Florida agricultural leaders launched an initiative to identify and implement climate-smart agriculture solutions and ecosystem services that benefit the public, producers and the planet.
The Florida Climate Smart Agriculture (FLCSA) Work Group is the collaborative effort of Solutions from the Land (SfL) and the University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (UF/IFAS).
The multi-stakeholder effort is led by growers, ranchers and forest landowners, in partnership with conservation, environmental, business, health, academic and government partners. Initiated in late 2018, the project aims to assist Florida agriculture and forestry leaders in examining the vulnerabilities and opportunities created by changing climatic conditions in ways that are relevant to their daily lives and those of their customers.
Ernie Shea, SfL president and CEO, gave an overview of the FLCSA Work Group during the 2021 virtual Ag Tech Expo, hosted by UF/IFAS.
Shea says Florida agriculture has been playing defense in the past, and it’s time to play offense. He believes now is the time to pivot and demonstrate to the world the full range of goods and services that can be delivered from the land.
In a time when Florida’s agricultural and forestry systems are facing more threats than ever, the group is developing and implementing an action plan that will enhance the resilience of these industries.
“I’ve been told that there’s somewhere around a thousand people a day that are moving into the state of Florida, and they’re bringing with them a desire to have a place to live, a quality of life, and it’s leading to farmland conversion,” Shea said.
Providing nutritious food for a rapidly growing population, farmland protection, climate change and clean energy are just a few of the challenges the group is addressing.
“There is no one path forward. We need multiple paths and multiple tools in our toolbox,” Shea says. “We are warmly embracing technology and innovation and putting farmers and ranchers at the forefront of the conversation.”
Moving forward, the FLCSA Work Group has committed to several goals, including the following:
- Explore distributed generation models of solar energy development where landowners would have an equity position in the project.
- Quantify and value agro ecosystem services using artificial intelligence.
- Develop a manageable plan of action to engage minorities and limited-resource producers by not only inviting minority farmers to the project, but building a concrete strategy for ways to identify and understand the unique needs of these communities and explore initiatives and policies that could help improve their livelihoods.
View the complete FLCSA 2021 work plan here.
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