This website no longer supports Internet Explorer 11. Please use a more up-to-date browser such as Firefox, Chrome for better viewing and usability.
Organic WorldHome / NewsNews

US: Recap of the Organic Agriculture Research Symposium 2016

The Organic Agriculture Research Symposium brought together researchers, students, farmers and others from across the US for an informative and interactive day in Pacific Grove, California this week. A pre-conference to the annual Eco-Farm Conference, the symposium featured sessions ranging from soil health and biodiversity to farming and livestock systems, including current and ongoing organic agriculture research findings.

On the left: Andre Leu, President of IFOAM - Organics International. On the right: Brise Tencer, Executive Director of OFRF (Photo: OFRF)

Several themes emerged throughout the day including the need for a more holistic approach to advancing organic agriculture, better dissemination and sharing of research; and greater investment in research in critical areas such as soil, water, pest and weed management.

The symposium began with a plenary session featuring Andre Leu, President of IFOAM - Organics International and Mathieu Ngouajio, National Program Leader in Cropping Systems, of the National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA).

Leu encouraged anyone interested in organic farming to join the organization’s Technology Innovation Platform (TIPI), which has established a vision and agenda to advance organic agriculture through research, development, innovation and technology transfer. Sharing highlights from the Paris Climate Change Conference held in November 2015, Leu emphasized the need for farmers and scientists to work together on solutions to overcome the challenges that organic farming systems face.

Ngouajio spoke about the diverse technical and scientific challenges organic farmers and conventional farmers interested in transitioning to organic are dealing with. Since 2001, NIFA has provided funding for many projects in organic agriculture research through two programs: Organic Transitions (ORG) and the Organic Agriculture Research and Extension Initiative (OREI). The FY2016 deadlines for research applications are March 10, 2016 for OREI and April 15, 2016 for ORG.

Diana Jerkins, the Research Program Director of the Organic Farming Research Foundation (OFRF) was among the presenters in an afternoon session titled "Long-term and Strategic Research". Jerkins reviewed OFRF’s assessment of future organic research needs, providing highlights of OFRF’s recent evaluations of organic research grants by the US Department of Agriculture, OFRF research grants, and OFRF’s National Survey of Organic Farmers (NORA). OFRF is currently accepting proposals for its 2016 grant program. RFPs are due February 8th.

Recordings of many of the symposium sessions will be available through the eOrganic website and on their YouTube channel over the next month.

Further information

Links

Do you want to add the website to the Home screen?
tap and then scroll down to the Add to Home Screen command.