This week Dr. Alyssa Whitcraft, Executive Director of NASA Acres, attended the World Agri-Tech Innovation Summit in London. The Summit brings together 900 senior decision makers from across the agri-food sector, including agribusinesses, food brands, farming co-operatives, policymakers, investors, and startups. The event investigates what is needed to spark critical action and build a more sustainable food system.

At the conference, Dr. Whitcraft gave a Lightning Talk on her work with NASA Acres, NASA Harvest, and Harvest Sustainable and Regenerative Agriculture (SARA) Initiative and chaired a panel on "Measuring and Monitoring Soil Health to Build Sustainable Farming Practices".

Acres scientists compile satellite data to support Maui wildfire response

In a live radio interview, Dr. Alyssa Whitcraft speaks with David Geiger of The Big Show to talk about what satellites can see and what that means for agriculture. Access the full interview recording and transcript.

NASA has increased its decades-long investment in U.S. agriculture through the launch of its new U.S.-focused agriculture consortium, NASA Acres. This consortium unites top scientists from physical, social, and economic sciences with agriculture stakeholders under the shared mission to bring NASA data, science, and tools “down-to-Earth” for the benefit of U.S. agriculture.

NASA Acres joined other NASA scientists at the 2023 Commodity Classic, the country’s largest farmer-led annual meeting. Researchers with NASA Acres led demos of Earth observation tools and dashboards; gave Hyperwall talks on recent agricultural research; participated in Ask a NASA Scientist sessions; and met with various commodity groups representing national corn, soy, wheat, and sorghum.