Colleges of agriculture at the land grant universities: Public service and public policy

In 1862, almost 50% of all United States residents lived on farms, which employed almost 60% of the labor force. The business of the day was agriculture, and the land grant college of agriculture (LGCA) system was mandated … to teach such branches of learning as are related to agriculture and the mechanical arts. … to promote the liberal and practical education of the industrial classes in the several pursuits and professions in life (1862 Morrill Act).

Initiated in 1862 with the passage of the first Morrill Act, and expanded in 1890 with the passage of the second Morrill Act, the LGCA system was the first embodiment of a post-Civil War national philosophy about higher education—the concept of higher education of a practical nature for citizens of ordinary means.

The 1862 Morrill Act produced land grant colleges in every state and territory and the District of Columbia. The 59 resulting colleges (including three within the University of California system and six in U.S. territories) are known as the 1862 colleges or “1862s.” The second Morrill Act, which mandated access to African Americans, gave rise to a set of historically Black colleges located in southern states and known as the 1890 colleges or “1890s.” There are 17 1890 institutions—16 public state colleges and Tuskegee University.

As full-fledged universities grew up around the original colleges, the LGCAs continued to have a unique relationship with the public and the federal government—one that has lasted more than 130 years and has some distinctive features. In initiating this study, the National Research Council felt that an assessment was needed of whether these long standing institutional arrangements continue to work to the advantage of the nation and, indeed, to the advantage of the LGCA system.

The two Morrill acts and two subsequent pieces of land grant legislation, the 1887 Hatch Act and the 1914 Smith–Lever Act, together endowed the LGCAs with a three-part mission of teaching, research, and extension. Extension was designed to link the colleges’ academic and research programs to societal needs through a public service function that includes extended education and technology transfer. Motivated by the desire to draw each state and territory into supporting science and education related to agriculture, land grant legislation created a federal–state partnership in agricultural research and technology transfer. The partners have traditionally been the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), at the federal level, and every state and territory, through their land grant colleges and associated state agricultural experiment stations and extension services, at the state and local levels. Cementing the partnership is a financial arrangement: each state and territory receives federal funding through USDA for its agricultural research and extension programs, contingent on each state and territory matching these federal funds.† Institutional funds for both research and extension programs are allocated based on formulas for which the major components are the percentages of the nation’s rural and farm populations located in each state and territory.

Recently, about 30% of all research expenditures by LGCAs’ state agricultural experiment stations derived from federal funds; state appropriations and private funds accounted for 51 and 19%, respectively. Of the 30% of expenditures supported by federal funds, about one-third came from formula funds, 10% come from competitive research grants administered by USDA and specifically designated for food and agricultural system research, 13% come from congressionally designated special grants, and 44% come from non-USDA agencies including the National Institutes of Health, the U.S. Agency for International Development, the National Science Foundation, and others.

Land grant colleges’ extension services are supported by federal, state, local government, and private funds. Recently, state appropriations contributed 47%, federal funds contributed 29%, and local government and private support accounted for 24%. The federal funds are drawn from USDA-administered formula funds (69%), congressionally designated funds (28%), and other federal sources (3%). Federal funding for teaching programs in food and agricultural sciences has been minimal in relation to support for research and extension (USDA-administered programs total $18 million); a formula such as those used to fund research and extension has never been adopted, nor is it proposed here.

The Colleges’ Contemporary Context

Since the colleges’ early years, the nation has experienced dramatic changes in the business of farming. First, in good part because of the colleges’ contributions to agricultural knowledge and farm technology, farming today is an industry based on science and technology. The productivity of farm labor has increased almost 7-fold since 1948 as a result of the development of modern farm technology, the use of more capital relative to labor, and improvements in the quality of inputs and managerial practices.

Second, the profile of a farm has changed dramatically since the LGCA system’s early years. Family farms still account for the majority of farms in the United States; however, the contemporary family farm is often a complex business entity, and family farms range in size from small scale specialty farms to very large scale, commercial organizations. Farming has also become a highly concentrated industry, thus a relatively small share of all farms produce a significantly larger share of all farm output. Associated with the great size disparity among U.S. farms is the fact that there are farmers of significantly different economic means, educational backgrounds, research capacities, and information needs.

Third, some segments of the U.S. food and agricultural sector are increasingly industrialized. In other words, farming, processing, and marketing are increasingly coordinated activities controlled through ownership or contractual arrangements by a single firm or “integrator.” In such operations, the seed, animals, or feed used for production may be owned by the integrating firm, which has a technical and professional staff that provides context-specific information to contractors based on proprietary data and research. These developments are requiring LGCAs in some parts of the country to rethink their partnerships with some farm and ranch client groups.

Along with changes in the farm sector, the national interest in the performance of the food and agricultural system, of which farming is one component, has evolved over the decades to reflect a wider array of public expectations. The modern food and agricultural system encompasses primary production, processing, marketing, retailing, and consumption—activities that now provide 18% of U.S. employment, 16% of “value added” to domestic production, and substantial contributions to the nation’s export earnings. The food and agricultural system includes, as well, the interaction of these economic activities with natural resources and the environment; human communities and their well being; and consumer health, safety, and ethics—interactions often difficult to evaluate in economic terms but clearly valued by contemporary society. Expanding global population, tightening global resource constraints, and environmental quality and food safety concerns combine to underscore the need for continued improvement in the productivity and sustainability of the food and agricultural system and the quality and safety of its products.

Major Conclusions and Recommendations

The committee assessed the adaptations of each of the three functions of the LGCAs—teaching, research, and extension—to the colleges’ contemporary environment and the U.S. public’s changing needs and priorities. A national science and education infrastructure that underpins continued advances in performance of the food and agricultural system, and federal support of that infrastructure, remain squarely in the national interest. The committee identified, however, four principal areas for change. Specifically, within the LGCA system there is:

1.  the need for greater relevance and accessibility through programs that embody an expanded view of the modern food and agricultural system and through inclusion of a wider array of students, faculty, and clientele of diverse backgrounds and perspectives;

2.  the need to remove historic barriers and, indeed, encourage research, teaching, and extension collaborations that cross disciplines, institutions, and states; to encourage faculty and student exchanges; and to make all programs in the system accessible to as wide a variety of stakeholders as possible—that is, there is a firm need to create a “new geography” that cannot be confined to a locality;

3.  the need for stronger linkages among the equally important functions of teaching, research, and extension and the need to reinvigorate the colleges’ role as models of the land grant concept and philosophy; and finally,

4.  the need for heightened accountability and quality through competitive processes for funding, guiding principles for the use of public (especially federal) resources, and more regular and critical evaluations of publicly funded programs.

Committee on the Future of the Land Grant Colleges of Agriculture

Anthony S. Earl

Chair

Quarles and Brady Law Firm

Madison, Wisconsin

R. Lee Baldwin University of California, Davis John C. Gordon Yale University

Gordon E. Guyer

Michigan Department of Agriculture Lansing, Michigan

Fred Harrison, Jr.

Fort Valley State College

Edward A. Hiler

Texas A&M University

Marlyn Jorgensen

Jorg-Anna Farms

Garrison, Iowa

Daryl B. Lund

Cornell University

Thomas F. Malone

The Sigma Xi Center

Research Triangle Park, North Carolina

Mortimer H. Neufville

University of Maryland, Eastern Shore

Elizabeth D. Owens

ISK Biosciences Corporation

Mentor, Ohio

C. Alan Pettibone

Washington State University

Allen Rosenfeld

Public Voice for Food and Health Policy

Washington, D.C.

Charles Saul

Agway, Inc.

Syracuse, New York

G. Edward Schuh

University of Minnesota

George E. Seidel, Jr.

Colorado State University

Jo Ann Doke Smith

Smith Associates

Irving, Texas

Katherine R. Smith

Henry A. Wallace Institute for Alternative Agriculture

James Wyngaarden

Duke University

Elisabeth A. Zinser

University of Kentucky

James J. Zuiches

Washington State University

Staff

Nicole Ballenger

Project Director

Diby Kouadio

Research Associate

Janet Overton

Editor

Viola Horek

Project Assistant