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Posts Tagged: annual report
2021 Annual Report highlights impact of UC ANR research and extension
The Program Planning and Evaluation unit collaborated with UC ANR academics, program staff, and Strategic Communications to compile over 50 vignettes that highlight the impact of our organization statewide during 2021. Stories range from enhancing oysters' resilience as the climate changes to improving financial stability of Californians to increasing diversity and inclusiveness.
“Kudos to all for giving us these impact stories,” said Vice President Glenda Humiston. “Thanks to your work and the organization's work in developing the public values, we now have a straightforward easy way to understand our impact. These are what captures stakeholders, lay audiences, legislators and policy makers at all levels. They want to know what's in it for them.”
Vice President Humiston extends a special thank you to the following UC ANR experts who reviewed 2021 Agricultural Experiment Station research reports to identify notable research with clearly articulated potential benefit to the public: Martin Smith, Francene Steinberg, Neil McRoberts, Jim Farrar, Leslie Roche, Rob York and Doug Parker.
If you have any questions about the annual report, please contact Leyla Marandi at leyla.marandi@ucop.edu. The 2021 UC ANR Annual Report is online at https://ucanr.edu/About. Feel free to share these success stories with friends, family, elected officials and others.
UC ANR 2020 Annual Report highlights impacts during COVID crisis
UC ANR's 2020 Annual Report is now live! The Program Planning and Evaluation unit collaborated with UC ANR academics, specialists, program staff, and Strategic Communications to compile the annual report with over 50 vignettes that highlight the statewide impact of our organization during an extraordinary year.
The report illustrates many of the ways that UC ANR pivoted work to adapt to social distancing policies during the COVID-19 pandemic. For example, 4-H advisors and staff created unique distance-learning opportunities for youth to learn about the natural world and participate in community service. UCCE advisors provided small-scale farms with technical assistance on COVID-19 safety and applying for emergency grants. Several statewide programs engaged in food-security initiatives that enhanced access to fresh produce at food banks and increased electronic benefit transfer (EBT) use at farmers markets.
UC ANR maintained its work on critical issues affecting Californians, including drought, wildfires, and climate resilience. UCCE academics led landowners and community organizations in adopt prescribed-fire tactics that reduce fuels and generated new knowledge about wildfire impacts on wildlife communities and post-fire mudslide risks. Others helped improve water efficiency and security for alfalfa growers in the Colorado Basin through innovative irrigation methods and introduced new findings on using species variations that better tolerate drought conditions for key crops like avocado, citrus, and grapes.
Programs such as UC Master Gardener and UC California Naturalist underwent organizational reflection on racial justice, strengthened efforts to increase the diversity of program volunteers, staff and participants, and worked to improve accessibility and cultural relevance for all Californians.
The annual report stories are organized by UC ANR's public values, demonstrating the organization's vision to improve the lives of all 40 million residents in California. If you have any questions about the annual report, please contact Leyla Marandi at leyla.marandi@ucop.edu.
UC ANR annual report shows impacts that benefit every Californian
These are the types of UC ANR outcomes summarized in the recently completed, 16-page 2019 Annual Report, Working for the Benefit of All Californians, produced by UC ANR's office of Program Planning and Evaluation.
“As we pulled this together, we realized that UC ANR research and extension branch out widely, reaching much further than is obvious on the surface,” said PPE director Katherine Webb-Martinez. “If you eat food grown in California, enjoy the outdoors, care about the state's less fortunate residents and find hope in the future of our state under the leadership of today's youth, UC ANR enhances your life.”
The new publication provides 60 examples of the hundreds of research and extension projects conducted in 2019 by UC Cooperative Extension advisors and specialists, and researchers who are part of the campus-based Agricultural Experiment Station.
Among the stories in the annual report is the work of UCCE nutrition, family and consumer sciences advisor Mary Blackburn to teach Alameda County senior citizens how to make simple, healthy meals on a budget. Her classes resulted in 92% improvement in understanding food advertisements.
In Santa Clara County, UCCE 4-H advisor Fe Moncloa provided training for teenaged teachers and afterschool staff in delivering computer science programs to young children. All of the 52 teens reported increased teaching confidence and most of the 35 staff members increased their understanding of the material.
UCCE specialist Dan Putnam and UC Agricultural Experiment Station researcher Charles Brummer at UC Davis tested alfalfa and forage grasses from around the world to select species and varieties farmers can use now and in the future, when climate change will likely require them to produce crops under warmer, drier conditions.
With only 75 native giant sequoia groves still gracing the Sierra Nevada, UCCE specialist Rob York developed a management plan to protect a grove owned by the Save the Redwoods League from high-severity fire in the future.
While there are many additional research and extension achievements recounted in the annual report, the work is not done.
“Despite such success stories, problems remain and the issues grow more complicated,” said UC ANR vice president Glenda Humiston. “The future will hold situations we have never seen before.”
PPE invites UC ANR staff and academics to share the PDF version of the annual report widely to clientele, contacts, political leaders and other stakeholders. A limited number of printed copies are available. Email katherine.webb-martinez@ucop.edu to request paper copies.
UC ANR's 2019 annual report is now available online.
Names in the News
Kron named north coast IPM advisor
Cindy Kron joined UC Cooperative Extension as area-wide IPM advisor for Sonoma, Napa, Mendocino and Lake counties in September 2019.
Before joining UCCE, Kron studied the three-cornered alfalfa hopper as a research entomologist for USDA in their Crop Disease, Pests and Genetics research unit. She tested cover crop species as feeding and reproductive hosts of the three-cornered alfalfa hopper in addition to testing commercially available biocontrol agents against the different life stages of the treehopper. She collaborated with a UC Davis colleague to create a degree-day model that predicts the ideal timing to implement cultural control measures with the greatest impact on treehopper populations.
Kron has researched a variety of insects including a two-year vineyard study on the population dynamics of Virginia creeper leafhopper, western grape leafhopper and variegated leafhopper. For her dissertation, she investigated the biology and behavior of the three-cornered alfalfa hopper and its relationship with vineyards. She also studied the effects of temperature on the developmental rate of the invasive European grapevine moth and reared brown marmorated stink bugs for USDA fumigation studies.
“My experiences have motivated me to help growers, stakeholders and the industry solve agricultural pest management problems through applied research and identifying IPM strategies and tactics that are economically feasible and implementable while having the lowest environmental impact,” Kron said.
Kron earned her bachelor's degree in viticulture and enology, with a minor in agricultural pest management, and her doctorate in entomology at UC Davis.
She is based in Santa Rosa and can be reached at ckron@ucanr.edu.
Nocco named UCCE specialist in soil-plant-water relations
Mallika Nocco joined UC ANR in September 2019 as a UC Cooperative Extension specialist in soil-plant-water relations, based in the Department of Land, Air and Water Resources at UC Davis.
After five years as a health care representative in the corporate world, Nocco decided to pursue her interest in soil, plants and the conundrum of sustainable agriculture.
She earned a Ph.D. in environment and resources and a master's degree in soil science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in the Nelson Institute's Environment and Resources Program. She earned her bachelor's degree in cultural studies/comparative literature and philosophy from the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities.
Nocco is based at UC Davis and can be reached at manocco@ucdavis.edu. Follow her on Twitter @mallika_nocco.
Harper honored as Range Manager of the Year
The California-Pacific Society for Range Management honored John Harper, UCCE livestock and natural resources advisor for Mendocino and Lake counties, with its Range Manager of the Year Award.
“He has advanced an exceptional program of extension education and public service that has been exemplary in gathering and evaluating scientific information and extending information to the range livestock industry and agencies locally and statewide,” wrote Mel George, emeritus UCCE range specialist,in his letter nominating Harper for the award.
Early in his career, Harper helped local ranchers evaluate grazing management practices and develop ranch management plans to address water issues associated with grazing and rangelands in the early 1990s. He was instrumental in developing the Rangeland Watershed Program's Ranch Water Quality Planning Short Courses and associated educational materials that led to the development of water quality plans for more than 2 million acres by more than 1,000 ranchers in California, according to George. In 2012, the Western Extension Directors bestowed an Award of Excellence on the Rangeland Watershed Program.
An early adopter of social media for outreach, Harper developed the blog UCCE Livestock and Range Topics and integrated the use of Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn into his suite of information delivery methods.
In 2012 Harper became California's representative to the Rangeland Partnership, which is responsible for the Rangelands West and Global Rangelands website. He provided leadership to industry in the use of social media to communicate about rangelands and their management.
Harper also improved access to university information and publications by the California Cattlemen's Association and other agricultural organizations. He has been developing new content, digitizing and archiving old publications and revamping the California Rangelands website and the UCCE Livestock & Range Beef Cattle web page.
Over the last few years, Harper has invested considerable time in economic development in Mendocino and Lake counties.
“He has been a central figure in the development of plans for a multi-species slaughterhouse to serve niche marketers on the north coast,” George wrote. “This would create jobs and strengthen the farm-to-consumer marketing of meat products. Likewise, he has worked with individuals to develop wool processing facilities and cheese making enterprises that will increase economic activity and potentially create jobs.”
For many years, Harper has organized what may be the only sheep shearing school in the U.S., creating new careers for the students while filling a need for sheep shearers. All 28 slots of his 2019 Beginning Sheep Shearing School were filled within 2 minutes of registration opening.
Harper received the award at the California-Pacific Society for Range Management Section Meeting Oct. 17.
New annual report shows how UC ANR is improving California life with science-based solutions
Of the hundreds of ways UC ANR impacts California lives and livelihoods, 40 are highlighted in the new publication, Working for the Benefit of All Californians: 2018 UC ANR Annual Report. A limited number of printed copies are available. Email jennifer.caron-sale@ucop.edu to request paper copies.
UC ANR has identified public value statements that reflect the breadth of its efforts. Academics and staff are working to promote economic prosperity, safeguard sufficient safe and healthy food for all, protect the state's natural resources, promote healthy people and communities, develop a qualified workforce, build climate change resilience in communities and ecosystems, and develop an inclusive and equitable society. These values touch every person in the state.
During the period covered in the new report, robust research and education programs supported agricultural communities. For example, UC ANR scientists improved the ability to predict beet curly top virus, avoiding losses approaching $100 million in processing tomatoes. A workshop offered by UC ANR educators on low-stress livestock handling convinced all the participants to incorporate the practices on their ranches. Online and in-person workshops provided to urban farmers resulted in new food safety plans for nearly all of the growers involved.
Families, farmers and natural resource managers are facing the prospect of climate change and looking for ways to continue prospering under uncertain conditions. Increasingly ferocious wildfires are causing serious losses to ranchers. UC ANR provided information on management practices to safeguard resources, prevent soil erosion and estimate the cost of forage losses so ranch owners can prepare loss claims. UC ANR has been instrumental in development of a website, Cal-Adapt.org, a clearing house to collect and disseminate climate change data.
Families and youth are a focus of UC ANR nutrition research, nutrition education and programs such as 4-H and CalFresh Healthy Living, UC. One UC ANR researcher collaborated with the Karuk, Yurok and Klamath tribes to identify culturally sound solutions to reduce food insecurity. In two Northern California counties, students were introduced by UC ANR educators to 36 local produce items. Their selection, consumption and interest in the produce served at lunchtime increased. UC ANR piloted a program that gets Latinx youth outside for environmental education.
Making food safer, enriching children's lives, extending reliable nutrition education and improving the productivity on California farms and ranches add up to significant value to the recipients of the services and to all Californians by making the state a better place to live and work.
