Source: PENNSYLVANIA STATE UNIVERSITY submitted to
IMPACT ANALYSES AND DECISION STRATEGIES FOR AGRICULTURAL RESEARCH (NC1034)
Sponsoring Institution
National Institute of Food and Agriculture
Project Status
COMPLETE
Funding Source
Reporting Frequency
Annual
Accession No.
1010877
Grant No.
(N/A)
Cumulative Award Amt.
(N/A)
Proposal No.
(N/A)
Multistate No.
NC-_old1034
Project Start Date
Oct 1, 2016
Project End Date
Sep 30, 2021
Grant Year
(N/A)
Program Code
[(N/A)]- (N/A)
Project Director
Glenna, LE.
Recipient Organization
PENNSYLVANIA STATE UNIVERSITY
208 MUELLER LABORATORY
UNIVERSITY PARK,PA 16802
Performing Department
Agri Economics, Sociology & Education
Non Technical Summary
Stakeholders have an essential need for a better understanding of how agricultural research systems encourage the development and diffusion of new technologies to help farmers adapt in response to many changes in their decision making environments. Understanding adaptation is a cross-cutting issue because of the diversity of changes farmers face. Various initiatives at the state, regional, and national level have emphasized the importance of research, extension, and technology transfer in helping farmers adapt to substantive and diverse changes.
Animal Health Component
50%
Research Effort Categories
Basic
50%
Applied
50%
Developmental
(N/A)
Classification

Knowledge Area (KA)Subject of Investigation (SOI)Field of Science (FOS)Percent
6106099308050%
6116050308050%
Goals / Objectives
Measure trends, patterns, and sources of agricultural productivity growth. Estimate the net benefits of public and private investments in agricultural research and characterize the nature of those benefits to consumers, producers, and the environment. Analyze the adoption and diffusion of new agricultural technologies, assess agronomic, economic, and institutional barriers to adoption, and evaluate policies to overcome such barriers. Analyze decision strategies for funding, planning, managing, and evaluating agricultural research by public and private organizations. Analyze opportunities, risks, and net benefits from public-private sector linkages and technology transfer arrangements, including joint ventures, partnering, consortia, specialty research centers, start-up companies, and intellectual property arrangements. Examine possible future demands for technology as influenced by changes in population, climate and other environmental factors in addition to estimating the potential benefits of prospective technological developments.
Project Methods
All objectives of this project will analyze primary and secondary data to achieve objectives. Primary data will be gathered through surveys and intensive interviews. Secondary data will be gathered by downloading data from various government sources and by securing documents from relevant organizations. Data will be analyzed using appropriate qualitative and quantitative methods of analysis.

Progress 10/01/16 to 09/30/21

Outputs
Target Audience:The NC1034 project had the stated intention of reaching multiple stakeholders involved in the agriculture and food system. Journal publications and book chapters mostly reached other academic researchers. However, presentations and lectures to students and broader audiences extended research findings to extension personnel, policy makers, college students, and the public. Changes/Problems: Nothing Reported What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?At least six graduate students were involved in conducting research or writing parts of these publications. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest? Nothing Reported What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals? Nothing Reported

Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals? Every publication listed addressed at least one of the four goals listed. Glenna, Brandl, and Jones (2015), Glenna, Shortall, and Brandl (2015), Glenna and Brandl (2017) addresses the goal related to trends, patterns, and sources of agricultural productivity growth (Goal #1). All three publications relied on crop yield data provided by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization. For the Glenna, Brandl, and Jones (2015) article, we also used data on sources of research funding for CGIAR organizations. For the other two articles, we used secondary data on OECD agricultural research funding and published analyses on that data to document changes over time in research funding (private and public) and trends in crop yields. Glenna (2017) and Chiles et al. (2018) address the decision strategies for funding, planning, managing, and evaluating agricultural research by public institutions and private organizations (Goal #2). Glenna (2017) relied mostly on National Science Foundation data on university research funding over time. The analysis for the article tracked changes over time from the early 1970s to the middle of the 2010s. The Chiles et al. (2018) publication drew from existing publications to document trends in corporate social responsibility and the role of university research in those trends. Glenna, Tooker, Welsh, and Ervin (2015), Pixley et al. (2019), and NAS (2016) analyze opportunities, risks, and net benefits from existing and potential future public-private sector linkages (Goal #3). Glenna, Tooker, Welsh, and Ervin (2015) analyzed survey data from a survey of agricultural scientists involved in corn research in the Midwestern part of the United States. The Pixley et al. (2019) and NAS (2016) publications involved surveys of publications on trends in genetic engineering and other advanced types of crop research. Tobin, Glenna, and Devaux (2016), Tobin and Glenna (2018), Konefal et al. (2019), and Borlu and Glenna (2020) analyze the adoption and diffusion of new agricultural technologies (Goal #4). Tobin, Glenna, and Devaux (2016) and Tobin and Glenna (2018) analyzed data from a survey gathered in the Highlands of Peru on the adoption and rejection of new potato varieties used to produce multicolored potato chips. Konefal et al. (2019) uses data from intensive interviews with people representing multistakeholder initiatives. Borlu and Glenna (2020) analyze survey data of wine-grape and apple growers in California, Washington, Pennsylvania, and New York.

Publications

  • Type: Journal Articles Status: Published Year Published: 2019 Citation: Pixley, Kevin V., Jose Falck-Zepeda, Ken Giller, Leland L. Glenna, Fred Gould, Carol A. Mallory-Smith, David M. Stelly, and C. Neal Stewart. 2019. Genome Editing, Gene Drive, and Synthetic Biology: Will They Contribute to Disease-Resistant Crops, and Who Will Benefit? Annual Review of Phytopathology 57: 165-188.
  • Type: Book Chapters Status: Published Year Published: 2019 Citation: Camacho-Villa, Tania Carolina, Luis Barba-Escoto, Juan Burgue�o-Ferreira, Ann R. Tickamyer, Leland Glenna, and Santiago L�pez-Ridaura. 2019. Diversity of Small-Scale Maize Farmers in the Western Highlands of Guatemala: Integrating Gender into Farm Typologies. Pp. 93-110 in Sachs, Carolyn E. (Ed.) Gender, Agriculture and Agrarian Transformations. London, UK: Routledge.
  • Type: Journal Articles Status: Published Year Published: 2019 Citation: Konefal, Jason, Maki Hatanaka, Johann Strube, Leland Glenna, and David Conner. 2019. Sustainability assemblages: From metrics development to metrics implementation in United States agriculture. Journal of Rural Studies
  • Type: Journal Articles Status: Published Year Published: 2020 Citation: Borlu, Yetkin and Leland Glenna. 2020. Environmental Concern in a Capitalist Economy: Climate Change Perception Among U.S. Specialty-Crop Producers. Organization & Environment 0(0): 1-21.


Progress 10/01/19 to 09/30/20

Outputs
Target Audience:The target audience for this work is primarily other academics. To the extent that members of the public and policy makers read journal articles and attend academic conferences, they are also the audience. Changes/Problems: Nothing Reported What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?One PhD student has worked on the project and gained skills in researching, writing, and publishing peer-reviewed articles (coauthor of a paper included in products). How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?The findings reported in the Journal of Rural Studies paper has been shared with one of the MSI organizations being studied. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?During the next reporting period, the focus will be on Goals #2, #3, and #4. The research that was reported during this reporting period is ongoing and will continue to generate new publications. Goals #1, #5, and #6 will be addressed in future years.

Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals? Research during this reporting period focused primarily on Goals #3 and #4. Progress towards Goal #3 was achieved through Glenna's efforts on two projects that examined the importance of public research universities in generating useful agricultural technologies. One found that new inventions in gene editing and synthetic biology are unlikely to meet the needs of a broad cross section of farmers, especially smallholder farmers in developing nations, unless they are generated as public goods. Another analyzed a survey of LGU scientists to examine the influence of industry research funding and commercial science activities compared to the activities of university scientists who do not receive industry money and do not pursue commercial outputs. The analysis found that scientists who receive industry funding pursue more commercial activities than those who do not. Furthermore, those scientists tend to claim that commercial activity is more valuable than public research activities. Progress towards Goal #4 was achieved through Glenna's research on the role of multistakeholder initiatives (MSIs) to promote sustainable agricultural production practices through the adoption of new technologies to better measure the impacts of agricultural practices. The research reveals that such efforts, which tend to rely on the private sector more than the public sector, create substantial challenges because the efforts require coordination along the value chain. Problems arise when various actors along the value chain disagree on the value of adopting new technologies. MSI institutions face the difficult task of introducing and promoting technology adoption while also managing different interests and goals. The other goals will be addressed in future years.

Publications

  • Type: Journal Articles Status: Published Year Published: 2019 Citation: Konefal, Jason, Maki Hatanaka, Johann Strube, Leland Glenna, and David Conner. 2019. Sustainability assemblages: From metrics development to metrics implementation in United States agriculture. Journal of Rural Studies. doi.org/10.1016/j.jrurstud.2019.10.023


Progress 10/01/18 to 09/30/19

Outputs
Target Audience:The target audience for this work is primarily other academics. To the extent that members of the public and policy makers read journal articles and attend academic conferences, they are also the audience. Changes/Problems: Nothing Reported What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided? Nothing Reported How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest? Nothing Reported What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?Goals 2, 3, and 4 are likely to be covered over the next year. Research on alternative market models for alternative meat products, research on farmer adoption of fieldprint calculators to measure sustainability practices, and research on policies governing gene editing technologies are will address these goals.

Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals? Goal 1 was achieved with through an analysis of how natural gas drilling in Pennsylvania and surrounding states affected agricultural productivity. The findings from that research were published in Agricultural and Resource Economics Review. Those findings were that farmers in gas drilling counties were more likely to become larger over time, indicating a tendency towards consolidation. However, the findings did not support anecdotal claims that dairy farmers were more likely to switch to hay or beef production because of income from drilling activities. Goal 2 was addressed though an analysis of existing genetically engineered crops and emerging genetic engineering techniques, such as CRISPR and synthetic biology, and how likely these outputs are to contribute to the public good. That research was published in Annual Review of Phytopathology. The study found that many of the promises regarding the benefits of the first generation of genetically engineered crops failed to come to fruition because the social dimensions of research and development emphasized privatization of benefits. The conclusion is that new genetic engineering techniques will also likely not deliver the promises unless attention is given to the need to develop the social context necessary to equitably distribute risks and benefits from the new technology. Goal 3 was addressed through an analysis of how public institutions, such as a university, could facilitate the corporate social responsibility among private firms. That was published in Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems. This goal was also addressed through the study of how private-public research partnerships influence the research agendas of public institutions. This was partly addressed in the Phytobiome Journal publication. The publication reported findings analysis of a survey of all land-grant-university agricultural scientists in the United States. The analysis indicated that approximately 1/3 of scientists indicated that public scientists should focus on research likely to have market potential and 2/3 of scientists indicated that they should focus on public benefits. Additional statistical analysis indicated that the scientists with a private-science orientation were more likely than the public-oriented scientists to believe that markets are the best indicators of the social value of science and technology and that they were less likely to contribute to basic science research. Goal 4 was addressed through an analysis of Peruvian smallholder farmers and their likelihood to adopt new potato technologies and to engage in commercial value chains. That research was published in Rural Sociology. The key finding was that the introduction of new potato varieties to facilitate participation in value chains facilitated inequality among producers because only the larger producers were more likely to be able to take on the risk of participation. Goals 5 and 6 have not been addressed yet due to focus on goals 1-4 in this reporting period.

Publications

  • Type: Journal Articles Status: Published Year Published: 2018 Citation: Hoy, Kyle A., Irene M. Xiarchos, Timothy W. Kelsey, Kathryn J. Brasier, and Leland L. Glenna. 2018. Marcellus Shale Gas Development and Farming. Agricultural and Resource Economics Review, 1-31.
  • Type: Journal Articles Status: Published Year Published: 2018 Citation: Tobin, Daniel, and Leland Glenna. 2018. Value Chain Development and the Agrarian Question: Actor Perspectives on Native Potato Production in the Highlands of Peru. Rural Sociology
  • Type: Journal Articles Status: Awaiting Publication Year Published: 2019 Citation: Pixley, Kevin V., Jose Falck-Zepeda, Ken Giller, Leland L. Glenna, Fred Gould, Carol A. Mallory-Smith, David M. Stelly, and C. Neal Stewart. 2019. Genome Editing, Gene Drive, and Synthetic Biology: Will They Contribute to Disease-Resistant Crops, and Who Will Benefit? Annual Review of Phytopathology.
  • Type: Journal Articles Status: Published Year Published: 2019 Citation: Bell, Terrence H., Kevin Hockett, Ricardo Ivan Alcal�-Brise�o, Mary Barbercheck, Gwyn A. Beattie, Mary Ann Bruns, John Carlson, Taejung Chung, Alyssa Collins, Bryan Emmett, Paul Esker, Karen Garrett, Leland Glenna, Beth K. Gugino, Maria del Mar Jimenez Gasco, Linda Kinkel, Jasna Kovac, Kurt Kowalski, Gretchen Kuldau, Johan Leveau, Matthew Michalska-Smith, Jessica Myrick, Kari Peter, Maria Vivanco Salazar, Ashley Shade, Nejc Stopnisek, Xiaoqing Tan, Amy Welty, Kyle Wickings, and Etienne Yergeau. 2019. Manipulating Wild and Tamed Phytobiomes: Challenges and Opportunities. Phytobiomes Journal 3:3-21.


Progress 10/01/17 to 09/30/18

Outputs
Target Audience:The primary audience reached for this reporting period was academic peers. Borlu, Yetkin and Leland Glenna. 2018. "Three Materialisms: Climate Change Perception among U.S. Specialty Crop Producers." Paper presented at the Rural Sociological Society Annual Conference, Portland, Oregon. 27-30 July 2018. Glenna, Leland and Maria Vivanco. 2018. "Institutional Corruption, Commercial Science, and Agricultural Research at Land-Grant Universities." Paper presented at the Rural Sociological Society Annual Conference, Portland, Oregon. 27-30 July 2018. Strube, Johann, Maki Hatanaka, Jason Konefal, and Leland Glenna. "Understanding the Increasing Private Ordering of Sustainability in US Agriculture Through a Study of Multi-Stakeholder Initiatives." Paper presented at the Agriculture, Food, and Human Values Society Annual Conference, Madison, Wisconsin. 13-16 June 2018. Another audience reached was the farmers and other professionals in attendance at the Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture. Glenna, Leland, Lawrence Busch, and David Ervin. "Agricultural Automation & the Future of Farm Work." Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture Annual Meeting, State College, Pennsylvania. 10 February 2018. Changes/Problems: Nothing Reported What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?A graduate student was funded on a USDA grant. A graduate student was funded on an AfricaRice grant. These grants generally supported the research efforts that fit within the theme of the 1034 project. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?The primary audience reached for this reporting period was academic peers. Borlu, Yetkin and Leland Glenna. 2018. "Three Materialisms: Climate Change Perception among U.S. Specialty Crop Producers." Paper presented at the Rural Sociological Society Annual Conference, Portland, Oregon. 27-30 July 2018. Glenna, Leland and Maria Vivanco. 2018. "Institutional Corruption, Commercial Science, and Agricultural Research at Land-Grant Universities." Paper presented at the Rural Sociological Society Annual Conference, Portland, Oregon. 27-30 July 2018. Strube, Johann, Maki Hatanaka, Jason Konefal, and Leland Glenna. "Understanding the Increasing Private Ordering of Sustainability in US Agriculture Through a Study of Multi-Stakeholder Initiatives." Paper presented at the Agriculture, Food, and Human Values Society Annual Conference, Madison, Wisconsin. 13-16 June 2018. Another audience reached was the farmers and other professionals in attendance at the Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture. Glenna, Leland, Lawrence Busch, and David Ervin. "Agricultural Automation & the Future of Farm Work." Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture Annual Meeting, State College, Pennsylvania. 10 February 2018. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?Work will continue on the USDA-funded project: "Farmer Adoption of Sustainability Metrics and Standards in the U.S." Work will continue on an Oxfam-funded project: "Neglected and Underutilized Species of Crops"

Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals? Goal #3 was achieved through the FACETS publication. The article analyzes data from a survey of sweet potato farmers in northern Ghana to determine adoption and diffusion of new crop varieties based on access to infrasctructure and infrastructure, while controlling for social and economic factors. Goal #4 was achieved through the publication in Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems. The article discusses how public and private sector organizations have different research goals and the potential for a public research organization, such as a university, to promote corporate social responsibility among collaborating private agribusiness firms.

Publications

  • Type: Journal Articles Status: Accepted Year Published: 2018 Citation: Chiles, Robert M., Leland Glenna, Amit Sharma, Jeffrey Catchmark, C. Daniel Azzara, and Audrey Maretzki. 2018. Agri-food Firms, Universities, and Corporate Social Responsibility: Whats in the Public Interest? Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems x(x):x-x.
  • Type: Journal Articles Status: Published Year Published: 2018 Citation: Chiles, R. M., Glenna, L., Sharma, A., Catchmark, J., Azzara, D., and Maretzki, A. 2018. Agri-food firms, Universities, and Corporate Social Responsibility: Whats in the Public Interest? Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems, 1-11.
  • Type: Journal Articles Status: Published Year Published: 2018 Citation: Chiles, Robert M., Eileen E. Fabian, Daniel Tobin, Scott J. Colby, and S. Molly DePue. 2018. "Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Agriculture: Reconciling the Epistemological, Ethical, Political, and Practical Challenges." Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics: 1-8.


Progress 10/01/16 to 09/30/17

Outputs
Target Audience:The research reached an academic audience through journal publications. It reached farm populations and academic audiences through presentations. Changes/Problems: Nothing Reported What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided? Nothing Reported How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?Research contributed to two presentations with communities of interest. One was research and extension professionals in Pennsylvania. The other was research and extension professionals in Guinea. Glenna, Leland and Abou Traore. "Social Institutional Factors Affecting Rice Yield Gaps." Invited Presentation to the Bordo Agricultural Research Center, Kankan, Guinea. 12 July 2017. Glenna, Leland. "GMOs, Organic, & Agricultural Industries." Pennsylvania State University Extension Conference 2017. Altoona, Pennsylvania. 19 April 2017. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?A recently administered survey of all agricultural scientists at all US land-grant universities had 1126 completed responses (16% response rate). That survey will enable an analysis to determine LGU agricultural scientists' perspectives on biosafety regulations, intellectual property policies and practicies, industry research collaborations, and declining public research funds.

Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals? During this reporting period, the focus was primarily on Goals #1, #3, and #4. Progress towards Goal #1 was achieved through research that demonstrated how internationally changing commercial interests and changing research funding sources are related to changes in crop research and yields. The US has come to rely more on private sources for research support, and crop yields have increased in crops that are more likely to be privatized (corn), while yields have flattened in crops that are still public (wheat). The United Kingdom has seen yields drop across the board as they have cut funding for agricultural research. But Germany continues to promote the production of public goods and its yields have increased in private and public crops (corn and wheat). These findings were reported in an article published in Sociologia Ruralis. Progress towards Goal #3 was achieved through research explaining how intellectual property protections in agricultural crops are hindering university research. A substantial number of entomologists in the survey indicated that bag-tag restrictions prevent them from conducting some research and from reporting their research findings. These findings were reported in Rural Sociology. Progress towards Goal #4 was achieved through research that was presented at various conferences on the subject of wine-grape and apple pruning and on sweet potato production in Ghana. The findings indicate that wine-grape and apple producers in the US are more likely be interested in adopting automated pruning machines if they are medium-sized producers because they are less able to compete with the large producers for laborers. The research in Ghana shows that sweet potato producers are more likely to be food secure than those who adopt high yielding rice production for commercial markets. Research on both projects will eventually appear in journal articles in the near future. Progress towards Goal #4 was also achieved through research on how food controversies (such as the debate over lean fine textured beef) unfold and why certain issues may be more likely to linger in the public consciousness than others. That research was published in Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics. Other research also contributed to this goal. One project focused on the fact that training for food scientists does not adequately consider the contested social context under which food is prepared. Scientists' inattentiveness to the complexities of these issues has negative consequences for (i) the scientists themselves, who may feel conflicted that their personal food choices do not align with the science, (ii) their employers, who depend on social acceptance in order to sell food scientists' products, and (iii) society as a whole, if food scientists cannot effectively communicate their perspectives in political debates about food. Findings from this research was published in the Journal of Food Science Education.

Publications

  • Type: Journal Articles Status: Published Year Published: 2017 Citation: Glenna, Leland L. 2017. The Purpose-Driven University: The Role of University Research in the Era of Science Commercialization. Agriculture and Human Values. Published online: DOI 10.1007/s10460-017-9824-6.
  • Type: Journal Articles Status: Published Year Published: 2017 Citation: Brandl, Barbara and Leland Glenna. 2017. Intellectual Property and Agricultural Science and Innovation in Germany and the United States. Science, Technology, & Human Values 42(4): 622-656.
  • Type: Other Status: Published Year Published: 2017 Citation: Fred Gould, Richard M. Amasino, Dominique Brossard, C. Robin Buell, Richard A. Dixon, Jose B. Falck-Zepeda, Michael A. Gallo, Ken E. Giller, Leland L. Glenna, Timothy Griffin, Bruce R. Hamaker, Peter M. Kareiva, Daniel Magraw, Carol Mallory-Smith, Kevin V. Pixley, Elizabeth P. Ransom, Michael Rodemeyer, David M. Stelly, C. Neal Stewart Jr., and Robert J. Whitaker. 2017. Elevating the Conversation about GE Crops. (Letter) Nature Biotechnology 35(4):302-304.
  • Type: Journal Articles Status: Accepted Year Published: 2017 Citation: Glenna, Leland L., Yetkin Borlu, Thomas Gill, Janelle Larson, Vincent Riccardi, and Rahma Adam. Forthcoming. Food Security, Sweet Potato Production, and Proximity to Markets in Northern Ghana. FACETS
  • Type: Journal Articles Status: Accepted Year Published: 2016 Citation: Chiles, R. M. 2016. Food System Fragility and Resilience in the Aftermath of Disruption and Controversy. Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics. 29(6):1021-1041.
  • Type: Journal Articles Status: Accepted Year Published: 2017 Citation: Chiles RM and Coupland JN. 2017. Questioning Reality, Questioning Science: Teaching Students in the Food and Agricultural Sciences about Epistemological, Ethical, and Empirical Controversies. Journal of Food Science Education 16: 49-53.