Resilient Communities & Lands

Mission and Goals

The mission of the Resilient Communities & Lands (RCL) PAT is to strengthen collaborations across the Cooperative Extension System relevant to communities and lands.

The goals of the RCL PAT are to strengthen the capacity of the Extension system to address resilience through:

1. Increasing collaborations and partnerships
2. Securing additional funding for Extension educational programming across all program areas (Agriculture and Natural Resources, Community Development, Family and Consumer Sciences and 4-H Youth Development) and Land Grant Institutions (1862, 1890 and 1994), and
3. Uplifting the skills of Extension faculty and staff by supporting related professional development offerings throughout the system.

Context

“And I dream of the vast deserts, the forests, and all of the wilderness of our continent, wild places that we should protect as a precious heritage for our children and for our children’s children. We must never forget that it is our duty to protect this environment.”

– Nelson Mandela

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), 2022 was the 6th warmest year since 1880 and North America tied for the 15th warmest year on record. Overall, the 10 warmest years on record have all occurred since 2010. We are already experiencing the consequential impacts of a warming planet, and these impacts extend well beyond an increase in temperature – they affect ecosystems and communities in the United States and around the world.

As the outreach arm of over 32,000 professionals from 112 national Land Grant institutions, including 19 Historically Black Colleges and Universities (1890s), and 35 Tribal Colleges and Universities (1994s), we have the responsibility to contribute to changing our nation’s path forward by leading with programming that directly addresses communities and lands. While Cooperative Extension has developed and implemented many programs to strengthen communities and lands, more work needs to be done to co-create knowledge relevant to local needs; and to deliver responsive, timely programming that helps our communities make informed, science-based decisions.

How is the Cooperative Extension System responding?

The Cooperative Extension System has over 200 unique RCL-related education programs being implemented throughout the country.

ECOP’s Program Action Team (PAT) on RCL developed the following three Priority Areas in 2021:

• Agriculture & Food Systems – Cooperative Extension will support the adaptation, mitigation, and resilience of U.S. agriculture. Helping farmers, ranchers, and landowners develop and adopt new practices will improve the profitability and sustainability of plant and animal systems across the rural-urban spectrum. These practices will develop adequate and safe food systems as supply chains strain under shifting conditions. In addition, Extension programs will help expand a responsive workforce in U.S. communities.
• Resilient Communities – Cooperative Extension will work with communities across the rural-urban spectrum to develop responsive plans to support transitioning to resilient communities. The plans will focus on the development of strategies that communities can deploy to strengthen the adaptation, mitigation, and resilience responses to changes. In addition, these plans would also focus on supporting communities as they develop risk management plans surrounding natural disasters – fires, floods, rising temperatures, and increased incidence of extreme weather events.
• Ecosystem Services – Cooperative Extension will promote nature-based and natural solutions that provide co-benefits for mitigation and adaptation across human and natural communities. Extension will support the protection of healthy ecosystems, natural areas and resources amid changes. Translational research and Extension programs focused on adaptation, mitigation, and resilience can help reduce atmospheric greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture and forest production. In addition, management practices for our forests, waterways, and other natural habitats will reduce negative impacts on ecosystems and human communities. Mitigation practices will include efforts such as carbon markets and alternative energy development to sequester carbon and reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and to help inform and educate the public on these concepts.

With these foci in mind, the PAT will endeavor the following:

• Engage in system-wide action planning
• Identify Extension programs that are ready to be scaled nationally
• Initiate partnerships that can advance programming at a national level
• Develop letters of intent for national program grants
• Provide content for the PAT on communities and lands to further develop the advocacy toolkit for mitigation, resiliency, and adaptation

What difference is Cooperative Extension making?

Effective Cooperative Extension educators meet people where they are, engage audiences and clientele in authentic and mutually beneficial ways, and create safe and productive spaces for facilitating participatory decision-making. Employing these leadership traits and laying this foundation during the earliest phases of work creates trust which is critical for long-term programmatic success.

Cooperative Extension currently provides tools for communities to develop cost-effective,  management plans, tools for farmers to make agronomic decisions, and provides municipalities with information and tools to help them adapt. Further, it has the capacity to engage communities in important dialogue, and the educational resources to affect change across audiences including rural and urban. Examples of this capacity include:

• • Extension Disaster Education Network (EDEN)
  • Weather Ready Farms
  • Sustainable Development Initiatives
  • Water Conservation Programs
  • Septic System Resources

What can be done with additional resources and partnerships?

More resources could enable Cooperative Extension to activate the coordination of CES professionals, provide professional development across the system, and catalyze collaboration and innovation. Practical applications to addressing communities and lands could be disseminated and thus implemented by farmers, ranchers, and foresters.
The long-term goal of such an effort would increase the capacity of Cooperative Extension to help stakeholders to adapt, mitigate, and be resilient to change at the local level. A coordinated, institutional-level strategy and programming informed by grassroots-level concerns is needed to effectively address the issues across this country’s communities.

There are real threats and enormous challenges to communities, and the agricultural and forestry sectors. The people living in and managing the lands need assistance to adapt to and mitigate the effects to communities and lands. Due to Cooperative Extension’s geographical reach, its breadth and depth of programming, its trusted relationship with many stakeholders, and its collaborations with many other national, state, and local organizations, it is uniquely situated to respond to the challenges that will present.