Reviews Write New Review
Location
Booking Fee
Fee: $##,###Get Pricing
Virtual Fee: $##,###Get Pricing
[email protected]
After earning a BA in biology from Kansas Wesleyan University, an MA in botany from the University of Kansas, and a PhD in genetics from North Carolina State University, Wes Jackson established and served as chair of one of the United States' first environmental studies programs at California State University-Sacramento. Jackson then chose to leave academia, returning to his native Kansas, where he founded a non-profit organization, The Land Institute, in 1976. He was head of The Land Institute until he stepped down in 2016. The organization describes its main goal as the development of Natural Systems Agriculture; it also publishes The Land Report, a newsletter about American sustainable agriculture and agrarianism.
The Land Institute explored alternatives in appropriate technology, environmental ethics, and education, but a research program in sustainable agriculture eventually became central to its work. In 1978 Jackson proposed the development of a perennial polyculture. He sought to have fields planted in polycultures, more than one plant in a field, as in nature. Jackson also wanted to use perennials, which would not need to be replanted every year - that would leave the soil more intact, preventing erosion, and allowing important relationships between soil and plant to continue. The Land Institute attempts to breed plants not presently used in agriculture into effective producers of perennial grains in intercropping conditions. Jackson argued that this version of agriculture used "nature as model", and to pursue that end The Land Institute has studied prairie ecology.
Entering its fourth decade, The Land Institute is beginning to demonstrate progress in developing the perennial crops called for in the Natural Systems Agriculture model. Programs in wheat, sorghum, and sunflower are generating crop lines displaying both perenniality and agriculturally-significant seed yield. Research on integrating these new plants into polycultures also continues. The Land Institute is not itself developing machinery suitable for one-pass harvesting of grain polycultures. It instead takes the position that integration of existing materials separation technology into harvesters is a straight-forward task, and will be accomplished by public and private agricultural engineers when the demand arrives.
Wes Jackson is the author of several books including New Roots for Agriculture and Becoming Native to This Place and is recognized as a leader in the international sustainable agriculture movement. He was a 1990 Pew Conservation Scholar, in 1992 became a MacArthur Fellow, and in 2000 received the Right Livelihood Award. His work is often referred to by author Wendell Berry, with whom Jackson has shared a longtime friendship and correspondence.
Videos
News
Related Speakers View all
Bruce Friedrich
Founder & CEO of The Good Food Institute
|
|
Will Allen
Pioneer in the Urban Farming Movement, Author & Foun...
|
|
Sarah Frey
CEO, Founding Farmer of Frey Farms, Author & Advisor...
|
|
Jasmine Crowe-Houston
Founder & CEO at Goodr Co.
|
|
Danielle Gould
CEO of Food+Tech Connect; Co-Founder & Co-CEO of Alp...
|
|
Gary Hirshberg
Co-Founder & Chief Organic Optimist of Stonyfield Farm
|
|
Jacques Pépin
Master French Chef; Food Columnist; Cookbook Author ...
|
|
Vanessa Garcia Polanco
Food System, Policy & Racial Equity Leader
|
|
Alex Shirazi
Host of the "Future Food Show", Founder & Managing D...
|
|
Kate Kavanaugh
Entrepreneur, Regenerative Agriculture Advocate & CE...
|
|
Tristram Stuart
Environmental Campaigner, Author & Businessman
|
|
Jason Clay
Senior Vice President of Food & Markets at WWF
|
|
Barton Seaver
Celebrity Chef, Author & Sustainable Food Advocate; ...
|
|
Dr. Lowell Catlett
Futurist, Economist & Former Dean, Emeritus of the C...
|
|
Tom Colicchio
Chef & Owner of Crafted Hospitality
|
|
Ed Begley Jr.
Environmental Activist & Emmy Award-Nominated Actor
|
|
Amy Wu
Founder of From Farms to Incubators
|
|
Sarah Schlafly
CEO of Mighty Cricket, FoodTech & HealthTech Entrepr...
|
|
Julia Collins
Founder & CEO of Planet FWD; Co-Founder of Zume Pizza
|
|
Marty Lagina
Star of "The Curse of Oak Island"
|