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Next Steps

Increased collaborative activity across the land-grant system has the potential to expand the reach of its work, and if effectively communicated, increase its relevance to stakeholders, including the private sector, policy makers, and the public. The land-grant system already provides a robust research, education, and outreach infrastructure, supporting a national research portfolio that ranges from short-term projects directed by individuals to longer-term, larger-scale group efforts. Emphasizing collaboration as an additional hallmark of its mission could allow the land-grant universe to be recognized as a more connected national system.

The Panel recognizes that the principles and recommendations in this report provide only an initial framework to enhance collaboration across the land-grant system that would allow it to operate more effectively as a unified whole. Adopting a culture of collaboration implies change in behavior reinforced by enabling policies. Universities and colleges could adopt curricula for project management, communication, and other skills that would improve chances for team success and perhaps provide new and satisfying career pathways for students and young faculty members. If the time required for project planning and team development and maintenance was treated as valuable during tenure and promotion deliberations, faculty might be more likely to pursue collaboration.

Some of the obstacles mentioned in the report are not trivial to overcome. Resources that need to be increased include more than just funding, although that is a crucial one. Others are staffing, available time for faculty to participate in research, and data infrastructure, including data science. Addressing some of the obstacles noted in this report implies an urgent need for additional funding and responsibility in return for greater effectiveness, capacity, and “true” partnership. Financial support for administrative assistance would enhance the ability of teams to develop successful proposals and would help level the playing field, allowing 1890 and 1994 institutions to become genuine participants in collaborative projects.

The various constituencies in the scientific community are encouraged to think broadly about the need to establish more forward-looking mechanisms for nationwide coordination of agricultural and food research. Diverse backgrounds, cultures, community relationships, and scientific expertise reside in the land-grant colleges and universities, but collaborative vehicles are needed to take advantage of that diversity and allow the institutions to operate in a more connected way. Opportunities such as data platforms with artificial intelligence tools, which participants can collectively and simultaneously contribute to and draw from in pursuit of answers to independent questions, are very compelling from the standpoint of knowledge generation around shared resources. There may be other collaborative platforms that could be built as an inclusive resource and a conduit for experimental data.

Collaboration organizers may also not be aware of the potential for external non-land-grant public or private partners with assets, such as data platforms, technologies, funds, and networks, to participate and support land-grant collaborations.

The kinds of partners that can help realize the vision of a project at the start and over time could include individuals from both land-grant and non-land-grant colleges and universities, individual producers and producer groups, state departments of agriculture, foundations and other nongovernmental organizations, international organizations, entrepreneurs and venture capitalists, and others in private industry. While land-grant investigators must be careful to avoid potential conflicts of interest, partnering with industry can have real benefits in helping to foster research that can translate into applications that drive positive economic and social impacts.

Finally, while there are clearly ways to increase the success of collaboration and team science in agricultural research, the success of large projects cannot be achieved without adequate and stable funding

for the overall enterprise for food and agriculture research. The Panel hopes that the ideas offered in this report will gain the attention of leaders of the land-grant colleges and universities and their stakeholders, and that they will be willing to spend time developing and implementing them with the support of Congress.