The Systems Agronomy for Global Development group at Cornell is led by Associate Professor Andrew McDonald. We are housed in the Soil and Crop Sciences Section of the School of Integrative Plant Science and are also affiliated with the Department of Global Development.

Lab mission: use the tools and integrating perspectives of systems agronomy to drive creative problem solving in plant production systems, particularly in the Global South where agriculture is under tremendous pressure to improve food security and rural livelihoods through inclusive approaches that contribute to a broad range of sustainable development goals, including the protection of essential ecosystem services and climate change mitigation.

Why ‘agronomy’?: Agronomy seeks sustainable and productive solutions for crop and mixed crop-livestock farming systems as the integrating science at the nexus of several disciplines including soils, economics, agricultural engineering, pest management, and crop improvement. Unlike classical experimental approaches conducted on small research plots (aka ‘rates and dates’), modern agronomy also investigates processes while characterizing key outcomes and tradeoffs in the context of complex management objectives that include yield, resilience, ecosystem services, and profitability.  By focusing on processes and how they play out across scenarios of variability and change, agronomic knowledge is increasingly predictive with respect to anticipating the value of technological innovations and system re-design options in time and space. The emerging predictive ability of modern agronomy is essential for empowering precision agriculture and adapting plant production systems to a changing climate.

Our approach: There are no universal solutions or absolute truths for achieving sustainable agricultural development. That makes the science challenging and the need for creative inter-disciplinary partnerships essential. Our research approach focuses on application of mixed-methods that span from basic characterization and scenario analysis with systems tools to targeting of solutions and working with partner networks on transition pathways. Our research approach is centered on addressing several ‘grand’ challenges confronting agri-food systems. Even with the elimination of food waste and broad-scale adoption of healthy diets, a world of 10 billion will require very substantial increases in the production of food, feed, fuel, and fiber while ensuring nutritional security beyond caloric sufficiency. How can we do this while adapting to a radically changing climate, ensuring ecological integrity at local to global scale, and fostering inclusive livelihoods?  Tradeoffs are inevitable and time is short to establish trajectories towards more sustainable futures.  Reference our ‘research’ page to learn more about the current priorities of the lab.