Agricultural science is a broad multidisciplinary field of biology that encompasses the parts of exact, natural, economic and social sciences that are used in the practice and understanding of agriculture. Professionals of the agricultural science are called agricultural scientists or agriculturists.
Agronomy is the science and technology of producing and using plants in agriculture for food, fuel, fiber, recreation, and land restoration. Agronomy has come to encompass work in the areas of plant genetics, plant physiology, meteorology, and soil science. It is the application of a combination of sciences like biology, chemistry, economics, ecology, earth science, and genetics. Professionals in the field of agronomy are called agronomists.
Sustainable agriculture is farming in sustainable ways meeting society's present food and textile needs, without compromising the ability for current or future generations to meet their needs. It can be based on an understanding of ecosystem services. There are many methods to increase the sustainability of agriculture. When developing agriculture within sustainable food systems, it is important to develop flexible business process and farming practices. Agriculture has an enormous environmental footprint, playing a significant role in causing climate change, water scarcity, water pollution, land degradation, deforestation and other processes; it is simultaneously causing environmental changes and being impacted by these changes. Sustainable agriculture consists of environment friendly methods of farming that allow the production of crops or livestock without damage to human or natural systems. It involves preventing adverse effects to soil, water, biodiversity, surrounding or downstream resources—as well as to those working or living on the farm or in neighboring areas. Elements of sustainable agriculture can include permaculture, agroforestry, mixed farming, multiple cropping, and crop rotation.
Agroecology (a-grō-ē-ˈkä-lə-jē) is an applied science that studies ecological processes applied to agricultural production systems. Bringing ecological principles to bear can suggest new management approaches in agroecosystems. The term is often used imprecisely, as the term can be used as a science, a movement, or an agricultural practice. Agroecologists study a variety of agroecosystems. The field of agroecology is not associated with any one particular method of farming, whether it be organic, regenerative, integrated, or conventional, intensive or extensive, although some use the name specifically for alternative agriculture.
The food industry is a complex, global network of diverse businesses that supplies most of the food consumed by the world's population. The term food industries covers a series of industrial activities directed at the production, distribution, processing, conversion, preparation, preservation, transport, certification and packaging of foodstuffs. The food industry today has become highly diversified, with manufacturing ranging from small, traditional, family-run activities that are highly labor-intensive, to large, capital-intensive and highly mechanized industrial processes. Many food industries depend almost entirely on local agriculture, produce, or fishing.
An agriculturist, agriculturalist, agrologist or agronomist, is a professional in the science, practice, and management of agriculture and agribusiness. It is a regulated profession in Canada, the Philippines, and the United States. Other names used to designate the profession include agricultural scientist, agricultural manager, agricultural planner, agriculture researcher, or agriculture policy maker.
Harold F. Reetz Jr. is an American agronomist. He was born in 1948 at Watseka, Illinois, and grew up on a dairy/grain farm in the east central part of the state. After receiving his B.S. degree in 1970 at the University of Illinois, he earned his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees at Purdue University in crop physiology and ecology. He has also co-authored book Efficient Fertilizer Use.
Charles Kellogg was an American farmer, merchant and politician from New York.
The Collaborative Crop Research Program (CCRP) funds participatory, collaborative research on agroecological intensification (AEI). Funded projects typically link international, national, and local organizations with communities of smallholder farmers, researchers, development professionals, and other parties. Projects work together as part of a Community of Practice to generate technical and social innovations to improve nutrition, livelihoods, and productivity for farming communities in Africa and South America. Large-scale impact is realized when new ideas, technologies, or processes are adapted, when insights from research catalyze change in policy and practice, and when innovation inspires further success. The program is under the direction of Rebecca J. Nelson of Cornell University and Jane Maland Cady of the McKnight Foundation.
The Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP) is a non-profit research and advocacy organization that promotes sustainable food, farm, and trade systems. IATP has offices in Minneapolis, Minnesota and Geneva, Switzerland, and operates both locally and internationally.
The term food system is describes the interconnected systems and processes that influence nutrition, food, health, community development and agriculture. A food system includes all processes and infrastructure involved in feeding a population: growing, harvesting, processing, packaging, transporting, marketing, consumption, distribution and disposal of food and food-related items. It also includes the inputs needed and outputs generated at each of these steps. A food system operates within and is influenced by social, political, economic, and environmental contexts. It also requires human resources that provide labor, research and education. Food systems are either conventional or alternative according to their model of food lifespan from origin to plate.
The IATP Food and Society Fellows Program provides two-year, part-time fellowships to professionals working to address health, social justice, economic viability, environmental, and other issues in food and farming systems. The program started in 2001 as a collaboration between the Jefferson Institute and the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP), with the guidance and support of the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. The program is currently administered by IATP and funded by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and the Woodcock Foundation. Generally, 8-12 fellows are selected each year; 72 fellows have been selected through 2009.
Hans Rudolf Herren is a Swiss entomologist, farmer and development specialist. He was the first Swiss to receive the 1995 World Food Prize and the 2013 Right Livelihood Award for leading a major biological pest management campaign in Africa, successfully fighting the cassava mealybug and averting a major food crisis that could have claimed an estimated 20 million lives.
Sustainable products are those products that provide environmental, social and economic benefits while protecting public health and environment over their whole life cycle, from the extraction of raw materials until the final disposal.
North American collegiate sustainability programs are institutions of higher education in the United States, Mexico, and Canada that have majors and/or minors dedicated to the subject of sustainability. Sustainability as a major and minor is spreading to more and more colleges as the need for humanity to adopt a more sustainable lifestyle becomes increasingly apparent with the onset of global warming. The majors and minors listed here cover a wide array of sustainability aspects from business to construction to agriculture to simply the study of sustainability itself.
Glenn W. Burton was an American agricultural scientist notable for his pioneering work in plant breeding, development of pearl millet in 1956 and for other contributions that helped increase world food production.
The Detroit Black Community Food Security Network (DBCFSN) is an urban, community-oriented, predominantly black, grassroots food justice group. The organization was initiated by a communal desire to start an organic garden collective, and has grown from its founding in 2006 with over 50 Detroit residents as members. In an effort to combat food insecurity and increase food sovereignty, DBCFSN established a community accessible food farm in 2008, known as D-Town Farm, which grows over 30 types of fruits and vegetables on seven acres of land.
Adesoji O. Adelaja is an academic and John A. Hannah Distinguished Professor in Land Policy at Michigan State University.
Digital agriculture refers to agricultural practices that digitally collect, store, analyze, and share electronic data and information along the agricultural value chain. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations has described the digitalization process of agriculture as a revolution, namely, a digital agricultural revolution (DAR). In a bibliometric study on the DAR from the Polytechnic University of Milan, digital agriculture has been defined as applying digital technologies to achieve Climate-smart agriculture objectives, that is, climate-change resilience, GHG emissions reduction, and sustainable intensification.
Cynthia Grant, Ph.D., is a former Canadian federal scientist who is internationally recognized as an expert in soil fertility and crop nutrition. A researcher with Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada (AAFC) (1986-2015), she is highly respected by industry, farmers, and public agencies alike. Her research provided the scientific foundation for the Made-in-Canada 4R nutrient stewardship framework that applies crop nutrients from the right source and at the right rate, time and place. Grant is now part of an elite group of ten women who have been inducted into the Canadian Agricultural Hall of Fame since 1960.
