Bioeconomy Project
Introduction
Can our agricultural landscape produce more food, feed, fiber, and fuel? More importantly, can we do it while we improve farm economics, local economies, environmental outcomes, and community well-being? Members of the New Agricultural Bioeconomy Project (NABP) believe the answer to both of these questions is a resounding yes. The NABP brings transdisciplinary resources from across the University of Minnesota together to explore these questions with local communities. Through facilitated engagement and decision support tools, we create shared learning opportunities and connections for community members, argricultural producers, businesses, NGOs, and others. Participants work together to identify innovative policy, research, technology, and learning strategies that promote economic, environmental, and community win-win-win opportunities.
The current work of the NABP seeks to engage stakeholders broadly in Southern Minnesota exploring new opportunities for biomass utilization by using a systems approach. Stakeholders work with the collaborative geodesign tool, a spatial decision support system, to talk about changes to the agricultural landscape and learn about the impacts to sediment, nitrogen, and phosphorous flow, along with carbon sequestration, and economic returns. Together, we are exploring how cellulosic bioproducts represent a potential win-win-win economic opportunity for rural communities. Feedstock sources include perennial grasses such as native prairie mixtures and switchgrass as well as existing agricultural products like corn stover.
Using the geodesign tool
The NABP wants to serve the needs of local community partners in exploring economic opportunities tied the local natural resources by:
- Building community connections within and between local people, businesses, and intuitions
- Convening diverse local stakeholders and facilitating participatory process to explore new win-win-win bioeconomic opportunities within the community
- Connecting University of Minnesota scholars, regional and local experts, and new and emerging bioeconomic industries to communities in ways that inform economic and environmental decision making
- Creating highly-accessible decision support tools to help local communities better understand the relationship between economics, environment, and community well-being
People
Marcus Grubbs, Project Coordinator, Humphrey School of Public Affairs
Volkan Isler, Associate Professor, Department of Computer Science
Nicholas Jordan, Professor, Department of Agronomy and Plant Genetics
Len Kne, Associate Director, U-Spatial
Bill Lazarus, Professor, Department of Applied Economics
David Mulla, Professor, Department of Soil, Water, and Climate
David Pitt, Professor, Landscape Architecture
Bryan Runck, PhD Student, Department of Geography, Environment and Society
Carissa Slotterback, Associate Professor, Humphrey School of Public Affairs
Timothy Smith, Director, NorthStar Initiative for Sustainable Enterprise, Institute on the Environment
Funding Sources
Minnesota's Discovery Research and Innovation Economy (MnDRIVE)
USDA-NRCS Conservation Innovation Grant Program
U-Spatial, University of Minnesota
Office of the VP for Research, University of Minnesota
Institute for Renewable Energy and Environment, UMN
Partners
Agricultural Research Utilization Institute (AURI), www.auri.org/
RowBot, rowbot.com/
