2019 Organic Agriculture Research Forum

The Organic Agriculture Research Forum, organized by the Organic Farming Research Foundation, was held at the Organicology Conference in Portland, Oregon on February 16, 2019. The day-long forum and poster session featured innovative presentations from researchers on organic farming and food systems. eOrganic attended the conference and recorded the presentations. 

Proceedings are available at https://ofrf.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/2019OARFProceedings.pdf

Click here to view the recordings on YouTube

Topics and Speakers

Fruits and Vegetables

  • Matthew Kleinhenz, Ohio State University. Enhancing the utility of grafting in U.S. organic vegetable production
  • Jim Myers, Oregon State University. Northern organic vegetable improvement collaborative
  • Erin Silva, University of Wisconsin. Impact of cultivar selection on arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi colonization and effects of biomass allocation and yield in organic carrot production
  • Javier Fernandez-Salvador, Oregon State University. Organic strawberry production in Oregon: A case for season extension research

Breeding

  • John Snyder, University of Kentucky. Conventional breeding (non-GMO) of tomato for insect and spider mite resistance
  • Brigid Meints, Oregon State University. Multi-use naked barley for organic farming systems
  • Jared Zystro, University of Wisconsin. Efficient methods to develop new sweet corn cultivars for organic systems

Climate Change

  • Jessica Shade, Organic Center. The real impact of organic agriculture on climate change: Adjusting LCA data to more fully account for organic systems
  • Léa Vereecke, University of Wisconsin. Optimizing organic cover crop-based rotational tillage systems for early soybean growth
  • Emily Evans, University of Minnesota. Understanding the value of tillage radish and winter hardy cover crops as nutrient sources for field crops
  • Lauren Snyder, Organic Farming Research Foundation. Organic soil health practices for climate mitigation and farm resilience

Social Science

  • William Tracy, University of Wisconsin. Corn earworm management: A survey of organic sweet corn growers
  • Amanda Marabesi, University of Georgia. A phenomenological inquiry into producers’ experiences growing organic produce
  • Jeff Schahczenski, National Center for Appropriate Technology. Is organic farming risky? The mysterious case of loss ratios

Funding

This project was organized by the Organic Farming Research Foundation and funded by the Organic Research and Extension Initiative grant, part of the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture in 2015 and 2016.

In 2015, additional funding was provided by the Ceres Trust and the conference was co-sponsored by the University of Wisconsin and the Organic Center.  In 2016, the conference was sponsored by the University of California’s Kearney Agriculture Research and Extension Center, the Organic Farming Research Foundation, and the Gaia Fund. The 2017 conference was in partnership with the University of Kentucky and Kentucky State University. The 2019 conference was in partnership with Organicology and the Ceres Trust. The 2020 Conference was funded by NIFA OREI and was conducted in partnership with Tuskegee University and the Southern Sustainable Agriculture Working Group and Ceres Trust.