Science Policy Report

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29 June 2016

In This Issue:

Policy News

International Corner

Research, Education, Extension Funding Opportunities

Science News

Policy News

Just a week before a Vermont law kicks in requiring labels on food containing genetically modified ingredients, U.S. Senate agriculture leaders announced a deal that preempts states labeling laws — and sets a mandatory national system for GM disclosures on food products. Sen. Pat Roberts, (R-KS), the chairman of the U.S. Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry, unveiled the plan that had been negotiated for weeks with U.S. Sen. Debbie Stabenow, (D-MI). The bill would mandate products with genetically engineered ingredients disclose that information on packaging in one of three ways: a label, a USDA-developed symbol or an electronic code consumers can scan. The bill also would use a narrow definition of genetic engineering that would exempt the newest biotech methods such as gene editing from the national disclosure standards. Read the full article.

In a consensus letter to U.S. policymakers, a partnership of 31 leading nonpartisan scientific societies, including the ASA, CSSA and SSSA, reaffirmed the reality of human-caused climate change, noting that greenhouse gas emissions "must be substantially reduced" to minimize negative impacts on the global economy, natural resources, and human health. Climate-change impacts in the United States have already included increased threats of extreme weather events, sea-level rise, water scarcity, heat waves, wildfires, and disturbances to ecosystems and animals, the intersociety group reported. "The severity of climate change impacts is increasing and is expected to increase substantially in the coming decades," the letter added. It cited the scientific consensus of the vast majority of individual climate scientists and virtually every leading scientific organization in the world. Read the full article.

The agriculture industry will be one of the first beneficiaries of the final rules released for governing the commercial use of unmanned aircraft, the White House says in a statement. The rules, which go into effect 30 days after publication, establish a framework for drones that weigh less than 55 pounds and make it easier to obtain approval to operate them, including not requiring a private pilot's license or the waiver process the Federal Aviation Administration has administered until now. Under the rules, drones must stay within the operator's visual line of sight, which the agriculture industry has said can be problematic for farmers with large amounts of land. But the FAA will consider waiving many of the rule's restrictions - except maximum weight, height and speed. See the White House fact sheet on the final rule. Read the full article.

The US science community got a big pat on the back from members of the Senate commerce and science committee. The senators delivered their encouraging message in the form of a bipartisan bill that would reauthorize programs at the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and tweak policies on science education and innovation across the federal government. Two years in the making, the American Innovation and Competitiveness Act finally makes its appearance as the Senate’s proposed replacement of the 2010 America COMPETES Act that expired in 2013. The new bill was crafted by Senators Cory Gardner (R–CO) and Gary Peters (D–MI) and has the backing of the committee’s chairman, Senator John Thune (R–SD), and ranking member Senator Bill Nelson (D–FL). Read the full article.

House Agriculture Committee’s Subcommittee on General Farm Commodities and Risk Management, held a hearing to educate members about innovations in agricultural imagery and technology. This is the second hearing in a series examining Big Data and its role in agriculture. The subcommittee heard from a variety of stakeholders about using satellites, manned airplanes, and Unmanned Aerial Systems (drones) as a way to collect imagery that farmers can leverage to make better business and conservation decisions for their farms. As technology continues to evolve, the witnesses stressed the importance of maintaining the privacy of individual farmers and ranchers and ensuring that their data is protected. Read the full article.

Early in his presidency, President Obama issued a simple and powerful pledge: to restore science to its rightful place. Last week, the Administration released a list of 100 examples of the profound impact that the President’s leadership has had in building U.S. capacity in science, technology, and innovation and bringing that capacity to bear on national goals. The release of this list corresponds with an exciting milestone for the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy: On June 18, Dr. John P. Holdren became the longest-serving Science Advisor to the President since Vannevar Bush pioneered a similar role while serving Presidents Roosevelt and Truman. Read the full article.

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee approved the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture, which was adopted by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization in 2001, and signed by the U.S. in 2002. The treaty would create a stable legal framework for international germplasm exchanges, allowing for facilitation of access by public and private entities for the sharing of plant resources. Though the U.S. has signed the agreement, the Senate must ratify the Treaty in order to enable the U.S. to participate in the framework. With Committee action complete, the Treaty would now have to be considered by the full United States Senate. Read the full article.

International Corner

To the relief of farmers, the controversial herbicide glyphosate will remain on the market in Europe for another 18 months. The widely used weed killer faced a 30 June deadline for reapproval of its safety—without which it could not be sold—but the decision has been stuck in political gridlock. So the European Commission stepped in to extend the safety approval until December 2017. The decision was mentioned by Commissioner for Health and Food Safety Vytenis Andriukaitis during a press conference today and may be officially announced tomorrow, according to a commission source. The safety of glyphosate has been hotly debated ever since the International Agency for Research on Cancer declared it a “probable human carcinogen” in March 2015. Read the full article.

A farming technique practised for centuries in West Africa, which transforms nutrient-poor rainforest soil into fertile farmland, could combat climate change and revolutionise farming across the continent, researchers said on Tuesday. Adding kitchen waste and charcoal to tropical soil can turn it into fertile, black soil which traps carbon and reduces emissions of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, according to a study carried out by the University of Sussex in England. The soils produced by the 700-year-old practice, known as "African dark earths", contain up to 300 percent more organic carbon than other soils, and are capable of supporting far more intensive farming, said the anthropologist behind the study. Read the full article.

China’s wheat may face being downgraded to feed quality and output could drop to a five-year low after persistent rain damaged crops in the world’s top producer and consumer, according to analysts. Higher-than-normal rainfall in April and May soaked crops in the provinces of Jiangsu, Anhui and Hubei, analysts at Shanghai JC Intelligence Co. and Beijing Orient Agribusiness Consultant Ltd. said. Heavy rain last month also damaged crops being harvested in parts of Henan, the country’s top wheat grower, the analysts said. Read the full article.

U.K. researchers and their organizations have reacted with dismay to last night’s decision by the U.K. electorate to leave the European Union. Science and technology were not a major talking point during the referendum campaign, but numerous scientists and research organizations urged voters to preserve the United Kingdom’s E.U. membership. Although the amount of funding channeled through Brussels to scientists is small compared with national grant systems, the United Kingdom has generally done very well in the race for European money. Read the full article.

The Chinese government has outlined a plan to reduce its citizens’ meat consumption by 50%, in a move that climate campaigners hope will provide major heft in the effort to avoid runaway global warming. New dietary guidelines drawn up by China’s health ministry recommend that the nation’s 1.3 billion population should consume between 40g to 75g of meat per person each day. The measures, released once every 10 years, are designed to improve public health but could also provide a significant cut to greenhouse gas emissions. Read the full article.

Research, Education, Extension Funding Opportunities

Industrial hemp has been attracting a significant amount of interest from diverse groups interested in this sustainable crop. Join us for this science-focused conference to define the industrial hemp agenda. The Science of Industrial Hemp Conference is positioned to be at the forefront of the scientific information for this emerging industry. Attendees will gain knowledge and information from a wide spectrum of scientific areas pertaining to industrial hemp as well as the production issues and challenges in starting up research in this legally challenging area. Denver, CO on July 28 & 29, with optional tour is offered July 27. Learn more and register here.

The Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture is now accepting pre-proposals as part of the Center's long-running competitive grants program. Investigators representing any Iowa nonprofit organization, agency, and/or educational institution with innovative ideas for research projects that impact water, soil, crops, and the land are encouraged to submit a pre-proposal. The competitive grants program is comprised of four initiatives: Ecology, Marketing and Foods Systems, Policy, and Cross-cutting. The focus areas for this year’s pre-proposals are soil health and associated biological processes, farming options for a more diverse landscape, how to increase adoption of conservation practices, and preliminary development of a collaborative group/issue team to research a critical sustainability topic, and food hubs/food processing and distribution business development. Deadline, July 8. Read the full announcement.

Each year, the National Science Board (NSB) pays tribute to remarkable contributions and public service in science and engineering through its Vannevar Bush and Public Service awards. Named after the gifted visionary and dynamic public servant who was behind the creation of the National Science Foundation (NSF), NSB's Vannevar Bush Award honors life-long leaders who have made exceptional contributions toward the welfare of humankind and the nation through public service activities in science, technology, and public policy. NSB's Public Service Award honors individuals and groups for substantial contributions to increasing public understanding of science and engineering in the United States. These contributions may be in a wide variety of areas, including mass media, social media, education, training programs and entertainment. Deadline, October 3. Read the full announcement.

One of the Merck Family Fund’s goals is to restore and protect the natural environment and ensure a healthy planet for generations to come. The Fund provides grants to nonprofit organizations that address one of the following four program areas: The Reducing CO2 Emissions Through Energy Efficiency and Carbon Pricing program supports the development of political and economic drivers at the federal and state level in the Northeast and Southeast to establish or expand carbon pricing mechanisms. The Conserving Ecologically Valuable Land program provides grants for land conservation efforts in the Southeast. The Urban Farming and Youth Leadership program supports initiatives in low-income urban areas in the Northeast that help young people to create urban farms and local markets. The Making Paper Production Sustainable program seeks to increase the rates of recycled paper in large paper sectors, reduce sourcing from endangered forests, and maximize clean production nationwide. Letter of Intent deadline, July 18. Read the full announcement.

The National Network for Manufacturing Innovation (NNMI) are shared research, development, and demonstration facilities to overcome cross-cutting challenges related to the manufacturing of clean energy and energy efficiency products, in addition to challenges associated with improving the energy efficiency of the manufacturing sector across the board. This FOA supports the establishment of a Clean Energy Manufacturing Innovation Institute for Reducing EMbodied-energy And Decreasing Emissions (REMADE) in Materials Manufacturing. This Institute will enable the development and widespread deployment of key industrial platform technologies that will dramatically reduce life-cycle energy consumption and carbon emissions associated with industrial-scale materials production and processing through the development of technologies for reuse, recycling, and remanufacturing of materials. Solving this enormous and currently unmet challenge could significantly reduce U.S. primary energy usage and greenhouse gas emissions in the manufacturing sector, which represents a particularly challenging sector to decarbonize, and improve U.S. manufacturing competiveness in the process. Concept paper deadline, July 28. Read the full announcement.

The California Department of Food and Agriculture is accepting applications for the State Water Efficiency and Enhancement Program (SWEEP). An estimated $18 million will be available for competitive grant funding to provide financial assistance to implement irrigation systems that reduce greenhouse gases and save water at California agricultural operations. Agricultural operations can apply for funding of up to $200,000 per project for irrigation projects that provide quantifiable water savings and greenhouse gas reductions. Deadline, August 5. Read the full announcement.

Science News

Conventional systems for the measurement and recording of streamflow and other environmental parameters are often expensive, limiting the number of automated monitoring stations that can be deployed. For instance, continuous streamflow data is not available for many watersheds of the world, especially in developing countries. This hinders the planning of adaptation to floods and droughts that affect many communities. In a recent article published in Agricultural and Environmental Letters, researchers present a new low-cost data recording system. The system is based on emerging open-source hardware technologies (the Arduino project) that researchers can customize to read and record information from a range of sensors. Read the full article.

The world’s crops face a vast army of enemies, from fungi to bacteria to parasitic animals. Farmers have deployed pesticides to protect their plants, but diseases continue to ruin a sizable portion of our food supply. Some scientists are now investigating another potential defense, one already lurking beneath our feet. The complex microbial world in the soil may protect plants much like our immune system protects our bodies. Scientists have known about so-called “suppressive soils” for decades. The microbiome in healthy soils keeps pathogens at bay. Read the full article.

The World Food Prize is proud to announce the 2016 laureates Drs. Andrade, Mwanga, Low and Bouis. The laureates' work revolutionized agriculture-based biofortification - the development and implementation of breeding critical vitamins and micronutrients into staple crops, thereby dramatically reducing “hidden hunger” for millions. Through the combined efforts of the four Laureates, over 10 million persons are now positively impacted by biofortified crops, with a potential of several hundred million more having their nutrition and health enhanced in the coming decades. As such, they are truly worthy to be named as the recipients of the award that Norman Borlaug created thirty years ago to be seen as the “Nobel Prize for Food and Agriculture.” Read the full article.

Crop yields will fall within the next decade due to climate change unless immediate action is taken to speed up the introduction of new and improved varieties, experts have warned. The research, led by the University of Leeds and published today in the journal Nature Climate Change, focusses on maize in Africa but the underlying processes affect crops across the tropics. It takes anywhere between 10 and 30 years to breed a new crop variety and have it adopted by farmers. The rate at which temperatures are increasing across the tropics means that by the time the crop is in the field it is being grown in warmer temperatures that it was developed in. Read the full article.

How many scientists does it take to debunk the myth that we need more food to feed the world? In the past decade, hundreds of scientists and experts have made it clear: Feeding the world is not about increasing how many bushels of grain we can grow, it’s about dirt, democracy, and our diets. A new report from Friends of the Earth, Farming for the Future, compiles the data and details how we can create a food system that feeds all people, now and into the future. Read the full article.

Three-quarters of the world’s poorest people depend almost entirely on agriculture for subsistence and income. One in nine people in the world today are undernourished, according to the United Nations, and World Bank data shows humanity needs to produce at least 50 percent more food by 2050 to feed an estimated 9 billion people. As the world grapples with rapid population growth, climate change and other serious threats to food security, the international development community is pushing for radical change across the global food and agriculture system to facilitate greater productivity. Read the full article.

To project how much food can be produced in the future, researchers use agricultural models that estimate crop yield, or how much of a crop can be produced in a certain amount of space. These models take into account factors like climate and weather variability, irrigation, fertilizer, and soil type. A new study published in the journal Nature Communications shows that the type of soil used in such a model can often outweigh the effects of weather variability--such as year to year changes in rainfall and temperature. The study is the first global assessment of the importance of soils in global crop models. Read the full article.

Integrating spatial information into decision processes for precision agriculture is a key approach to site-specific management. Soil maps, such as the NRCS Soil Survey Geographic (SSURGO) dataset, are often used to partition fields into separate zones but still lack the resolution needed for implementing precision agriculture. Digital soil models (DSMs) are used to help improve traditional soil maps by integrating high-resolution environmental data with statistical processes to define complex soil-landscape associations; however, methods for validating their success in precision agriculture are needed. Read the full article.

Two facts widely acknowledged for some time are increasingly being linked to conclude that the United States has an urgent need to increase its investment in agricultural research:  First, the latest population projections from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations indicate that by the year 2050 the world population will likely increase by 2.4 billion people, reaching 9.7 billion total people and requiring more than a 60% increase in food production from the 2005 level. Secondly, the major source of growth in agricultural output is due to productivity growth spurred by research innovations, rather than increases in inputs. Moreover, global food security as a motivation for increased investments in agricultural research is often complemented by the goal to maintain the competitiveness of U.S. agriculture amid uncertainties and challenges due to global climate change. Read the full article.

A full one-third of the food the world produces ultimately goes uneaten. That’s a billion tons of food loss and waste (FLW) every single year. There are many good reasons to reduce this loss and waste—food security, economic gains and environmental sustainability, just to cite a few. But many of those most capable of fixing the problem, like governments and businesses, don’t know where to begin. That’s why the Consumer Goods Forum, EU FUSIONS, FAO, UNEP, WBCSD, WRAP and WRI are launching the Food Loss and Waste Accounting and Reporting Standard (FLW Standard), the first-ever global standard to consistently measure FLW. Read the full article.
 

The scientific orientation has proved immensely powerful. It has allowed us to nearly double our lifespan during the past century, to increase our global abundance, and to deepen our understanding of the nature of the universe. Yet scientific knowledge is not necessarily trusted. Partly, that’s because it is incomplete. But even where the knowledge provided by science is overwhelming, people often resist it—sometimes outright deny it. Many people continue to believe, for instance, despite massive evidence to the contrary, that childhood vaccines cause autism (they do not); that people are safer owning a gun (they are not); that genetically modified crops are harmful (on balance, they have been beneficial); that climate change is not happening (it is). Read the full article.

Sources: USDA; NSF; DOE; ScienceInsider; Washington Post; NPR; EurekaAlert; The White House Blog; Ag Professional; New York Times; World Food Prize; Food Tank; DevEx; Choices Magazine; The New Yorker; World Resources Institute; Bloomberg; Reuters; The Guardian;

Vision: The Societies Washington, DC Science Policy Office (SPO) will advocate the importance and value of the agronomic, crop and soil sciences in developing national science policy and ensuring the necessary public-sector investment in the continued health of the environment for the well being of humanity. The SPO will assimilate, interpret, and disseminate in a timely manner to Society members information about relevant agricultural, natural resources and environmental legislation, rules and regulations under consideration by Congress and the Administration.

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