Florida innovation, American farmers, the path to competitiveness

Research into creating new plant varieties has saved billions of lives around the world. American agricultural research is also saving lives.

American farmers face global competition in the aisle of produce. Labor challenges put them at a disadvantage. Innovations from research keep them competitive.

Part of the beauty of agricultural research is that even the playing field of international trade does not punish other countries. It just lifts ours. For example, the study supports the Florida citrus industry, which exported $23.4 million worth of orange juice to Canada in 2023.

Our farmers are fiercely independent. They prefer to be paid from the market instead of the government. What they ask is that they want a fair market to film them making a living. Agricultural research provides farmers with the tools, techniques and talents to become the most efficient and environmentally sound producer in the world.

Farmers are the backbone of industries that lift the rural America economy. Too often, the origin of our food remains in economic development efforts. I support Florida Senate President Ben Albritton for the “country renaissance” that raises jobs and businesses near corn, citrus and blueberry farms.

Innovation requires investment. Some estimates have a 20-1 payoff from every dollar spent on agricultural research.

Half a century ago, the average US farm fed 98 people. After decades of agricultural research helped farmers achieve higher yields, the average US farm currently feeds 169 people.

But we have lost our position in other countries. According to the US Department of Agriculture, US investment in agricultural research has dipped by this century. China’s investment in agricultural research has more than quadrupled since 2000, and is now twice as high as the US level.

This is a national security threat. We don’t want to rely on China for our food.

Yes, my phone is selfish. National Funding for Agricultural Research supports a national network of research at public universities, such as those at the University of Florida where I work.

But it also nurtures citizens. Farmers in the state say they are not in business without the research we do on their behalf. As a public university, we take our discoveries from our lab and share them with farmers through demonstrations by scientists, how-to manuals, and even farm visits.

And we do it not for them or for them, but with the farmers of America. Our deep connections rooted in decades of partnerships allow us to receive constant feedback on issues we need to solve and what doesn’t work.

Federally funded knowledge is in the public interest. As the challenges of producing food become more complicated, we need to generate more.

These challenges include globalization. There is an international race to feed the future and we are losing.

We can take a punitive approach to leveling out the playing field in international trade in agriculture, or bet on American farmers and the scientists who support them. We can compete without conflict.

Every time we discover how to grow more food by reducing the available land, and every time we extract more crops per drop, we advocate for national security by protecting the land, employing millions of Americans, and enhancing our ability to feed ourselves.

With the advent of artificial intelligence, this is a pivotal moment in agricultural research. AI should be applied to agriculture to promote breakthroughs in medicine, transportation and communication. AI is trying to translate agriculture more deeply than tractors and genetics.

If we don’t do that, other countries will. And our farmers do something else. In Florida, if farmers can’t afford to farm their own land, they will sell it. The rooftop is called the last crop. Once the neighborhood is built, it will not return to agriculture.

Agricultural research is profitable in producing food, despite not being paid for much of what farmers give us. Green spaces, wildlife habitats, flood protection carbon sequestration, and more.

You cannot ask farmers to build their own labs and test their livelihoods. National investment in agricultural research is a way to put technology into people who take risks in innovation, invest in Moonshot, and produce food, feed, fiber and fuel.

Dr. J. Scott Angle is Senior Vice President of Agriculture and Natural Resources at the University of Florida and is a leader at the UF Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (UF/IFAS).