An interdisciplinary team in Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences, in collaboration with the Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay, a conservation nonprofit working with farmers, has received a $250,000 grant from the Northeast Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education program. The team will use the funding to study how conservation agriculture practices — efforts to minimize damage to soil health and the natural ecosystem — affect the well-being of dairy farm workers and farm families.
The project, “Examining the Impacts of Conservation Agriculture on Farm Workforce Well-Being,” is led by Kathleen Sexsmith, assistant professor of rural sociology. Project team members include Florence Becot, the Nationwide Insurance Early Career Professor and lead of Penn State’s Agricultural Safety and Health Program, and Adrian Barragan, associate research professor of veterinary and biomedical sciences, from Penn State; and Mauricio Rosales, senior agriculture projects manager, and Alexandra Neumann, agriculture projects manager, with the Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay, also known as the Alliance.
Sexsmith said the research will explore an often-overlooked aspect of agricultural sustainability: the social and workplace impacts of conservation agriculture practices on the farmers and workers who perform them.
Conservation agriculture practices — such as cover cropping, reduced tillage, manure management strategies and riparian forest buffers — can support environmental stewardship, profitability and long-term farm viability. However, researchers note that these practices also can create new workplace challenges for dairy farmers and farm workers.
Source : psu.edu