CNH-L: The Influence of Conflicting Policies and Supply-Chain Pressures on Farmers' Decisions and Tradeoffs with Respect to Biodiversity, Profitability, and Sustainability

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A grand challenge of the 21st century is to increase food production to meet the needs of the world's people while ensuring long-term economic and ecological sustainability. Farming methods that focus on supporting biodiversity to produce essential ecosystem services may play an important role in addressing this challenge while lessening the harmful effects of intensive farming methods that rely heavily on non-renewable inputs. The investigators will focus their research on lettuce farmers who vary in their use of practices that support biodiversity along the central coast of California, one of the nation's most productive agricultural regions. The researchers will employ in-depth interviews and focus groups with these farmers to discover how and why they do or do not adopt diversification practices. Ecological studies of their farms will assess bird and soil microbial biodiversity and will quantify key ecosystem services provided by these organisms including the maintenance of soil fertility, enhancement of water conservation, and reduction of the spread of foodborne pathogens. A range of socioeconomic methods including a quantitative survey and a farm-level cost-and-return study will examine how biodiversity and ecosystem services affect farm profits, regulatory compliance, and decisions about whether to use diversification practices in the future. These data will be integrated to construct a Markov decision-process model of the coupled natural-human system and to assess policy scenarios that may influence adoption rates of specific farming practices. Although focused on the central coast of California, where the ecological and social costs of historically intensive agricultural production can be readily observed, findings and insights obtained through this research will have important implications in the U.S. and other nations for regions facing similar challenges related to intensive agricultural production. This project is supported by the NSF Dynamics of Coupled Natural and Human Systems (CNH) Program.This interdisciplinary research project will study the influence of policies and markets on farmers' management decisions, the effects of these decisions on farmland biodiversity and the ecosystem services it provides, and how these ecosystem services affect farm productivity, profitability, and sustainability. This project will provide new information and insights regarding how agricultural conservation incentive programs and supply chains jointly affect the ability and willingness of farmers to use farming practices that can increase biodiversity. The project will identify how such farming practices affect birds, soil microbes, and the vital services they provide. Findings based on socioeconomic and ecological approaches will be integrated to model how farmers navigate conflicting requirements and to identify the consequences of their choices. The project will provide education and training opportunities to engage in scientific research for post-doctoral researchers, graduate students, and undergraduate students, many of whom are members of groups underrepresented in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. The project also will develop infographics and fact sheets as well as conduct community events, workshops, and other forms of outreach for farmers, consumers, policy makers, and the public.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.