- Author: Saoimanu Sope
In late April, University of California Agriculture and Natural Resources hosted its first regional meeting for UC Cooperative Extension advisors and specialists based in Southern California. The meeting, hosted by Daniel Obrist, vice provost, and Lynn Schmitt-McQuitty, director for county Cooperative Extension, brought together 50 participants over two days for networking and collaboration.
Based on feedback collected from ANR's Statewide Conference in April 2023, academics indicated a desire to meet more frequently opposed to waiting for the conference that occurs every five years. As a result, ANR is hosting regional meetings throughout California to provide an in-person opportunity for academics to discuss their research projects, interact with senior leadership, gain clarity related to merit and promotion, strengthen communication skills and network.
On the first day, academics had the option to attend an Impact and Outcome Writing Workshop presented by Martin Smith, Emeritus Professor of Cooperative Extension at UC Davis. The session also included an interactive segment, facilitated by Katherine Webb-Martinez, director of program planning and evaluation, and Christina Becker, program policy analyst for PPE, that broke down impact reporting into theory and application.
To end the day on a social note, attendees were invited to dinner where they could continue informal discussions and networking. During that time, academics got to interact with senior leaders, including Obrist and Schmitt-McQuitty, county and Research and Extension Center (REC) directors such as Rita Clemens for Riverside, San Bernardino and Orange counties, and Jairo Diaz of Desert REC, as well as statewide support staff like News and Information Outreach in Spanish (NOS).
“A key opportunity of these meetings is to build peer networks with colleagues and collaboration opportunities in the regions. So many of our academics are new to ANR, and the regional meetings allow us to welcome and onboard new colleagues and get to know each other,” Obrist said.
The meetings are also beneficial for those transitioning into a new academic role within ANR. Natalie Levy who currently works as a specialist for water resources at South Coast REC, participated in the meeting with her new position, soil health and organic materials management advisor, which begins June 3, in mind.
“It was helpful to have senior leadership present. I spoke to Lynn the most and she gave me good feedback about developing a new program and my research interests,” Levy said. “I also liked the session discussing merit and promotion because it gave me a framework to use as I step into a new role.”
The morning of the second day, academics participated in a poster session to share their research with colleagues. Attendees also engaged in discussions to understand and address regional needs, build new partnerships and engage senior leadership for support.
“I learned a lot about my colleagues from the poster session. I felt more connected to their work because I could visualize how we can collaborate,” said Ashley Hooper, urban community resiliency advisor for Los Angeles County. “It can be isolating for advisors who don't have counterparts in other counties or in ANR. Seeing how others are managing their programs during the poster session gave me reassurance that I'm on the right track in my position.”
In the afternoon, academics heard from Vice President Glenda Humiston, who addressed ANR's budget and career pathways for academics. Niamh Quinn, human-wildlife interactions advisor for Los Angeles, Orange and San Diego counties, presented on the merit and promotion process to remind academics that “swallowing the eBook” (Guidelines for UC ANR Academics Preparing the Thematic Program Review Dossier) is the best way to learn how merit and promotions work within ANR.
Finally, Saoimanu Sope, digital communications specialist, showed academics how to leverage social media as an extension tool. Ricardo Vela, program manager for News and Information Outreach in Spanish, and Miguel Sanchez, broadcast communications specialist for NOS, described how to produce videos using a smartphone.
“It was useful to see colleagues from other counties, especially those who work in different disciplines,” said Quinn, who, like Hooper, is programmatically isolated given her program niche. As someone who uses social media for her program, Quinn described the social media presentation as informative. “I felt better educated and equipped to make improvements afterwards,” she said.
The regional meeting schedule is as follows:
Region 3: May 30-31, at UCCE San Joaquin County Building in Stockton
- Counties: San Joaquin, Stanislaus, Merced, Mariposa, Mono, Inyo, Madera, Fresno, Tulare, Kings and Kern
- RECs: Kearney, Westside and Lindcove
Region 5: June 10-11, at UC Santa Cruz
- Counties: Sonoma, Napa, Marin, Contra Costa, San Francisco, San Mateo, Alameda, Santa Clara, Santa Cruz, San Benito and Monterey
Region 2: Sept. 12-13, Central/Northern Sierras, specific location TBD
- Counties: Tehama, Glenn, Butte, Colusa, Sutter, Yuba, Nevada, Placer, El Dorado, Yolo, Solano, Sacramento, Amador, Calaveras and Tuolumne
- REC: Sierra Foothills
Region 1: Feb. 26-27, 2025, Redding, specific location TBD
- Counties: Del Norte, Siskiyou, Modoc, Humboldt, Trinity, Shasta, Lassen, Mendocino, Lake and Plumas-Sierra
- RECs: Intermountain and Hopland
- Author: Saoimanu Sope
UCCE specialist's research prevents water pollution, reduces water use
When interviewed to become a University of California Cooperative Extension specialist in environmental horticulture, Lorence “Loren” Oki was asked what kind of research he wanted to conduct.
In response, he showed the hiring committee a photo of a residential gutter. “Water is a big concern, and I found very little research on runoff from homes,” said Oki, explaining that studying residential runoff is what “started his career” with UC Agriculture and Natural Resources back in 2002.
Although he remains active supporting growers and advising industry leaders, Oki retired from UC ANR in July 2023. Before joining ANR, Oki worked as a researcher for UC Davis' Department of Environmental Horticulture studying greenhouse irrigation in 1994, bringing his total time with the University of California to 29 years.
Oki, professor emeritus of Cooperative Extension at UC Davis, led many research projects that advanced the green industry which includes landscapes, nurseries and floriculture.
“Loren is the epitome of a specialist,” said Darren Haver, UC ANR's Research and Extension Center system director, who has worked with Oki for more than 20 years on projects that have significantly improved urban water quality and water conservation efforts across California.
Research influences pesticide management
With a $3 million grant funding a statewide study, Oki and Haver set out to characterize runoff from residential sources over a five-year period. They determined the volume of irrigation runoff from residential land use, as well as the pollutants in the runoff.
Oki and Haver, co-principal investigators, along with researchers from UC Davis and UC Riverside, discovered that the degradation products of the insecticide fipronil – commonly found in runoff water – were more toxic than its parent compound. The study led to an investigation of human pathogens and pathogen indicators in residential runoff, the first of its kind.
Another contribution was the early detection of a new pesticide used for ant control, enabling strategies to be put in place to prevent it from reaching local streams and creeks. Oki and Haver's work also persuaded the California Department of Pesticide Regulation to change pesticide labels to minimize the chances of pesticides moving off target during irrigation and rain events.
These changes included preventing pesticide application before predicted rain and preventing irrigation after applications, keeping pesticides from impervious surfaces, and restricting applications on lawns and landscape beds within two feet of impervious surfaces and others.
Plant trials expand beyond California
Oki was also the principal investigator of the Climate-Ready Landscape Plants project, which may be the largest irrigation trial in the western U.S., and the UC Plant Landscape Irrigation Trials, the California component of that project. The UCPLIT trials originated in 2004 at UC Davis as a research project by Karrie Reid, retired UCCE environmental horticulture advisor for San Joaquin County, while she was pursuing her master's degree. In 2017, the irrigation trials were duplicated at the South Coast Research and Extension Center.
These projects evaluate landscape plants under varying irrigation levels to determine their optimal performance in regions requiring supplemental summer water. Throughout the trial, Oki identified many landscape plants, including rose cultivars, that remain aesthetically pleasing with little water.
Today, the trials have expanded beyond California as the Climate-Ready Landscape Plants Project at Oregon State University, University of Washington, University of Arizona and Utah State University.
Growing up in the nursery industry
In 2017, Oki obtained tenure, allowing him to expand his professional responsibilities to include production horticulture, specifically greenhouses and nurseries, an industry he was extremely familiar with. “I come from a nursery family,” Oki explained. “My grandfather started Oki Nursery in the early 1900s.”
During World War II, Oki's family was incarcerated in the Poston Relocation Center in Arizona and lost their homes and property. When they were released, they returned to the nursery industry to rebuild their lives. “After World War II, my father and uncle got more involved with my grandfather's work,” he said.
The Oki family played an instrumental role in technological development for nurseries in general. Oki Nursery, which was located in Sacramento, worked closely with IBM and was the first to use a computerized system in the industry.
Oki developed computerized scheduling for the bedding plants, poinsettias, chrysanthemums, bulbs and other crops. He developed a method to calculate the cost of any crop grown by the nursery at any point in the crop cycle and computerized greenhouse environmental and irrigation controls. This may not sound impressive now, but that was in the 1980s.
“My father was known for being progressive and he also knew everyone at UC Davis,” said Oki. “He wanted to work with anyone who had an interest in doing something good for nurseries.”
Inducted into Green Industry Hall of Fame
In the 1950s, Oki Nursery partnered with researchers from UC Davis' agricultural engineering program and developed the overhead sprinklers commonly used in nurseries today. Until the 1980s, Oki Nursery was the largest nursery in Northern California. Before it shut down in 1993, Oki worked in the family business as a greenhouse manager when runoff became a growing concern.
“I remember getting served with a notice by the Regional Water Quality Control Board stating that we needed to prevent runoff because it was polluted with nitrate fertilizer, which was common in the nursery industry,” Oki said.
One of those efforts focused on using controlled-release fertilizer instead of applying fertilizer via irrigation as a liquid feed. “What we learned is that if we converted nurseries to controlled-release fertilizer, we could reduce the nitrate runoff,” he said. While a member of the Oki Lab, Bruno Pitton earned his Ph.D. studying nursery hydrology and the fate of nitrogen fertilizers in container crop production adding to the information on runoff and nitrate management. Pitton is now the environmental horticulture advisor for Placer and Nevada counties.
In 2023, Oki was inducted into the Green Industry Hall of Fame, which recognizes individuals with a minimum of 20 years in the landscape, nursery or floriculture industry and who have made significant contributions to the field.
Having grown up in the industry, Oki said that his father taught him to never be afraid to try new things. “If you think you have an idea that might work, do the best you can to make it work. If it doesn't work out, then it doesn't work out. And that's OK,” he said.
Revitalizing space for greater impact
This mentality encouraged Oki whenever tackling new tasks, like rebranding the California Ornamental Research Federation, a space for education and collaboration, as UC Nursery and Floriculture Alliance.
In 2009, Oki and David Fujino, executive director of the California Center for Urban Horticulture, became co-directors of CORF, which catered to the cut flower industry. At that time, Oki and Fujino realized that nurseries generated much greater revenue in the state than cut flowers.
“It was a strategic decision to change CORF to UCNFA, which included floriculture and nurseries in the name,” Fujino said. Combined, nurseries and floriculture have consistently placed in the top five agricultural commodities in the state.
When reflecting on their partnership, Fujino said that working with Oki was a “natural fit.” “I couldn't have asked for a better partner, a better colleague and, ultimately, a better friend to have my back and work side by side,” he added.
Since UCNFA's launch, the two have worked to maintain the group's impact by hosting “Ask your Advisor” webinars to connect advisors to growers, as well as co-hosting large-scale events such as the annual conference for the International Plant Propagators' Society — an organization focused on greenhouse and nursery production education — for the Western Region, which Oki's father helped establish in the 1960s.
Encouraging a return to education
Gerry Spinelli, UC Cooperative Extension production horticulture advisor for San Diego County and member of UCNFA's administrative committee, described those who have learned from Oki as his sons and daughters. “When I meet someone that's learned from Loren or worked with him, that person instantly becomes my friend. That's the kind of effect Loren has on us,” Spinelli said.
Grant Johnson, UC Cooperative Extension urban agricultural technology advisor for Los Angeles and Orange counties, credits Oki for his master's degree in horticulture from UC Davis.
“Loren gave me a lot of direction as far as career choices and research interests. He instilled in me a dedication to life-long learning, just like he continues to do,” said Johnson. Before Oki became his professor, Johnson worked with Oki as a staff research associate at the South Coast Research and Extension Center in Irvine.
Another influential person in Oki's life is John Kabashima, emeritus environmental horticulture advisor for UCCE Orange and Los Angeles counties and fellow Green Hall of Fame inductee. Like Oki, Kabashima grew up in the nursery industry.
Oki, who earned a bachelor's degree in ornamental horticulture from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo and a master's degree in plant science from UC Riverside, decided to pursue a Ph.D. in ecology at UC Davis with Kabashima's encouragement.
While Oki was still working in his family's business, Kabashima said that Oki relied on UC ANR researchers for scientific information and felt like Oki wanted to be one of them. “I told him that he's a good nursery guy, but he's a better scientist,” said Kabashima. “His heart is in science.”
The two began working together as soon as Oki became a graduate student and have been colleagues and friends for nearly 40 years. “My favorite response from Loren whenever people ask him a question is, ‘It depends,'” Kabashima said. “It always leads to people opening up and giving more context. That's what Loren does, he gets you to think.”
/h3>- Author: Mike Hsu
The Fresno-Merced Future of Food Innovation Initiative (F3) – of which UC ANR is an anchor institution – took a big step forward during the UC Regents meeting May 18.
The Regents unanimously approved the formation of F3 Innovate – a new 501(c)(3) nonprofit that will raise funds for the partnership initiative that also includes the Central Valley Community Foundation (CVCF), California Department of Food and Agriculture, UC Merced and CSU Fresno.
Largely funded by a $65 million Build Back Better grant from the U.S. Economic Development Administration, F3 aims to advance innovation and entrepreneurship in agrifood technology, strengthen food systems, bolster local and regional economies, and bring greater prosperity to the San Joaquin Valley and beyond.
The new F3 Innovate nonprofit will focus on agrifood systems research and commercialization, services for micro-enterprises and small businesses in under-resourced communities, ag-tech innovation seed funding, and building a talent pipeline to sustain these efforts.
“This 501(c)(3) is critical to all of that, because it really lets us bring together the public and private partners, and ensures that broader stakeholder participation and benefit,” said Glenda Humiston, UC vice president for agriculture and natural resources, during her presentation to the Regents (view recording of the meeting).
UC Merced Chancellor Juan Sánchez Muñoz and CVCF President and CEO Ashley Swearengin also spoke passionately during the meeting about the need to form the nonprofit as a key connector and catalyst for the F3 initiative.
F3 – and the new F3 Innovate – will continue to take shape through the work of Gabe Youtsey, UC ANR chief innovation officer; Josh Viers, associate dean for research of UC Merced's School of Engineering; and many other academics and staff across UC ANR and UC.
"Establishing F3 Innovate as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization is a strategic move designed to unlock and accelerate agriculture technology from lab to market. It will pave the way for a wider range of collaboration opportunities between the UC and industry, and ensure the inclusion and representation of all our stakeholders, from small and socially disadvantaged farmers to startups and corporates," said Youtsey, who is also founder of The VINE, UC ANR's Innovation & Entrepreneurship program that is co-leading F3.
"The UC Regents were enthusiastic about this partnership as it aligns perfectly with our mission of transforming cutting-edge agricultural research into practical, market-ready solutions while doing the hard work of engaging our local workers, communities and farmers to adopt these new technologies," Youtsey added. "It enables us to foster deep and meaningful collaborative relationships with industry partners, advancing technology commercialization that is inclusive and truly beneficial to all involved."
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
Vice President Glenda Humiston hosted 50 high-level representatives from 24 countries as part of the Tenth Americas Competitiveness Exchange (ACE 10) on Innovation and Entrepreneurship tour of Northern California Oct. 21-27.
Over the course of a week, ACE 10 participants visited innovation clusters in San Francisco, Salinas, Santa Cruz, Monterey, Fresno, Davis and Sacramento.
UC Cooperative Extension advisors David Haviland and Jhalendra Rijal and Sebastian Silva of ag tech company Semios talked to the international delegates about almond research and how UCCE works with growers and companies.
Later, an entrepreneur told AVP Wendy Powers that he was beginning to think about how to develop a university-based Extension system in Grenada, how to convince his government to redirect funds from federal agencies to the university.
Tour co-sponsor Valley Vision's Tammy Cronin described activities during the ACE 10 visit to Sacramento in a blog post.
The ACE program is coordinated by the U.S. Department of Commerce's International Trade Administration and Economic Development Administration in coordination with the U.S. Department of State and the Organization of American States. It brings together decision-makers from around the world to explore global and regional partnerships, and economic development opportunities to establish new global commercial relationships.
“ACE has been instrumental in showcasing the incredible innovation capacity of U.S. regions and has proven critical in establishing global commercial relationships that can support U.S. business objectives,” said Dennis Alvord, EDA deputy assistant secretary for regional affairs. “Northern California is a world-renowned center of innovation and entrepreneurship activity and we look forward to showcasing the incredible work that the Department of Commerce and regional leaders are doing to advance the innovation economy.”
EDA and OAS posted daily updates about the tour on Facebook and Twitter with the hashtag #ACXchange.
- Author: Pamela Kan-Rice
“In the coming decade, the stresses on the U.S. food and agricultural enterprise won't be solved by business as usual – either in the field or in our current research efforts,” said Susan Wessler, the Neil and Rochelle Campbell Presidential Chair for Innovations in Science Education and distinguished professor of genetics at UC Riverside, who was a co-chair of this important new study.
Alison Van Eenennaam, UC Cooperative Extension specialist at UC Davis, served on the Committee on Science Breakthroughs 2030: A Strategy for Food and Agricultural Research, and other UC academics were involved in reviewing content for the 200-page book.
The urgent progress needed today, given challenges such as water scarcity, increased weather variability, floods and droughts, requires a convergent research approach that harnesses advances in data science, materials science, information technology, behavioral sciences, economics and many other fields.
The committee identified five breakthrough opportunities that take advantage of a convergent approach to research challenges and could potentially increase the capabilities of food and agricultural science dramatically:
- A systems approach to understand the nature of interactions among the different elements of the food and agricultural system can be leveraged to increase overall system efficiency, resilience, and sustainability.
- The development and validation of highly sensitive, field-deployable sensors and biosensors will enable rapid detection and monitoring capabilities across various food and agricultural disciplines.
- The application and integration of data sciences, software tools, and systems models will enable advanced analytics for managing the food and agricultural system.
- The ability to carry out routine gene editing of agriculturally important organisms will allow for precise and rapid improvement of traits important for productivity and quality.
- Understanding the relevance of the microbiome to agriculture and harnessing this knowledge will improve crop production, transform feed efficiency, and increase resilience to stress and disease.
They include recommendations for a range of federal agencies, as well as federal and private funders and researchers.
“It is very gratifying to see a strong recommendation for enhanced support to the Agricultural Experiment Station and Cooperative Extension systems as vitally important infrastructure!” VP Glenda Humiston said.
Humiston and other UC ANR leaders are considering how UC ANR might best use the ideas presented in the report.
The report is available for free download at https://www.nap.edu/catalog/25059/science-breakthroughs-to-advance-food-and-agricultural-research-by-2030.