Report shows how ag research funding can supercharge U.S. industry

A newly released report shows how U.S. farmers — facing a surge of weather events and disease outbreaks — can increase production and revenues with innovations produced by federally funded agricultural research but warns that more investment in agricultural research is needed to prevent falling further behind China. According to the report issued by the Supporters of Agricultural Research (SoAR) Foundation and 20 FedByScience research institutions, agricultural research and development (R&D) funding has an estimated return on investment of 20 to 1. While other federal research investments have grown, however, the report said U.S. agricultural research funding has stagnated. China, on the hand, invests nearly twice as much as the U.S. in agricultural science.