Progress 09/01/23 to 08/31/24
Outputs
Target Audience:Land and water managers, including farmers, ranchers, Acequia, and other irrigation district community members, as well as federal, state, county, and local agency staff. Changes/Problems:We updated the IRB protocol to include our in-depth market interviews. What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?Farmer training of the planning, development, and implementation considerations of organic and water conservation practices in collaboration with our team, and graduate and undergraduate student professional development on project activities detailed in other sections of this report. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?The accomplishments/preliminary results have been disseminated in interviews, focus groups, site visits, and conferences. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?In relation to our goals, study questions, and objectives, find below our planned accomplishments in year 3. 1) Personnel plan and expenditures: Our team has plans to utilize the budgeted funds for this project, find the following of note: 1.a) Our economics team has completed plans to expand the research, with a focus on in-depth interviews as detailed in this section 5.c. 1.b) Our farmer consultant, Santa Cruz Farm and Greenhouses, will utilize the budgeted funds to conduct an herb trial at fields at Northern NM College, in a riparian floodplain along the Santa Cruz River, and in the floodplains of the upland dry river beds (arroyos) contributing to the Santa Cruz River. 2) Goal: To identify pathways to agricultural and water resilience for small farm communities in the increasingly arid Southwest, and use this understanding to develop an organic system planning protocol and toolkit for effective targets and innovative strategies. 1.a) The southern NM input models, analyzed results data, synthesis SD model, and scenarios for testing will be completed and visualizations of results prepared for stakeholder review. We will test and validate the model and scenarios with stakeholders in interactive model exercises; the model will be revised with feedback and data, recalibrated and revalidated. 1.b) The organic system planning toolkit will input preliminary results and information provided by the organic certification workshop, which will be held approximately February 2025. 1.c) Research questions include: 1.c.i) What are the essential strategies for preserving cultivation and irrigation/surface water spreading in agricultural valleys to also preserve community and ecological resilience and what is the role of the organic and holistic approach in these strategies? 1.c.ii) What are the essential dynamics to inform policies that support collaborative networks of locally-led adaptive management to achieve the organic holistic approach on regional scales? 3) Study question: A central question of this work is what combination of organic systems can support small farming communities to achieve the water demand reductions needed to preserve cultivation across agricultural valleys while also achieving overall agricultural resilience. The research and publication plan to break this question down into their constituent parts in the next reporting period is included in the following hypothesis and our plans to address objectives. 3.a) Hypothesis: the holistic strategy of a high-value, low input organic practices and management approach can result in lowering water demand across the farm system, resulting in lowered water demand on a regional scale. This would provide evidence supporting that organic approaches optimize water supplies and facilitate better water management. 4) Objective E1) is to build regional learning communities and outreach strategies. 4.a) We will further develop collaboration networks, learning communities, and outreach strategies with a focus on developing resilience strategies including: 4.a.i) Our team consultant ALI will focus on stakeholder driven development of pilot projects for agricultural resiliency in the San Juan River basin as well as development of website content including addition of content from case study assessments and further planning, and interviews of team members. The bi-lingual informative website with the additions of current interviews and updated plans will go live. 4.b) Research questions include: 4.b.i) How can stakeholder strategies interconnect to strengthen the building of resilience? 5) Objective R2) is to identify farmer selection criterion for organic crops and practices that can excel in current and projected climate changes. 5.a) Field trials. 5.a.1) We will analyze the first year's crop and water budget data and collect and analyze the second year's data. 5.a.2) We will in collaboration with our farmer consultant, Santa Cruz Farm and Greenhouses, conduct an herb trial at fields at Northern NM College, in a riparian floodplain along the Santa Cruz River, and in the floodplains of the upland dry river beds (arroyos) contributing to the Santa Cruz River. 5.b) We plan to feature the low-water medicinal plant trial on our field day tour in all three regions, and as part of other related workshops. 5.c) We will publish a book chapter (detailed in section Other Products 4.2), 3 manuscripts (detailed in Accomplishments 5.c.i and 5.d). 5.d) (1) The draft manuscript describing consumer preferences for Lycium cream should be submitted in the next several months. The draft three-statement financial model (detailed in section Accomplishments 5 5.d.iii) will be completed by the end of the calendar year. The model will be used to explore financial returns from various New Mexico grown herbs as they are identified by the research team. An additional manuscript will be developed exploring the consumer preferences for Ginseng tea, a popular herbal tea made out of Ginseng root. 5.e) Research questions for results include: 5.e.1) What are the optimal irrigation requirements and water budget for high value crops in arid and semi-arid regions of NM to maximize yield and water use efficiency? 5.e.2) Is there any significant difference on water budget using deficit and extreme deficit irrigation treatment on 3 different arid and semi-arid regions? 5.e.3) How do conservation practices, such as deficit irrigation and soil moisture management, affect water use efficiency and crop yield for medicinal herbs and shrubs? 5.e.4.) What is the potential of fallow land for cultivating medicinal herbs and shrubs in terms of water use efficiency, adaptability, and overall contribution to sustainable agriculture in arid regions? 5.e.5) What are the projected impacts on water demand, crop productivity, and resource sustainability when progressively diversifying 10%, 20%, 30%, and eventually all farming land to medicinal crops? 5.e.6) How will the phased diversification to medicinal crops and conservation practices influence the regional water budget, and what are the broader implications for agricultural sustainability in water-scarce regions? 5.f) Research questions for synthesis analysis include: 5.f.1) How low in water use can a farmer go in the three regions of New Mexico with trials and achieve a high value return, as measured by post-harvest physiology, quality, yield, and market assessments? 5.f.2) What are findings of the key regional characteristics in the three regions that affect crop choice and yields? 5.f.3) We will continue market and cost analysis on crops and practices of high interest, including in-depth interviews with purchasers of crops of interest. We will share the herb processing facility economic feasibility analysis with potential sponsors for such a project (particularly the ¡La Sostenga! program at Northern NM College) and publish a manuscript article. 6) Objective RE3) is to identify combinations of strategies that can achieve regional resilience See the overall goal (this section, section 2) for a comprehensive description of next year's plans on this objective.
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
Our goals, study questions, and objectives are found below with year 2 reporting 1) Personnel: - PIs contributed time planned (many utilized their standard salary to support the effort to plan for upcoming research and field staff needs) - 4 graduate and 1 undergraduate student (a miscoding for the economics student is being corrected); - Consultants: Santa Cruz Farm and Greenhouses - 0.01 FTE (plan for budget expenditures are focused on a year 3 herb trial in the landscape); Alamosa Land Institute - 0.06 FTE 2) Goal: To identify pathways to agricultural and water resilience for small farm communities in the increasingly arid Southwest, and use this understanding to develop an organic system planning protocol and toolkit for effective targets and innovative strategies. The toolkit includes the following main elements and progress: 2.a) The development of strategies (further detailed in objective E.1) 2.b) For the system dynamics (SD) synthesis model to test strategies, we developed the model using crop data and org project information, including the following progress: - We a) further developed the causal loop diagram for the model, b) identified challenges with characterizing surface flow from storm events and groundwater recharge, and to overcome those, we initiated changes in the structure of the model, began a submodel to characterize recharge (MODFLOW), and began calibration efforts using an additional model (RGTIHM), and c) finished calibration of the model with observed flow data - For the SD analysis of alternative organic crops on regional scale, we further developed the plan to input the field trials results and the regional implications of crop changes 2.c) For the development of the organic system planning protocol, we finalized our plan for incorporating results into the protocol, and planned an organic certification workshop for Feb. '25. 3) Study question: A central question of this work is what combination of organic systems can support small farming communities to achieve the water demand reductions needed to preserve cultivation across agricultural valleys while also achieving overall agricultural resilience. - We further developed our research and publication plan - As identified in the Other Products section, the students developed their research into presentations and posters, and team members submitted a book chapter and further developed planned manuscripts. 4) Objective E1) is to build regional learning communities and outreach strategies. We closely collaborated with our networks and learning communities to develop resilience strategies. Our team consultant ALI co-developed multiple innovative landscape- and watershed-scale agricultural resilience planning strategies in the Northern and Lower Rio Grande basin study areas which identify potential opportunities for alternative agricultural production, flood mitigation and managed aquifer recharge, including: - Co-developed plans focusing on restoring watershed health to mitigate downstream flooding and improve water quality through reduction in sediment transport, reduction in flood energy and upland revegetation, and along riparian corridors in the agricultural valleys, aquifer recharge through increased overbank flooding, removal of invasive species and accumulated fuel reduction, and planting of native species including wild gathered traditional food crops. - Completion of 3 videos of interviews with individual stakeholders, farmers, and producers, and documentation from community workshops, which have been added to a preliminary structure for the informative website. 5) Objective R2) is to identify farmer selection criterion for organic crops and practices that can excel in current and projected climate changes. 5.a) We incorporated input from farmers in workshops and market research into our farmer selection criterion for organic crops and practices framework, developed a crop list of promising organic herb and medicinal crops for NM farmers and presented it at the conference identified in the Other Products section 2.1, and recommended crops for the paired field and water budget studies. 5.b) We installed the experiments for the crops and water budget equipment for the paired field and water budget studies in the northern and southern NM regions, as described following: - In Las Cruces, NM, 9 different annuals/perennial herbaceous plants and 3 perennial shrubs were transplanted at the Fabian Garcia Research Center. These crops are all considered high value due to their medicinal or horticultural use. Drip lines were installed per the water budget study, and all crops and establishment data is done being taken to monitor survivability after transplanting. Three crops, calendula, spilanthes and marshmallow had the best establishment. Calendula and spilanthes high value flowers were harvested and biomass data was collected over the multiple harvests. - At the Alcalde site, two replicated trials were established, both using drip irrigation. First, we established a trial of five native shrub species in hedgerow/windbreak configuration. The second trial consisted of nine low-water-use medicinal plant species under three different irrigation treatments. In this trial, survival of clary sage and marshmallow was 100%, while survival of spilanthes, calendula, and evening primrose was 93%. Survival of Mexican arnica was 0%. We were able to harvest three species--marshmallow, spilanthes, and calendula in our first year. Annuals like spilanthes and tepary beans are now lost to frost, and we will monitor the perennials for survival in the spring. - Installation of the water budget study equipment including soil moisture probes and pressure transducers measuring groundwater levels in two of the three research sites is completed (Fabian Garcia and Alcalde) 5.c) We secured additional IRB approval for the market analysis consisting of in-depth interviews with businesses that would purchase these crops. Our developed crop list supports questions of production, demand, preferences, recommendations, customer purchase quantities, product forms and series of market in depth questions to inform production. 5.d) We developed a plan to synthesize the first year protocol and crop and water budget study results including our literature review findings into an article on cultivation of medicinal plants in aridlands into a special Issue of Horticulturae, entitled "Strategies of Producing Horticultural Crops under Climate Change" 5.e) Our economics team analyzed previously collected survey data related to public use and acceptance of complementary and alternative medicines, with a focus on Chinese medicinal herbs, and presented results at the ICSB oxford botanical conference 2024. The data, analysis and resulting manuscript will help frame the larger question associated with the project relating to public/consumer use and preference for organically grown low water use herbs and other plants. - The survey included a discrete choice experiment question related to lyceum cream, Lycium Barbarum. The experiment included product-specific attributes of price, growing conditions (wild, cultivated), location (U.S., International), Scent (scented, unscented), and production type (organic, non-organic). This analysis has been done using an N-logit methodology and a manuscript is in preparation. - A three-statement financial model was developed (draft complete) to explore the financial feasibility of processing herbs into essential oils. The model will allow users to estimate the financial returns from value-added herb production, based on user-specified variables, e.g., labor, equipment, and energy requirements and costs. Additionally, users can explore potential impacts of various marketing strategies, e.g., direct-to-consumer marketing via farmers' markets. 6) Objective RE3) is to identify combinations of strategies that can achieve regional resilience. See goal for progress description
Publications
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Progress 09/01/22 to 08/31/23
Outputs
Target Audience:Land and water managers, including Farmers, Ranchers, Acequia and other irrigation district community members, and Federal, State, County, and Local agency staff. Changes/Problems:
Nothing Reported
What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?Farmer training of organic and water conservation practices in workshops, and graduate student professional development on project activities. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest?The accomplishments/preliminary results have been disseminated in workshops, focus groups, and conferences. What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?In relation to our goals, study questions, and objectives, find below our planned accomplishments in year 2. 1) Goal: To identify pathways to agricultural and water resilience for arid and semi-arid small farms, and synthesize these understandings into an organic system planning toolkit. 1.a) Installation and monitoring protocols for field studies will be developed and tested, further data on crops and practices collected for inputs into regional scenario modeling assessment. 1.b) The model approach will be further developed collaboratively with the target audience, particularly farmers. 2) Study question: A central question of this work is if expanding organic and traditional systems can support small farms to achieve the water demand reductions needed for preserving cultivation across agricultural valleys while also achieving overall agricultural resilience. The research and publication plan to break this question down into their constituent parts in the next reporting period is included in the following hypothesis and plans to address objectives. 2.a) Hypothesis: the holistic strategy of a high-value, low input organic practices and management approach can result in lowering water demand across the farm system, resulting in lowered water demand on a regional scale. This would provide evidence supporting that organic approaches optimize water supplies and facilitate better water management. 3) Objective 1: Build regional learning communities to collect knowledge on holistic systems that align with organic approaches (organic and traditional local knowledge), co-produce tools, and share innovative strategies using an interactive website for producers, policy-makers, and the public 3.a) We will continue to convene the regional learning communities in workshops, working groups, and focus groups. 3.b) We will review ecosystem service indicators for efficacy of planning; review model experiments 3.c) We will continue to capture stories from producers to create narrative of challenges faced, potential solutions, and ecosystem benefits of agriculture; we will describe the project. 3.d) We will create the user website interface and go live with the website. 3.e) Research questions for manuscript development: 3.e.i) What is the role of local knowledge in achieving a full understanding and implementing a holistic organic approach functions on a regional scale? 3.e.ii) How can stakeholder strategies interconnect to strengthen the building of resilience? 4) Objective 2: Identify farmer selection criterion for organic crops and practices that can excel in current and projected climate changes through analyses of attributes, markets, and costs, and paired field and water budget studies that assess yields, water use, and farmer needs as compared to non-organic approaches 4.a) We will install studies in field, collect data, and conduct initial analysis on extreme drought tolerant/low water use/high value organic crops and their corresponding water budgets. Research questions for manuscript development: 4.a.i) How low in water use can a farmer go in the three regions of New Mexico with trials and achieve a high value return, as measured by post-harvest physiology, quality, yield, and market assessments? 4.a.ii) What are findings of the key regional characteristics in the three regions that affect crop choice and yields? 4.b) We will continue market and cost analysis on crops and practices of high interest, including in-depth interviews with purchasers of crops of interest. We will share the herb processing facility economic feasibilty analysis with potential sponsors for such a project (particularly the ¡La Sostenga! program at Northern NM College) and publish a manuscript article. Research questions for manuscript development: 4.b.i) What crops show promise in their marketability to be currently reliable, and what indicators should farmers track to assess crop marketability over time? 4.c) We will complete and submit for publication manuscripts on the crop selection criterion and ranking analysis, the survey analysis results on complementary and alternative medicines, and the results with a focus on Chinese medicinal herbs. We will present these results at the International Conference on the Science of Botanicals and the 7th World Congress on Medicinal and Aromatic Plants in MS on April 15th-18th, 2024. 5) Objective 3: Identify combinations of strategies that can achieve regional resilience through decision-support models that assess water, agroecological, and socio-economic system dynamics 5.a) We will continue in all three regions to identify and develop key strategies collaboratively with farmers that can be replicated on a landscape scale to increase regional resilience. We will continue to develop examples as pilot projects to allow us to continue the collaboration to develop the strategies to be feasible, effective, and ready for implementation. Research questions for manuscript development: 5.a.i) What are the essential strategies for preserving cultivation and irrigation/surface water spreading in agricultural valleys to also preserve community and ecological resilience? 5.a.ii) What is the role of the organic and holistic approach in these strategies? 5.b) We will test and validate the model and scenarios with stakeholders in interactive model exercises; the model will be revised with feedback and data, recalibrated and revalidated. Overall system analysis through system dynamics modeling research questions for manuscript development: 5.b.i) What are the regional water implications? ii) What outside support and policies would facilitate implementing resilience strategies on scale to preserve holistic organic agricultural approaches? iii) With this analysis, we will then identify essential elements to inform policies that support collaborative networks of locally-led adaptive management to achieve the organic holistic approach on regional scales. 6) The results will enable us to continue to leverage this project for additional funded achievements: 6.a) Significant interest from agencies and private foundations exists to support executing the pilot projects designed in this project, which will lead to additional collaboration and collection of local knowledge. 6.b) Significant interest from universities, mentors, and practitioners exists to support the development of educational programs, community liaisons, and a network of mentor educators to develop the next generation of community organic/holistic agricultural stewards while executing the pilot projects, which will lead to additional dissemination and training of the knowledge collected and developed. Collaboration is occurring in particular with Northern NM College on several initiatives, also in particular their ¡La Sostenga program!, with the New Mexico Acequia Association on their mentor programs, and with Reclamation on developing educational programs at NMSU to address needs in the southern NM region.
Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals?
In relation to our personnel plan, goals, central study question, and objectives, find below the accomplishments in year 1 1) Personnel plan and expenditures: 1.a) PIs: the planned time expenditures have been completed and all team members have contributed the time previously estimated to support the project. Many of the staff were able to utilize their standard salary to support the effort, and thus expenditures are lower, with a plan to convert the budgeted amounts to field staff support in subsequent years. 1.a.i) Sam Fernald (0.02 cal mo. yr. 1) 1.a.ii) Connie Maxwell (0.07 cal mo. yr. 1) 1.a.iii) Kevin Lombard (0.01 cal mo. yr. 1) (PES) 1.a.iv) Ivette Guzman - 12 month salary supports this effort, salary not needed (PES) 1.a.v) Jay Lillywhite (0.02 cal mo. yr. 1) (AG ECON) 1.a.vi) Rob Heyduck (0.04 cal mo. yr. 1) (Alcalde Science Center) 1.b) Graduate students 1.b.i) Three graduate students were hired and a job opening posted for a combined fourth position (originally 5 graduate students), one began the Fall semester 2023, and two are confirmed to begin the Spring semester 2024, and the final combined fourth position is anticipated to begin also spring 2024. 1.b.ii) For the economics graduate student, the graduate student assistant was hired later than originally planned due to difficulties in identifying a student with project-related interests and abilities. 1.c) Consultants (invoices under process) 1.c.i) Santa Cruz Farm and Greenhouses - 0.025 FTE 1.c.ii) Alamosa Land Institute - 0.05 FTE 2) Goal: To identify pathways to agricultural and water resilience for arid and semi-arid small farms, and synthesize these understandings into an organic system planning toolkit. 2.a) We completed a draft of the main structure of the handbook/toolkit and distributed it at the first year workshops 2.b) We made substantial progress in refining the synthesis system dynamics model (part of the toolkit) for the southern NM Rio Grande region 3) Study question: A central question of this work is if expanding organic and traditional systems can support small farms to achieve the water demand reductions needed for preserving cultivation across agricultural valleys while also achieving overall agricultural resilience. 3.a) We have completed a research and publication plan to break this question down into their constituent parts (see plans for next reporting period). 4) Objective 1: Build regional learning communities to collect traditional and local knowledge, co-produce tools, and share innovative strategies using an interactive website for producers, policy-makers, and the public 4.a) We developed collaboration networks establishing the beginnings of the learning communities and conducted workshops and farmer focus groups in all regions 5) Objective 2: Identify farmer selection criterion for organic crops and practices that can excel in current and projected climate changes through analyses of attributes, markets, and costs, and paired field and water budget studies that assess yields, water use, and farmer needs as compared to non-organic approaches 5.a) From a literature review and input from farmers in workshops and market research, we completed a framework for crop analysis and selection. The framework is categorized by region and location and then ranking by 19 indicators of marketability / community economic well-being, agroecological functions, agronomic suitability, and food sovereignty / community health. 5.b) We then identified the crops and practices for the paired field and water budget studies. We anticipate continuing with a comprehensive crop analysis with the framework and publishing these results in year two. 5.c) The framework has informed questions for a market analysis consisting of in-depth interviews with businesses that would purchase these crops to gain a deeper understanding of market dynamics in year 2. 5.d) Dr. Lillywhite analyzed previously collected survey data related to public use and acceptance of complementary and alternative medicines, with a focus on Chinese medicinal herbs. The data, analysis and resulting manuscript will help frame the larger question associated with the project relating to public/consumer use and preference for organically grown low water use herbs and other plants. 5.e) The team also developed a project for students to design, cost and estimate the benefits of an organic herb processing facility in an economic development feasibility class taught by Dr. Lillywhite. 6) Objective 3: Identify combinations of strategies that can achieve regional resilience through decision-support models that assess water, agroecological, and socio-economic system dynamics 6.a) We have collected substantial input from farmers and other land and water managers in all regions on resilience strategies 6.b) We have identified and developed key strategies collaboratively with farmers that can be replicated on a landscape scale to increase regional resilience. Our team developed example pilot projects, which allow us to continue the collaboration to develop the strategies to be feasible, effective, and ready for implementation. We began in year one with the northern New Mexico Rio Grande region. 6.c) Ecosystem service drivers for resiliency have been collaboratively hypothesized; model structure, causal relationships, and feedbacks initially adapted; initial tests of stakeholder strategies have been conducted; initial model calibration has been conducted.
Publications
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