Recipient Organization
UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA
G022 MCCARTY HALL
GAINESVILLE,FL 32611
Performing Department
(N/A)
Non Technical Summary
Climate-smart (CS) agriculture produces food, fiber, and fuel using less resources, optimizing land-use efficiency, and mitigating pollution of air, water, and soils. Row crops are a major agricultural system in Southeast U.S., covering 4 million acres in FL, GA, and AL. Most of this area (95%) is fallow in the winter after harvesting the summer row crops. There is an opportunity to integrate value-added CS Winter Cropping Systems to generate income and economic development while providing ecosystem services including soil protection from erosion, habitat for pollinators, soil organic carbon sequestration, and reduction of nitrate leaching. Project CHEERS addresses USDA's priority areas of climate smart agriculture and strengthening bioeconomy. This project will form a hub of diverse stakeholder groups including farmers and various enabling agencies and communities such as Extension professionals, CS commodity industry, federal agencies, and academia to address these objectives: 1. Identify long-term behavioral patterns related to CS Winter Cropping Systems among producers; 2. Analyze farm level economic and environmental trade-offs between current and CS Winter Cropping Systems; 3. Equip multiple stakeholders with decision support platforms to assess farm and regional scale economic and environmental trade-offs between current and CS Winter Cropping Systems; 4. Co-design, co-develop, share, and implement actionable science; 5. Inspire and instruct the next generation. This project will enhance economic outcomes of rural stakeholders, reduce entry barriers for beginning farmers, sustainably intensify agricultural production, and create equitable pathways for the next generation of agricultural professionals to play a vital role in the climatesmart bioeconomy.
Animal Health Component
60%
Research Effort Categories
Basic
10%
Applied
60%
Developmental
30%
Goals / Objectives
The long-term goal of CHEERS is to enable transitioning of the prevailing agricultural economy to a CS circular bioeconomy, profitably, for all in the value chain. The increasing market demand for a carbon-based circular economy with commodities produced with lower environmental impact is allowing for a shift from incentivizing yield alone to incentivizing sustainably produced commodities. These demands can be leveraged to balance environmental benefits with economic de-risking, to ensure climate adaptation in agricultural systems extends beyond short-lived monetary incentives-based adoption. To enable this, economic and environmental benefits from these systems must be demonstrated at scale, a local supply chain needs to mature, various tools for regionally relevant decision making must become accessible to the producer and the producer's support system. The community at large will benefit from a science-based understanding of the role of agriculture in climate change adaptation. The objectives of CHEERS are designed to address these needs.
Project Methods
Objective 1: Identify long-term behavioral patterns related to the adoption of CS winter cropping systems1A: Identify factors affecting CS winter cropping system adoption decisions Activity 1: Collaborate with producers and other stakeholders on adjusting CSA practices.Activity 2: Examine factors that affect guidance related to CS practices.Activity 3: New focus groups will be developed for the HUB.1B: Assess the potential for adoption of CS winter cropping systems through value framingActivity 1: Evaluate producer value orientation and perceived correlations.Activity 2: To assess how alternative presentations of value-based information affect decisions.Expected Outcomes: a) Agricultural research and innovation will be informed by social priorities at the farm level; b) Outputs will enable decision support tools; c) Maximizing perceived connections between CS winter cropping system adoption and valued outcomes can increase the adoption; d) Producer-adopter types based on their speed of adoption, adoption motivations, risk tolerance, and other emergent characteristics will be identified.Limitations: This objective relies on self-reported, historical, and perceptual data.Evaluation: Interview question guides, surveys, and focus group question guides will be designed.Objective 2: Analyze farm-level economic and environmental trade-offs between prevailing and CS winter cropping systems: CHEERS will leverage five long-term cropping sites and on-farm sites to compare prevailing peanut-cotton rotations against different CS winter cropping systems.2A: Provisioning Ecosystem Services: crop yield, livestock gains, water suspended solids, total N, P, NO3-N and NH4-N in runoff and leachate.2B: Supporting Ecosystem Services: Water erosion and soil health will be monitored.2C: Regulating Ecosystem Services-GHG emission mitigation potentialActivity 1: Greenhouse gas (CO2) analysis will be measured, and Eddy towers will evaluate winter crops.Activity 2: Cattle CH4 emission contributions on applicable winter crop diets will address GHG emissions mitigation.2D: Regulating Ecosystem Services: Diversity and abundance of insect pests and natural enemies Activity 1: Canopy and ground-dwelling arthropods at long-term and on-farm demo sites.Activity 2: Pollinator abundance and diversity will be characterized.Activity 3: The impact of CS winter cropping system on plant-parasitic nematode management.Activity 4: Disease assessment.2E: Regional Cultural Ecosystem Services: Producer and other stakeholder social values in select FL-GA-AL.Expected outcomes: a) Identification of trends, challenges, and knowledge gaps in CS winter cropping system; b) Data to assess impact on regional CS and categorized by ES type for multiple users; c) Quantitative, spatially explicit information to evaluate ES monetization in rural agricultural landscapes; d) Synergistic information among the multi-disciplinary network of agricultural scientists.Limitations: Some of the soil signals may not register within the time limits of the project.Evaluation: Document analysis.Objective 3: Equip multiple stakeholders with regionally relevant decision support tools3A: Customize and enhance climate information for better decision makingActivity 1: Climate indicators for the proposed CS winter systems.3B: Trace regional scale impact of producer decision-making Activity 1: Integrate remote sensing and AI to map historical and changing land use patterns.Activity 2: Statistical assessment of key ecosystem services at the regional level.Activity 3: Assessment of regional economic impact of CS winter cropping systems adoption.Activity 4: Ascertain economic and environmental trade-offs considering expected changes in climate by 2100.3C: Quantify economic value of ecosystem services provided by CS winter cropping systemsActivity 1: Evaluate benefits of reduced GHG (CO2, N2O, CH4) emissions.Activity 2: Estimate benefits of reduced soil erosion.3D: Develop an interactive web mapping and analysis tool An online public-facing web application that demonstrates the environmental, economic, and social benefits associated with CS decisions.3E: Connect CS winter cropping systems with value-added markets and the bioeconomySAF and similar supply chain optimizations can be conducted for other relevant winter cropping scenarios.Expected Outcomes: a) New knowledge for winter crop risks; b) New approaches for producing local-scale weather, climate, and crop production risks; c) Remote-sensing-based inventory of winter cropping system practices at the landscape scale in the SE US; d) Integrated assessment of regional level economic and environmental trade-offs; GCAM results will directly feed into policymaking across multiple sectors in the southern US and beyond; e) Web-enabled applications for CS winter cropping system planning, management, support, and monitoring, that are accessible to multiple stakeholders.Limitations: The data chosen as input variables for statistical landscape delineation should coincide with what we know are the major drivers of specifically evaluated ecosystem services.Evaluation: Document analysis.Objective 4: Co-develop and deliver actionable science-Extension4A: Establish the CHEERS Ambassadors ProgramActivity 1: Elite Extension agents from FL, GA, and AL will be appointed as CHEERS Ambassadors.Activity 2: The Ambassadors will organize a "Producer School" in each year of the project.4B: Translate and package scienceActivity 1: Translate various research outcomes for delivery to Extension professionals, producers, and other members of the HUB.Activity 2: A farm-level, user-friendly decision tool will be packaged.4C: Build capacity in Extension programming in the Black Belt region of ALThe Tuskegee University Cooperative Extension Program (TUCEP) will work with small, socially disadvantaged producers in 12 of Alabama's Black Belt counties.Expected Outcomes: a) Sustainability of the HUB through expansion of the network of Ambassadors; b) Cohort of Extension professionals trained in CS winter cropping systems, climate literacy, and use of the decision tool.Limitations: Effectiveness of the materials produced here will be only as good as the research that informs it.Evaluation: Document and website analysis.Objective 5: Inspire & instruct the next generation-EducationActivity 1: Resource Repository: Creating and curating resources related to CS systems in the HUB.Activity 2: Immersive Experiences: to connect those interested in a career in farming with current farmers.Activity 3: CHEERS Undergraduate Mentoring: Three programs at UF will be leveraged for undergraduate mentoring in STEM careers, Extension, agricultural communication, and leadership through.Expected Outcomes: a) Increased capacity among agricultural teachers; b) Students and youth become powerful advocates of science-based climate adaptation.Limitations: Finding willing producer partners for the immersive program may have potential roadblocks.Evaluation: Document and website analysis of training itineraries, manuals, documents, and sign-in logs will be reviewed to establish curriculum components and attendee affiliations to ensure wide participation of intended audience.