Stover — also sole finalist to become director of Texas A&M AgriLife Research — said agricultural science must shift its focus beyond generating food to generating a “food environment that promotes healthy people.”
“We must enhance health-promoting qualities in agricultural commodities and connect growing urban populations to the rural agricultural activity improving their health and quality of life,” he said.
Dr. Patrick Stover, Texas A&M University System vice chancellor (front) tours ongoing construction of a new headquarters at the Texas A&M AgriLife Research and Extension Center at Dallas. (Texas A&M AgriLife photo by Gabe Saldana)
The vice chancellor, who joined Texas A&M in March, made the remarks during a two-day tour of initiatives at the Texas A&M AgriLife Research and Extension Center in Dallas. The center’s new headquarters is slated to open late this year.
“Agriculture must become integral to urban culture,” Stover said. “People today, as we become more urbanized, don’t know where our food comes from or its role in our health. That has to change.”
Meanwhile, he said, agricultural science must grow its capacity for harnessing “big data” to improve food quantity, quality and economic value based on the varying nutritional needs of individual persons.
“Robust data does not exist yet for us to affect this,” Stover said. “But these resources will enable us to begin setting recommendations for food production and legislation based on reducing chronic disease.”
AgriLife Extension turfgrass specialist Dr. Lindsey Hoffman (left) and lead turfgrass breeding scientist Dr. Ambika Chandra (center right) host Texas A&M Vice Chancellor Patrick Stover on a tour of research greenhouses at Dallas (Texas A&M AgriLife photo by Gabe Saldana)
Stover spent a day touring the field research plots and laboratories of the Dallas center’s turfgrass breeding, plant disease immunity and genome research teams. He and center personnel discussed emerging technologies in fundamental plant sciences and their applications in better agricultural systems. He also met with turfgrass program stakeholders including the Turfgrass Producers of Texas trade association, the U.S. Golf Association and Tanglewood Golf Resort of Pottsboro.
A group including Texas A&M Vice Chancellor Patrick Stover tours a demonstration landscape installation at Tarrant Regional Water District in Fort Worth, designed by Texas A&M AgriLife Research’s Dallas-based Water University program. (Texas A&M AgriLife photo by Sarah Pyatt)
He traveled with the center’s Water University program to Tarrant Regional Water District Headquarters in Fort Worth. There, the group explored a demonstration landscape by Water University and the regional water provider. The installation teaches visitors to use native and adapted plant life for water conservation and quality protection. The groups also reviewed historical collaborations in ecological engineering and watershed planning.