Resilient Agriculture: Expanded & Updated Second Edition: Cultivating Food Systems for a Changing Climate

Real world stories from the frontlines of climate change, resilience, and the future of food

Practical insights and plenty of examples of how we can reshape our food system to one that is resilient and regenerative.
-- Mathis Wackernagel, Ph.D., founder and president, Global Footprint Network, co-author Ecological Footprint

Inspiring and practical at a time when we desperately need both.
-- Dr. Anne Waple, founder and CEO, Earth's Next Chapter

Brilliantly argues that it isn't some vague notion of "technology" that will show us the way forward but people working together and carefully stewarding the land.
-- Mark Bittman, author, Animal, Vegetable, Junk and How to Cook Everything

CLIMATE CHANGE PRESENTS an unprecedented challenge to food and farming in the U.S. and beyond. Damaging weather variability and extremes capture the headlines, but more subtle changes caused by hotter summer nights, warmer winters, and a longer growing season have far-reaching effects on the land, people, and communities that feed us.

This expanded and updated edition of Resilient Agriculture takes you beyond the headlines and the hype to shine a light on agricultural climate solutions with the power to cultivate new American foodways that are just, sustainable, regenerative, and resilient.

Updated content includes:

• Current and expected changes in regional weather patterns that disrupt food and farming
• New adaptation stories from sustainable, climate-smart, organic, and regenerative farmers and updates on the producers featured in the first edition
• Real-world applications of resilience thinking that connect the dots between food justice, sustainable development, regenerative economy, and planetary health
• A companion website with stories, videos, issue briefs, reading guides, and more.

Whether you are working in food and farming or are simply an interested eater, Resilient Agriculture will take you on a journey into real-world resilience solutions with the power to regenerate the well-being of land, people, and community no matter the challenges ahead.

What would a more resilient food system look like? Lengnick answers that question with this path-breaking, delightfully informative book.
-- Richard Heinberg, senior fellow, Post Carbon Institute, author, Power: Limits and Prospects for Human Survival

A guidepost for building a better and more resilient food system.
-- Dr. Gabrielle Roesch-McNally, director, Women for the Land, American Farmland Trust

Laura Lengnick is an award-winning soil scientist with 30 years of experience working as a researcher, policymaker, educator, activist and farmer to put sustainability values into action in U.S. food and farming. Her research in soil health and sustainable farming systems was nationally recognized with a USDA Secretary's Honor Award in 2002 and she served as a lead author of the 2013 USDA report, Climate Change and Agriculture in the United States: Effects and Adaptation. Over the last decade, Laura has led federal, state and regional projects exploring agricultural climate solutions that cultivate resilient land, people and community. Laura served on the leadership team of NC-ADAPT in 2015, led the Climate-Resilient Agriculture Initiative in the Hudson Valley of New York in 2018, and led the design of Clemson University's Multifunctional Agriculture Destination in 2019. She was the agriculture lead on the Natural and Working Lands Action Plan included in the North Carolina Climate Risk Assessment and Resilience Plan released in 2020. Laura is a Visiting Professor in the College of Agriculture, Forestry and Life Sciences at Clemson University and a member of the Planetary Health Lab at the University of Edinburgh (Scotland). She founded and owns Cultivating Resilience, LLC, a private firm that works with organizations of all kinds to integrate resilience thinking into operations and strategic planning. In 2021, Laura joined the Glynwood Center for Regional Food and Farming as the Director of Agriculture. She resides in Asheville, NC.