Overview
Federal support for agricultural research and extension has not kept pace with the needs of Specialty Crops, despite its critical importance to help producers and processors maintain competitiveness amid the unprecedented challenges of the global marketplace. Specialty Crops are labor intensive, require highly specialized management, and are produced and processed in thousands of distinct locations throughout the U.S. Research designed to have a direct impact on producers and processors of Specialty Crops has never been more necessary, yet, USDA support is drastically lacking.
Specialty Crop research has been historically under funded for a variety of reasons. From a technical perspective, Specialty Crops are exceedingly diverse, with complex, site-specific growth characteristics. Many are perennial, require considerable capital expense to establish, and do not produce a crop until several years after planting.
Specialty Crops producers and processors must meet exacting and highly differentiated quality requirements for their products, adding another level of complexity to research. Thus, researchers and funding agencies have a substantial disincentive to focus on Specialty Crops for both basic and applied studies, since they must invest significantly more time and resources compared to annual program crops or so-called model species to obtain scientifically valid, publishable results. Furthermore, applied research and extension must include work on the whole plant level, in commercially relevant cropping systems, another strong disincentive to researchers and funding agencies. In summary, Specialty Crops are highly “research intensive.”
Politically, Specialty Crops lack the geographically concentrated power of program crops, since they are produced and processed in a dispersed manner throughout the country. In addition, producers and their organizations have often operated in a fragmented way.
Specialty Crops in aggregate account for roughly the same economic value as program crops, yet face much more competition from exporting countries with low labor costs and less stringent regulatory pressures, and remain historically under funded by USDA research agencies.
This background paper will address four key proposals: (1) the merger of ARS and CSREES; (2) the USDA’s Specialty Crop Research Initiative; (3) the National Institute for Food and Agriculture; and, (4) CREATE-21. All these proposals bring welcome attention to the precarious situation of our country’s agricultural research and extension activities and as such, we applaud their intent. To effectively address the needs of the nation’s Specialty Crop industries, however, agricultural research must receive new money. Our group wholeheartedly embraces the following fundamental position:
- Agricultural research and extension should be an investment priority for the United States. We support the National-CFAR proposal of doubling Federal funding for agricultural research over the next five years.
We also share a number of serious concerns regarding the current research situation and proposed actions:
- inadequate total funding
- ongoing reductions in extension funding and personnel
- lack of coordination between researchers and stakeholders
- insufficient producer and processor input in strategic planning of research
- inadequate assessment of research impact
- increasing imbalance between fundamental and applied research
- inadequate support for long term funding of certain research
Merging ARS and CSREES
The Agricultural Research Service plays a key role in Specialty Crop research that must not be diminished or compromised by the various proposed merger plans. Often research within ARS is the only viable means of ensuring a focused, long-term commitment in critical areas, such as: genetics and breeding, sustainable cropping systems, conservation and utilization of pathogen-free plant germplasm, biosecurity, phytosanitary issues, food safety, and integrated pest management. Effective, customer-oriented research in these areas cannot be addressed through typical competitive processes based on “scientific merit.”
The working group is also quite concerned that the ARS mission could be degraded as part of a merged agency with potentially excessive pressures to fund extramural research.
Position:
v ARS has a unique, invaluable research mission of critical importance to the Specialty Crop industries. Its role must be preserved with clearly defined management authority and its function enhanced with adequate funding
v A merged agency must emphasize responsiveness to producer and processor interests and concerns
v Any consolidation effort must retain a strong technical and scientific base to address phytosanitary, food safety, and pest management issues
v Before proceeding with a merger, clear benefits must be articulated, as well as assurances that resultant potential chaos will not diminish the functions of either ARS or CSREES
v Any consolidation or reorganization must enhance the level of cooperation among intramural and extramural research, extension and education functions of USDA and universities and other partners
v It is important to preserve institutional memory in any consolidation so that lessons learned from past successes and mistakes are retained for future benefit
USDA Proposal for a Specialty Crop Research Initiative
The Farm Bill Specialty Crop Coalition welcomes and applauds the USDA proposal for a competitive Specialty Crop Research Initiative. USDA has done a good job of outlining the kinds of research which would be helpful for specialty crops and the need for a separate funding stream directed solely towards specialty crops.
v The coalition calls for $200 million per year funding vs. $100 million in the USDA proposal. Considering the wide variety of specialty crops, their diverse production situations, and the research intensive nature of their research needs, $200 million is the minimum amount required for an effective program
v The initiative should support both intramural and extramural funding
v Explicit mechanisms for industry involvement should be built into the legislation establishing the initiative
National Institute of Food and Agriculture and Create-21
Both the NIFA and Create-21 Proposals seek a doubling of funds to a merged agency and a re-structuring of research to emphasize funding through peer-reviewed competitive processes. While we unequivocally support enhanced overall funding, any restructuring must retain significant emphasis on crop- and region-specific research and extension essential for Specialty Crops. The NIH and NSF models advanced in the NIFA and Create-21 proposals inherently encourage an emphasis on fundamental investigations of academic scientific interest and discourage applied research for implementation by producers and processors. Such an approach will not develop or deliver the benefits of science and technology to Specialty Corp industries and leave us at an increasingly disadvantage in the competitive global marketplace. If either proposal moves forward, the coalition requests that:
v It is funded with new money
v Fundamental research is balanced with applied research contributing directly to Specialty Crop competitiveness
v Explicit mechanisms for industry involvement are built into the legislation establishing the initiative