Award Abstract # 2053534
Collaborative Research: Examining the Vulnerability and Recovery of Small Farms to Natural Hazards and the Impact to Rural Community Resilience

NSF Org: CMMI
Division of Civil, Mechanical, and Manufacturing Innovation
Recipient: BOARD OF REGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA
Initial Amendment Date: November 2, 2021
Latest Amendment Date: June 7, 2024
Award Number: 2053534
Award Instrument: Standard Grant
Program Manager: Joy Pauschke
jpauschk@nsf.gov
 (703)292-7024
CMMI
 Division of Civil, Mechanical, and Manufacturing Innovation
ENG
 Directorate for Engineering
Start Date: November 1, 2021
End Date: October 31, 2025 (Estimated)
Total Intended Award Amount: $165,572.00
Total Awarded Amount to Date: $173,572.00
Funds Obligated to Date: FY 2022 = $165,572.00
FY 2024 = $8,000.00
History of Investigator:
  • Christine Wittich (Principal Investigator)
    cwittich@unl.edu
Recipient Sponsored Research Office: University of Nebraska-Lincoln
2200 VINE ST # 830861
LINCOLN
NE  US  68503-2427
(402)472-3171
Sponsor Congressional District: 01
Primary Place of Performance: University of Nebraska-Lincoln
2200 Vine St, 362L WHIT
Lincoln
NE  US  68583-0855
Primary Place of Performance
Congressional District:
01
Unique Entity Identifier (UEI): HTQ6K6NJFHA6
Parent UEI:
NSF Program(s): DRRG-Disaster Resilience Res G
Primary Program Source: 01002223DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT
01002425DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT
Program Reference Code(s): 041E, 042E, 116E, 9102, 9150, 9178, 9231, 9251
Program Element Code(s): 198Y00
Award Agency Code: 4900
Fund Agency Code: 4900
Assistance Listing Number(s): 47.041

ABSTRACT

This Disaster Resilience Research Grant (DRRG) project contributes to the advancement of national health, prosperity and welfare by creating new knowledge on disaster recovery for the agricultural industry. Despite the criticality of agriculture to U.S. and global food production, the lack of economic diversity and prevalence of agriculture in many rural areas, particularly in the central US, is theorized to be a major contributor to low disaster resilience. Resilience is a complex function of socio-economic dimensions and the built environment; and the population, economics, and physical infrastructure that comprise agricultural regions are distinct from the urban and suburban areas that are the common focus of most disaster and community resilience studies. This research generates a fundamental understanding of the resilience of farms and agriculture-prevalent rural communities in the face of severe windstorms, which will be of broad benefit to society and to national resilience. The research team will identify, evaluate, and recommend actions to enhance resilience of farms. To maximize the impact of these findings, the team will partner with the Extension Disaster Education Network for outreach and technology transfer. Implementation of these mitigation measures can transform the disaster resilience of rural and agricultural regions, safeguarding the lives of citizens, regional and national economies, and global food production.

The long-term goal of this research is to enhance the resilience of rural communities to natural hazards, which requires state-of-the-art research on the infrastructure that support farm operations, the recovery processes of individual farms, and the interaction of individual farms within the regional agricultural economy. As a first step towards enhancing rural resilience, the interdisciplinary team will conduct a three-year research project carefully tracking resilience from hazards to structures to farms to communities. The project is characterized by two primary goals. The first goal is to generate a fundamental understanding of the vulnerability and recovery of farms following windstorms through longitudinal reconnaissance of impacted agricultural communities, surveys of impacted farmers, correlation of hazard intensity with infrastructure response, and the examination of the linkages between recovery of individual infrastructure with farm-level recovery. The second goal is to develop and validate a risk-informed resilience assessment framework comprised of a farm-level resilience factors and community-level economic analyses to support decisions on business continuity and infrastructure investment for farms and the broader agriculture-prevalent rural communities.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

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