Strategic Vision for NP 305

Mission:

Develop and transfer sound, science-based information and technologies for productive and profitable food, fiber, and floral/ornamental crop production systems that meet consumer demands for high quality, affordable products, grower needs for a stable income and competitiveness in the global marketplace, worker needs for a safe working environment, and the public’s desire for maintaining or improving environmental quality.

Program Vision and Relevance:

The ARS Crop Production Program conducts research to increase cropping efficiency, productivity, quality, marketability, and protection of annual, perennial, greenhouse, and nursery crops while maintaining or enhancing worker safety and environmental quality.

The ARS Crop Production Research Strategy supports:

• The ARS Strategic Plan for FY 2006-2011.  (see http://www.ars.usda.gov/SP2UserFiles/Place/00000000/ARSStrategicPlan2006-2011.pdf),  specifically Performance Measure 2.2.3 : Expand, maintain, and protect our genetic resource base, increase our knowledge of genes, genomes, and biological processes, and provide economically and environmentally sound technologies that will improve the production efficiency, health, and value of the Nation’s crops.
• The Strategic Plan of USDA’s Research Education and Economics mission area. (see http://www.ocfo.usda.gov/usdasp/usdasp.htm)

Production capacity, production efficiency, and crop protection are major pillars supporting national crop productivity.  A high priority is the development and subsequent transfer to customers of efficient crop production technologies and sustainable cropping systems. 

The Nation’s rural economic vitality depends on the ability of growers to produce and market agricultural products – including food, fiber, flowers, industrial products, and fuels – profitably, while at the same time enhancing the natural resource base upon which crop production depends.  This future financial success depends on increasing productivity, production, and conversion efficiencies; accessing new markets for specialized products; developing technologies to provide new opportunities for U.S. farmers; and utilizing tools and information to mitigate risks and enable rapid adjustments to changing market conditions.  The farm sector has great and varied needs driven by a wide variety of resource, climatic, economic, and social factors, thus requiring an equally diverse array of solutions.  

The United States produces more than 325 million acres of commercial-scale grains, sugar, fruits, nuts, vegetables, and ornamental crops, with the commercial producer value exceeding $110 billion annually.  However, sustaining and/or enhancing the economic production of food, fiber, flowers, and other crops is a continuing challenge.  Production inputs are increasingly expensive and are causing cost/price squeezes in essentially all plant agriculture operations.   

To exacerbate the situation, land resources for profitable crop cultivation are rapidly diminishing, requiring improved management strategies for maximum sustainable production if the Nation is to maintain a basic capacity for food self-reliance, or for domestic plant agriculture to endure as a significant component of the Nation’s economy.  The Nation’s agricultural resources also require management to promote environmental sustainability.  To enhance the development of sustainable systems for crop production, ARS must consider producer profit; integrated pest control, including effects on non-pest species such as bees; effects of inputs on environmental ecosystems, including soil, air, water, and protected areas; pollination and pollinators; environmentally sound control-agent application systems; labor-saving mechanization systems; and compatibility of inputs with worker safety and food quality requirements. 

These market, production, and environmental concerns require the adaptation and development of new technologies to provide economically viable and environmentally sustainable crop production systems while meeting the Nation’s increasing demand for food, flowers, and fiber.  In particular, all inputs of production agriculture must be assessed to ensure their safety and the absence of damaging environmental effects.  Thus, to improve food, flowers, and fiber production systems, ARS must consider the potential effects of these systems on the Nation’s natural resources and on environmental quality during the development process.  Also, particularly in light of labor shortages and rising labor costs, ARS must develop new mechanization technologies to promote safe work environments, efficient production systems, and optimized production and processing of higher quality products.

In addition, declining honey bee (Apis) populations and honey production require special attention.  Over the past several years, a myriad of pests and potentially adverse cultural and pest management practices have been threatening many of the bee species required for pollination of a multitude of crops.  Also, as new crops or niches are introduced, there is an increasing need for non-Apis bee pollinators for specific crops or protected environments.

NP 305 draws heavily on other ARS National Programs, universities, and industries in adapting and incorporating technologies, approaches, and strategies that enable the advancement of the Nation’s agricultural industry and enhanced international competitiveness.

Overall challenges are to increase substantially the knowledge base of, and sustainable technology for crop production and cropping systems; to improve the delivery of technologies generated; and to promote the use of these systems.  The program is expected to yield one or more production practices that can be integrated into a system for managing plant population densities, fertility, pollination, irrigation and other cultural practices, and pests in an efficient and effective manner.  Meeting these goals will require bringing emerging technological capabilities together to support immediate and long-range strategies aimed at future crop production, protection, and food safety challenges for small, medium and large-sized farms, including organic farming systems.  It will also require substantive collaborations with the customers in program planning, research, and evaluation.

Program Priorities:

ARS has adequate research capabilities to pursue two major research goals associated with the ARS Crop Production Mission.  Research priorities for each goal were based on input from ARS stakeholders:

Component 1: Integrated Sustainable Crop Production Systems 

Goals:  Cropping systems that are profitable and productive for new as well as traditional crops, utilizing production methods that include efficient and effective integrated control strategies for multiple pests, improved methods, principles, and systems for irrigation, improved mechanization, and models and decision aids to reduce inputs and conserve natural resources while sustaining or increasing yield and quality.

Component 2: Bees and Pollination

Goals: Improved honey bee and non-apis bee health and well being, better  hive management practices for more robust pollination, development of emerging technologies to be used to address current and future challenges of the bee keeping industry, conserving bee biodiversity, and develop pollinators for land restoration.

Long Term Outcomes:

ARS crop production research will result in:

• New knowledge and understanding of the interactions between biotic and abiotic components of annual, perennial, and greenhouse cropping systems.
• New knowledge and understanding of the interactions between crop canopy, environment, and pesticide spray equipment that impact efficacy, efficiency, and worker and environmental protection.
• Improved horticultural, agronomic, and pest management tools, strategies, and technologies that increase adaptability, productivity, production efficiency, product quality, profitability and economic viability of select annual, perennial, and greenhouse crops.
• Annual, perennial, and greenhouse crop production systems with enhanced productivity, profitability, and sustainability.
• Increased health of managed honey bees and non-apis bees for pollination and honey production.
• Healthy fecund queens.
• Colonies that maintain vigor and population growth during pollination and have improved overwintering.
• New genomic tools that will enable better understanding of bee responses to a variety of stresses.
• Ability to identify key groups of bee pollinators.
• Restored ecosystems with native plant guilds.