FEW Workshop - Planned Migration as a Strategy to Sustain Agricultural Production

阿拉巴马大学亨茨维尔分校的研究人员和他们的NCAR合作者将在科罗拉多州博尔德召开一次研讨会，以定义问题，并分享与农业迁移在维持生产中可能发挥的作用以及如何从食物、能源和水联系系统的角度定义可持续生产的地理位置相关的研究和想法。研讨会的主要成果将是一份简短的报告，总结主要的研究需求和潜在的方法。上个世纪，美国农业生产的地理位置发生了巨大变化，大量粮食和纤维在灌溉条件下转移到干旱的西部地区，粮食生产集中在中西部上部。问题是，上个世纪的这种模式在未来是否可持续和可靠。在灌溉的情况下，目前处于水分压力下的西部的部分生产能否迁回东部？西南地区的一些生产能否转移到水资源更丰富的西北地区？粮食生产能否更多地在地理上分布，以避免目前生产集中所带来的环境问题(例如，养分流失)和易受小型区域性干旱的影响？这种农业生产的地理位置也改变了能源消耗，通过电能在西部地区输送地表水，在高平原地区抽水。它创造了运输能源的需求，将冷藏食品从西部运往东部，将谷物从中西部运往东南部，供家禽和猪消费。另一方面，农业向东南部的新一轮迁移可能会在热电发电和水力发电损失中争夺冷却用水。这次研讨会将汇集水文学家、农学家、经济学家、气候学家、生态学家、能源专家和水资源规划者，讨论当前农业地理的脆弱性，并讨论新的农业迁移是否可能在下个世纪维持生产。

Researchers from the University of Alabama-Huntsville and their NCAR collaborators will convene a workshop in Boulder Colorado to define issues and to share research and ideas relevant to the role that migration of agriculture might play in sustaining production and how the geography of sustainable production might be defined in terms of food, energy, and water nexus systems. The primary outcome from the workshop will be a short report that summarizes primary research needs and potential approaches.The geography of agricultural production in the U.S. changed dramatically in the last century with substantial food and fiber shifting to the arid west under irrigation and grain production becoming concentrated in the upper Midwest. The question is whether this paradigm of the last century is sustainable and reliable for the future. Can some portion of the production in the West now under water stress be migrated back to the East under irrigation? Can some production in the Southwest migrate to the Northwest where water is more plentiful? Can grain production be more geographically distributed to avoid the environmental issues (e.g. nutrient run-off) and vulnerability to small regional droughts that the present concentration of production entails? This geography of agricultural production has also changed energy consumption through electrical energy used to move surface water in the West and to pump water in the High Plains. It has created the need for transportation energy to move refrigerated food from the West to the East and grains from the Midwest to the Southeast for consumption by poultry and swine. On the other hand, a new migration of agriculture back to the Southeast may see competition for water for cooling in thermoelectric generation and hydroelectric losses. This workshop will bring together hydrologists, agronomists, economists, climatologists, ecologists, energy experts, and water resource planners to discuss the vulnerabilities of the present geography of agriculture and discuss whether a new migration of agriculture might sustain production in the coming century.