Agricultural News
No Till University to Be Established for Oklahoma Farmers in 2011
Wed, 17 Nov 2010 15:47:46 CST
No-till on the Plains, Inc. has received the first ever state Conservation Innovation Grant for Oklahoma that will fund the proposed No-till University. The grant amount awarded was almost $74,000. The primary focus of No-till University is to enhance the overall soil health of cropland and deteriorated rangeland through continuous no-till practices, or CNT. The curriculum and technological aspects for the courses will be developed up through spring 2011, when the program will be tested with 20 EQIP-eligible, no-till producers. Training and implementation for the general public will be available by December 2011. The curriculum is based on the systems approach to CNT, providing an educational resource that allows the ever growing community of no-tillers to share knowledge of current and effective practices.
No-till University provides a virtual learning environment based on Moodle (www.moodle.org), a leading technology with more than 30 million registered users in 210 countries, and a collaborative knowledge base. No-till on the Plains grant partner GeoAgro will deploy the technological aspects of the program. The University aims to establish a learning community, where authorized entities, No-till on the Plains, NRCS and other conservation partners can participate, provide, improve and deliver training. The system will provide advanced features to support traditional courses, workshops, or instructor-led online courses. Producers will be eligible for the National Certified Agriculture Program for No-till Producers which is currently being developed by No-till on the Plains in collaboration with GeoAgro and Aapresid.
No-till practices promote clean air and improve water quality for everyone. For producers, the practices help improve the soil quality, eventually improving the quality of their yields. The curriculum uses the best no-till practices world-wide and is based on holistic management of the CNT system. Utilizing a management system of CNT addresses many of the long-term resource concerns that are priorities for the (Oklahoma) NRCS. Courses include water infiltration into the soil, permanence of cover for the soil, diverse rotations, cover crops and green manures, proper nutrient and pest management, and proper management of livestock both above and below ground (including the microbes living in the soil that create a healthy soil).
'No-till on the Plains' reputation for quality programs is world-renown. No-till on the Plains Inc. is a non-profit educational organization providing information to farmers on adopting no-till and other sustainable production methods, and further developing those techniques. The organization is devoted to educating producers about how to develop economically, agronomically, and environmentally-sound crop production systems through the application of no-till farming techniques. Executive Director is Brian Lindley and Jana Lindley serves as Program Coordinator of the organization.
No-till on the Plains collaborates with numerous contacts statewide in Oklahoma including the Oklahoma Conservation Commission, the Noble Foundation, No-till on the Plains Board of Director Alan Mindemann, along with a network of exceptional CNT producers who are actively involved with No-till on the Plains. No-till University will create a unified message about CNT and aggregate information so that the sciences of agronomy, soils, range management and animal husbandry will work together to benefit producers.
Producers using this educational tool benefit with increased productivity, stronger financial stability, and a system that they have committed their operations to for the long-term. The longer a producer or landowner remains in a CNT system, the greater the benefit. The reclamation process continues to enhance soil quality. For most producers, up to 96% of soil erosion has been eliminated. Eliminating soil erosion enhances water quality by reducing sedimentation that deposits in waterways and streams and ultimately ending up in lakes and reservoirs forever changing the aquatic habitat.
Permanent cover on soil all but eliminates particulate matter and air quality issues involved with production agriculture. CNT soils store carbon and reduce overall agricultural CO2 emissions. CNT enhances the soil with biological organic compounds using cover crops and diverse crop rotations, reducing applied fertilizers which can leach into the groundwater.
Properly managed CNT soils have lower surface temperatures which lowers evaporation rates, resulting in more moisture for the crops reducing plant stress and slowing depletion of aquifer systems.
CNT is beyond sustainable because it can restore the original soil structure and aggregation that makes native soils efficient and productive. Nutrient requirements are more easily managed and herbicide and pest management issues decrease rapidly. Each facet of this system lives in synergy with and directly impacts the next facet.
Increasing awareness and adoption of continuous no-till is critical to the continued success of agriculture in the state of Oklahoma. Video footage of the recent tornados of May 10, 2010 showed a disturbing amount of dust in the air from the windstorms reminiscent of the Dustbowl era. The fact that Oklahoma's reservoirs and lakes are filling with sediment at an alarming rate affects recreation, fish and wildlife habitat, water quality, and drinking water supplies for the entire state population.
WebReadyTM Powered by WireReady® NSI
Top Agricultural News
More Headlines...
