Retaking The Field Volume 5

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“Retaking the Field Volume 5: Innovation to Profit” explores how federally funded agricultural research strengthens farmers and ranchers’ bottomline by reducing costs and risks, increasing profits, and laying the groundwork for new products and industries. With powerful examples from universities across the country, it describes how research can generate outsized economic benefits that extends for decades. The report is in partnership FedByScience universities and the SoAR Foundation. Sponsors include the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities and the Association of American Veterinary Medical Colleges.

Stories from the issue

Building Blueberry Businesses

The Florida blueberry industry got its start in the 1970s when the University of Florida (UF) Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences developed the first Southern Highbush blueberry...

Raising Resilient Pigs

Through cutting-edge genome editing, scientists are working to help the swine (pig) industry produce healthier, more resilient animals. Genome editors are enzymes that allow scientists to...

Winning With Wheat

Funded by USDA, the International Wheat Yield Partnership Coordinated Agricultural Project (CAP) and its predecessor Triticeae CAP (T-CAP) focused on improving wheat and barley for...

Supercharging Protein Production

Missouri

Scientists at Washington University in St. Louis have discovered a way to supercharge protein production up to a thousandfold. The researchers employed a tool used in biomedical research...

Elevating Water Management

To ensure proper moisture content for productive soils in the U.S. Corn Belt region, farmers use drainage strategies on approximately 25% of their cropland. While this is some of the most...

Strengthening Citrus

The Florida citrus industry, directly and indirectly, generates approximately 45,000 full-time jobs with a total economic impact of approximately $8.6 billion per year in the state....

Highlighting Human Health

Investments in agricultural research provide a boost to improve human health. With the sequencing of the swine (pig) genome, there are new opportunities to research with models that are...

Sterilizing Screwworm

A highly successful example of public research for animal health began in the 1950s in the fight to eradicate the New World Screwworm. The screwworm is a maggot that feeds off the flesh...

Searching for Solutions

The leading natural cause of death in beef and dairy cattle is Bovine Respiratory Disease (BRD), a combination of viral and bacterial infections. The disease causes losses of more than a...

Cracking Livestock Codes

The Human Genome Project accelerated the discovery of disease genes in humans, provided a new paradigm for medical research, and opened doors to analyze the genomes of various livestock....

Protecting People and Poultry

Salmonellosis is a disease passed from chickens infected with Salmonella bacteria to humans through their contaminated meat and eggs. It causes nearly 94 million infections with 155,000...

Saving Soybeans

The total value of the U.S. soybean crop was $41 billion in 2016 according to the American Soybean Association. Soybean is heavily impacted by root and stem rot diseases caused by...

Helping Honey Bees

Insect pollinators are essential to U.S. growers of fruits, vegetables, nuts, and seeds. Honey bees are the premier managed pollinators of most crops, accounting for $11.7 billion of the...

Collaborating on Corn

U.S. farmers produce 41 percent of the world’s corn on 400,000 farms located primarily in the Midwest Corn Belt region. American production value of corn was over $50 billion in 2018. The...

Safeguarding Goats and Sheep

The barber pole worm poses a great threat to the small ruminant (sheep and goat) industry. These harmful miniature predators cause irreversible damage to sheep and goats, including...

Maximizing Biodegradable Mulch

Vegetable and fruit growers pay for a lot of plastic – $3.4 billion in worldwide sales in 2017. Farmers use plastic mulch to suppress weeds, retain moisture, prevent soil erosion, and...

North Carolina Cooperative Extension Creates $300 Million Economic Impact

At North Carolina State University, Cooperative Extension educators taught classes that empowered people to make better-informed decisions in communities across the state.

Conquering Cotton Pests

The boll weevil is a pest that devastates cotton plants by feeding on its buds and flowers. Native to Central Mexico, the beetle spread throughout the southwest by the 1920s and nearly...

Boosting Broccoli

Broccoli is a high-value crop worth nearly one billion dollars per year. Although there is growing consumption in the Eastern United States, very little broccoli has been produced there....

Growing Guayule and Guar

Although they are not household words, guar gum (an extraction from guar beans) and guayule (a desert shrub) represent huge domestic and global markets. Demand for guar gum in the United...

Capitalizing on Cranberries

Both cranberries and blueberries are botanically part of the Vaccinium species. The U.S. Vaccinium industry’s domestic wholesale value exceeds $2 billion per year. Although production and...

Nebraska Extension Tackles Extreme Weather

Nebraska

Nebraska has experienced five $1 billion severe storm events since 2010.

Benefitting Boars

Instead of surgically castrating young boars, researchers at the University of California, Davis and Washington State University are developing a practical and humane way to remove “boar...

Retaking The Field Volume 5

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