$5M USDA Grant Helps Train Next Generation of Food and Agriculture Scientists

November 16, 2023

three students in community garden — Students learn about the importance of soil for urban agriculture in San Diego through a community research class funded by the grant.

Faculty from CAL are among a large team at SDSU leading the effort to prepare career-ready students for work on food system challenges on U.S.-Mexico border

The university was awarded a $5M U.S. Department of Agriculture grant to continue work that is part of a $1M HSI educational USDA grant received last year. The new project is entitled: "Expanding and Diversifying Careers in Sustainable Food Systems along the U.S.-Mexico Border."

The five-year grant supports students, including those from historically excluded communities, through funding, mentoring, and high impact learning opportunities, such as undergraduate research, internships, and community-engaged classes.

“This grant is focused on regenerative agriculture,” Pascale Joassart-Marcelli, co-PI and director of the Center for Better Food Futures.”But our focus is broad; we are thinking about regenerating soils and the environment, but we are also considering how food and agriculture can rebuild local economies, strengthen health, engage communities, and reclaim cultural knowledge.”

Indigenous and immigrant communities are a focus of the research. “By working with immigrant and tribal communities, such as the Kumeyaay, on the issues of sustainable food systems, we hope to attract students whose knowledge and experiences are linked to ancestral practices that are extremely valuable in developing solutions to make our food system more sustainable and equitable,” she said. The grant will support 240 undergraduate, 18 master’s, and 7 doctoral students, with funding set aside for up to 50 Indigenous students.

The goal is to help train the future generation through diversifying and expanding opportunities for careers in food and agriculture. Students will learn strategies to address issues of the day that include climate change, food insecurity, poverty, and environmental degradation.

New grant projects will focus on urban agriculture and agroforestry in San Diego, water use and heat stress in Imperial Valley, ethnobotany and forestry in Baja, among other topics.

Projects associated with the previous USDA grant have included research in Baja and Oaxaca, Mexico as well as locally at the SDSU Community Garden and elsewhere. SDSU students traveled to Oaxaca in the summer to examine how its traditional food culture is shifting — from the field to the plate. And, students in San Diego worked locally with food scientists to analyze the nutritional content of eggs within a hyper local sustainable food system.

Co-principal investigators from across campus include, from CAL: Pascale Joassart-Marcelli (Better Food Futures and geography); Ramona Pérez (Center for Latin American Studies and anthropology); Trent Biggs, and Amy Quandt (geography). From other colleges: Lluvia Flores Renteria, John Love, and David Lipson (College of Sciences), Changqi Liu (Health and Human Sciences), and Iana Castro (Fowler College of Business).

The project is housed in the new Center for Better Food Futures and linked to the Food Studies Program.

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