websites Status: Published Year Published: 2013 Citation: Various authors, and dates; Food Systems Webinars: An archive of Center-sponsored webinars that focus on food systems. Food System webinars: http://aese.psu.edu/nercrd/presentations/webinars-food-systems

Progress 07/15/12 to 07/14/13

Outputs
Target Audience: Nothing Reported Changes/Problems: Nothing Reported What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided? The Center supports a dedicated graduate student, leveraging in-kind tuition funds from the College of Agricultural Sciences. This student works closely with the Center Director and receives training on regional economic and related modeling. An undergraduate student intern is being exposed to projects and activities at partner institutions in the Northeast region. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest? In addition to publications and reports, and the webinar, key results have been make available to the Center’s newsletter subscriber base, which exceeds 800 individuals. They will also be adopted in on-line classes in Summer 2014. Key results also were presented to the leadership of the land grant university system in the Northeast (NERA, NEED) as well as to stakeholders in Washington, DC. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals? We will continue with this work over the next reporting period. This includes leading and carrying out work on the grants that have been obtained by the Northeast Center. Another national webinar will take place, and a national conference is planned for May 2014 in collaboration with the National Value Added Group, to be held in Baltimore, MD. We also will continue to conduct needed research and submit resulting papers for publication and presentation consideration.

Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals? The Northeast Regional Center for Rural Development continued to encourage and facilitate collaboration among researchers, educators and students across the Northeast region. Accomplishments included organizing of conference calls and webinars and the writing of newsletters, reports and scientific papers and presentations. A presentation at the Uddevalla Symposium on Entrepreneurship, that was held in late Spring 2013 at the Kauffman Foundation Center in Kansas City, MO, examined the policy-related and other factors associated with the location of the fastest-growing firms across the rural and urban U.S.; these firms are known as the INC5000. Research continued on the effect of the bigbox revolution on retailing and the wider community in which the stores are located. This was published in the journal Economic Development Quarterly (Bonanno and Goetz 2012). The Center Director was invited by the leadership of NERA (Northeast Research Association) to organize a session on unique features of the Northeast food system and to make a presentation on the Scale and Diversity of the Northeast Agriculture and Food System to the jointly-held 2012 session between the Northeast and Northcentral Experiment Station Directors. At the direction of its Board of Directors, and under the advice of the Technical Advisory Committee, the Center sponsored a webinar in the area of foods systems designed to share research and outreach across the region. Jointly with the Directors of the other regional rural development centers, the Director attended various stakeholder meetings in Washington, DC over the last year, including a session sponsored by the Democratic Rural Caucus.

Publications

• Type: Journal Articles Status: Published Year Published: 2012 Citation: Bonanno, A. and S.J. Goetz (2012) Walmart and Local Economic Development: A Survey, Economic Development Quarterly. November, vol. 26 no. 4 pp. 285-297