$3.2 million grant trains students to tackle poverty and food system problems

According to this press release, a five-year, $3.2 million NSF grant will support 25 Ph.D. students for two years each in a new Cornell program that will train them to use interdisciplinary approaches to tackle food and agricultural problems that contribute to extreme poverty around the world.

Funded through federal stimulus money, the program will include field research in Kenya and Ethiopia to study both highland and dryland agricultural systems. Courses that address water shortages, climate change and vulnerability to food systems, soil degradation, pests and diseases, and food supply chains will be offered.

"The idea behind the program is to expose students to different disciplinary approaches to the same problem," said Chris Barrett, professor of Applied Economics and Management and the program's principal investigator. "Some of the biggest challenges facing society revolve around poverty, food and the environment, areas that have been hallmarks of graduate Cornell training for years," said Barrett. "This program will deepen that training and stitch together interdisciplinary approaches."