Final report for WPDP21-005
Project Information
The compounding threats of climate change and pandemics threaten the sustainability of agriculture around the globe. In the Western region, the added risk of high-intensity and unpredictable wildfires threatens agricultural communities at alarming and increasing scales. This project provided timely training to agricultural professionals on wildfire disaster preparedness, response and recovery. Our project was based on six years of climate risk education, four years of wildfire and disaster risk management and four years of resilience research with impacted producers in California. Though California is the most agriculturally productive state in the United States, it is also the one at greatest risk to the threat of wildfires. California’s farmers are increasingly confronted with wildfires through direct farm losses, smoke and ash health hazards, lost markets and time, evacuations and power outages. Our experience in on-the-ground response and research have shown us the critical need for educational resources for these communities.
To support the economic and social sustainability of rural agricultural communities our project expanded the ‘Farming Through the Wildfire Season’ course which guided agricultural professionals in practical, proven strategies for risk reduction, wildfire preparedness, disaster response and recovery. The course includes multimedia resources and both an online and a hardcopy workbook which supports self-guided on-farm assessments and activities designed for site specific and regional level analysis. Completion of the course resulted in a Wildfire Resilience Plan tailored to producers’ businesses. The workbook was accompanied by additional resources such as related online modules and a Resilience Resource Library . In addition, the project team conducted workshops to train agricultural professionals in high-risk western regions on how to use the curriculum with their clients and communities and on key aspects of wildfire readiness.
Our project enhanced the overall viability for producers facing devastating threats of wildfire by equipping them with the practical tools to increase resilience to fire, in turn supporting the viability of agricultural communities.
The goal of this project is to develop an activity-based, multimedia curriculum which is readily adaptable to diverse regional priorities and is appropriate for teaching farmers and ranchers how to attain wildfire resilience. Wildfire resilience refers to the capacity of agricultural communities to reduce their fire vulnerability and their ability to adapt and transform in response. We conceptualize resilience across multiple scales (farm, region, state) and across multiple phases (disaster risk management, preparedness, response and recovery). Our program elucidates tested strategies that support communities whose livelihoods depend on fire adapted ecosystems.
The overall outcome of this project is to increase the capacity of Cooperative Extension advisors, NRCS field staff, farm advisors, disaster response personnel and other agricultural professionals to apply the knowledge of wildfire resilience with their clientele (farmers, ranchers, farmworkers, agricultural communities and governments). Generally, this will be accomplished through creating highly targeted educational materials and workshops that will:
- Enhance agricultural professionals understanding of the potential impacts of wildfires to agricultural producers and farming communities
- Support agricultural professionals in evaluating their clients’ vulnerability and response capacity to wildfire.
- Increase agricultural professionals' ability to assist their clientele in developing a wildfire resilience plan based on their prior assessment of their wildfire vulnerability.
- Increase agricultural professional’s knowledge around the networks, resources and policies available and needed to address fires. Professionals will review social, nonprofit and government resources available for fire prevention, preparation and recovery.
- Extend the knowledge of disaster management best-practices to agricultural professionals.
- Support agricultural professionals in creating fire response and prevention networks where producers commit to building preparedness in their region.
The first update to the core curriculum will be complete in January 2023. Iterative changes will be made thereafter with a final version complete by Fall 2023. Our program will support agricultural professionals in using the curriculum materials in community-based efforts to effectively support their clientele. We will reach agricultural service providers at trainings this winter (Ecofarm, Small Farm Conference, CARCD) and additional trainings in the late spring and summer of 2023.
Updated Project Objective section (added here per WSARE advice because the portal wasn't working):
The goal of this project was to develop an activity-based, multimedia curriculum which was readily adaptable to diverse regional priorities and was appropriate for teaching farmers and ranchers how to attain wildfire resilience. Wildfire resilience refers to the capacity of agricultural communities to reduce their fire vulnerability and their ability to adapt and transform in response. We conceptualized resilience across multiple scales (farm, region, state) and across multiple phases (disaster risk management, preparedness, response and recovery). Our program implements tested strategies that support communities whose livelihoods depend on fire adapted ecosystems.
The overall outcome of this project was to increase the capacity of Cooperative Extension advisors, NRCS field staff, Regional Conservation Districts, farm advisors, disaster response personnel and other agricultural professionals to apply the knowledge of wildfire resilience with their clientele (farmers, ranchers, farmworkers, agricultural communities and governments). Generally, this was accomplished through creating highly targeted educational materials and workshops that:
- Enhanced agricultural professionals understanding of the potential impacts of wildfires to agricultural producers and farming communities
- Supported agricultural professionals in evaluating their clients’ vulnerability and response capacity to wildfire.
- Increased agricultural professionals' ability to assist their clientele in developing a wildfire resilience plan based on their prior assessment of their wildfire vulnerability.
- Increased agricultural professional’s knowledge around the networks, resources and policies available and needed to address fires. Professionals will review social, nonprofit and government resources available for fire prevention, preparation and recovery.
- Extended the knowledge of disaster management best-practices to agricultural professionals.
- Supported agricultural professionals in creating fire response and prevention networks where producers commit to building preparedness in their region.
An expanded version of the core curriculum was developed as of March 2023. Our program supported agricultural professionals in using the curriculum materials in community-based efforts to effectively support their clientele.
This two year project began with regular team meetings and curriculum development. The curriculum development was led by the Co-PIs and was based on a needs assessment of 65 producers and 224 extension personnel conducted in 2019. The development of activities in the workbook was supported by a UC Davis PhD research project carried out between 2019-2023 that identified the variations of wildfire vulnerability and adaptive capacity that exists amongst farmers and farming communities.
Year One Fall 2021 - Fall 2022 - Curriculum Development
The project team met multiple times to start the project in late 2021. An initial draft of the curriculum was finished on 12/15/2021. The project team reviewed drafts of the Farming through Wildfire Season curriculum with key partners and advisors. After that the curriculum development team integrated feedback and team members were assigned specific tasks for individual curriculum segments. Once developed, a blind review of the workbook was conducted by a select group of 5 professionals and 3 producers. Reviewers represented a range of geographic regions, production sizes and practices to increase applicability of the materials. The project team reviewed that version, incorporated feedback, and as of Dec 21, 2021 the new version of the curriculum has been in use.
Once the content of the workbook was complete the project team identified which learning modules, written copy and activities were needed to accompany the workbook. Case Studies (farmer and rancher) stories and expert contributors for the learning modules were selected to develop core activities, handouts and record videos. The workshop agenda and content was drafted and circulated to the project team. After circulating all final materials (workbook, learning modules and workshop agenda) to the project team, multiple virtual meetings occurred to address final questions and concerns.
All curriculum materials were made freely available online, on the curriculum website. CAFF’s disaster clearinghouse was updated regularly throughout the project period.
Year Two: Fall 2022 - Fall 2023 - Workshops
Four trainings were conducted in regions that are at high-risk to wildfires. In January 2023, project partners presented at EcoFarm to 15 people and 25 questions were answered. On February 26th, 2023, The Farming Through the Wildfire Season was presented at the CA Small Farm Conference to 40 people. 10 questions were answered during that training. In March 2023, the same presentation was provided to technical service providers at the CA Resource Conservation District’s annual meeting. 36 people attended that session. Lastly, on July 20th, 2023, an additional training to four technical service providers was given. That was a very interactive presentation and 18 questions were answered during it. 95 agricultural service providers were trained on how to use the curriculum as well as on key aspects of wildfire readiness and resilience. Those agricultural professionals will then go on to work with their clientele.
Cooperators
- (Educator)
- (Researcher)
- (Educator and Researcher)
Education
During this project we mainly used live, virtual trainings to share the new workbook curriculum. Those trainings were recorded and are free to access, archived on CAFF’s Youtube channel: CAFFFlix: https://www.youtube.com/@CAFFflix/videos. The curriculum expansion was mainly completed by Farmer Campus. They solicited feedback from CAFF, farmers, extension professionals, and university scholars when they updated the content during this project.
Education & Outreach Initiatives
One main objective of this project was to expand an activity-based, multimedia curriculum that was readily adaptable to diverse regional priorities and is appropriate for teaching farmers and ranchers how to attain wildfire resilience.
The project team met multiple times to start the project in late 2021. An initial draft of the curriculum was finished on 12/15/2021. The project team reviewed drafts of the Farming through Wildfire Season curriculum with key partners and advisors. After that the curriculum development team integrated feedback and team members were assigned specific tasks for individual curriculum segments. Once developed, a blind review of the workbook was conducted by a select group of 5 professionals and 3 producers. Reviewers represented a range of geographic regions, production sizes and practices to increase applicability of the materials. The project team reviewed that version, incorporated feedback, and as of Dec 21, 2021 the new version of the curriculum has been in use. The workshop agenda and content was drafted and circulated to the project team. After circulating all final materials (workbook, learning modules and workshop agenda) to the project team, virtual meetings occurred to address final questions and concerns.
All curriculum materials were made freely available online, including on the Farmer Campus website as well as cross linked on CAFF’s Resilience Resource Library which was updated regularly through the project period.
The main outcome of all that work is that an expanded version of the curriculum is now available! Farmer Campus’s webpage that hosted the curriculum has received 9,902 views since the start of this project.
Enhance agricultural professionals’ understanding of the potential impacts of wildfires to agricultural producers and farming communities.
Train agricultural service providers on the wide range of impacts wildfires can have on agricultural areas.
We applied to present at the EcoFarm Conference, California Small Farms Conference (CASFC), and the California Resource Conservation District’s Conference (CARCD). We were accepted to present workshops in English on the Wildfire Workbook at the CASFC, CARCD, and EcoFarm conferences. EcoFarm also accepted us presenting on the same concepts of the Wildfire Workbook during a workshop in their Spanish track (Listos en la Finca, a Spanish version of the Farming Through Wildfire Season workbook). We did not “count” this session as a deliverable for this grant because the trainings were intended for agricultural service providers and we were not able to predict the demographics in advance, but we pursued the opportunity as a way to reach a broader audience. One additional training was held for RCD and UCCE Ag service providers specifically in summer of 2023. 95 agricultural service providers were trained on how to use the curriculum as well as on key aspects of wildfire readiness and resilience. These agricultural professionals were encouraged to share the resource with their clientele.
Increased agricultural professional’s knowledge around the networks, resources and policies available and needed to address fires.
This topic was covered in the training and reflected in the curriculum shared with providers.
At the end of the trainings we asked participants to provide feedback on whether their knowledge had changed. With the help of the UCCE Evaluation Specialist, Vikram Koundinya, we designed and analyzed a one page retrospective evaluation shared at the end of each workshop (example provided for reference) What we found was…
(96% of participants saw an increase in knowledge across any of the six critical wildfires knowledge domains we measured. The six knowledge domains where:
- Key components for wildfire disaster management in agriculture
- Potential IMPACTS of wildfires on agriculture
- Critical gaps that contribute to fire VULNERABILITY of farms
- PREPARATION: networks, people and resources available to prepare for wildfires
- RESPONSE: networks, people and resources available to respond to a wildfire emergency
- RECOVERY: networks, people and resources available to recover from wildfires
The knowledge domains that had the highest increase in knowledge were 4, 3, 5, and 1 respectively. On Average, 41% of participants stated that they had a “large increase in knowledge” in those knowledge areas; 52% stated that they had “some increase” and 6% had no increase. Overall, 94% of respondents had some increase in knowledge in these knowledge areas after attending our workshops.
The areas with the least increase in knowledge were area 2 and 6. While 78% of participants had some knowledge increase, 22% of participants said that they had no increase in knowledge in these areas. We attribute this to the fact that the impacts of wildfires in agriculture are only just starting to become documented (area 1) and are diverse, varying across production type. Admittedly, we did not have as much time to delve into these subject areas but hope to do so as funding allows in future.
Extended the knowledge of disaster management best-practices to agricultural professionals.
We provided four different trainings to technical service providers. More details were mentioned on them in earlier objectives.
At the end of the trainings we asked participants to provide feedback on whether their knowledge had changed. With the help of the UCCE Evaluation Specialist, Vikram Koundinya, we designed and analyzed a one page retrospective evaluation shared at the end of each workshop (example provided for reference) What we found was…
(96% of participants saw an increase in knowledge across any of the six critical wildfires knowledge domains we measured. The six knowledge domains where:
- Key components for wildfire disaster management in agriculture
- Potential IMPACTS of wildfires on agriculture
- Critical gaps that contribute to fire VULNERABILITY of farms
- PREPARATION: networks, people and resources available to prepare for wildfires
- RESPONSE: networks, people and resources available to respond to a wildfire emergency
- RECOVERY: networks, people and resources available to recover from wildfires
The knowledge domains that had the highest increase in knowledge were 4, 3, 5, and 1 respectively. On Average, 41% of participants stated that they had a “large increase in knowledge” in those knowledge areas; 52% stated that they had “some increase” and 6% had no increase. Overall, 94% of respondents had some increase in knowledge in these knowledge areas after attending our workshops.
The areas with the least increase in knowledge were area 2 and 6. While 78% of participants had some knowledge increase, 22% of participants said that they had no increase in knowledge in these areas. We attribute this to the fact that the impacts of wildfires in agriculture are only just starting to become documented (area 1) and are diverse, varying across production type. Admittedly, we did not have as much time to delve into these subject areas but hope to do so as funding allows in future.
The training evaluation form template is attached for reference.
Educational & Outreach Activities
Participation Summary:
Learning Outcomes
Project Outcomes
CAFF formally started our Wildfire Resilience Program in February of 2022. This project was one of the main projects happening under the CAFF Wildfire Resilience program in 2021-2023. During 2022, the project team met monthly to ensure project deliverables are on-track. Farmer Campus spent most of their time updating the newest version of the workbook curriculum. CAFF staff also reviewed the workbook and provided feedback and recommendations. Additionally, CAFF staff updated our Wildfire Resilience Library quarterly, which can be found here: https://caff.org/resilience-resources/. Finally, a significant amount of time was spent by project members in 2022 applying for winter conferences, revising conference plans based on input received from the conferences, and planning the trainings planned for early/mid 2023.
In 2023, four trainings were completed and the online curriculum has been accessed 9,902 times.
We applied to the EcoFarm Conference, California Small Farms Conference (CASFC), and the California Resource Conservation District’s Conference (CARCD). We were accepted to present workshops in English on the Wildfire Workbook at the CASFC, CARCD, and EcoFarm conferences. EcoFarm also accepted us presenting a version (Listos en la Finca) of the Wildfire Workbook during a workshop in their Spanish track. That was not a deliverable for this grant (we didn’t “count” it as one of the four trainings), but we pursued the opportunity as a way to reach a broader audience. With the three English trainings (CARCD, CASFC, Ecofarm), that left us with one additional training that we completed in the summer of 2023. Four trainings were conducted in regions that are at high-risk to wildfires. 95 agricultural service providers were trained on how to use the curriculum as well as on key aspects of wildfire readiness and resilience.
From Zach Main, CalFire Captain and Farmer in the Capay Valley, CA.:
“I was first introduced to the Farmer Campus learning platform during a course regarding family farms transitioning between generations. The course went very well and the Farmer Campus platform helped quite a bit. Once I opened the "door," I found a lot of topics and groups on Farmer Campus that I was interested in. Most of the topics that attracted me related to farming and fire, as those two are what I spend my life doing. I took another self paced course titled "Farming Through Wildfire” where I met CAFF’s Wildfire Specialist, who asked me if I’d be interested in engaging a bit more. I joined CAFF’s Wildfire Resilience Program as an Advisory Council member and had the pleasure of co-creating content on Defensible Space for Farms and Ranches, which I helped present at the 2022 CA Small Farm Conference. I am very grateful for the spark that I saw during the first program I took through Farmer Campus and the opportunity to continue being involved through CAFF’s Wildfire and Grazing Policy Workgroup. I would highly recommend this content and training for any farmer.”
"We met Darcy Cook from the San Diego, RCD district manager for San Diego through our course. Our curriculum resonated so strongly with her that we've embarked on a collaborative effort to establish a "train the trainers" program for agricultural professionals. Darcy is keen on having us train her office, enabling them to better serve their farmer stakeholders. This model promises to extend our reach to more farmers by empowering advisors on the ground. While the initiative is still in need of funding, this project has not only nurtured a crucial partnership but also set the groundwork for planning and future success. Allowing us to extend our reach of wildfire resources across the state, and potentially the western region."
Open ended survey responses from people that attended the trainings:
“OUTSTANDING SESSION! Best of the day! Can't wait to get started going through all the resources. SO well organized and clearly presented. Appreciated beyond words!” - Small Farms Conference Workshop Attendee
“I’m not sure anyone else is doing such nuanced wildfire education work for farmers in California as Natalia and Katie are doing at Farmer Campus- I applaud your efforts!” - NRCS Agent, Guest Speaker and Workshop Participant for Live Webinar Sept 2022
“[I will be] incorporating the framework of 'comprehensive vulnerability assessment' to my daily work, while generally focused on agronomic management; emphasizing soil health as a resilience mechanism and need for redundancy or backups for infrastructure like irrigation systems when seeking resources for making improvements.” - EcoFarm Workshop Participant 2023
“Hard to know where to start--but just so helpful to have a framework [through this Workbook]. I plan to start by presenting it to our team and assigning different sections to different people!”
After completing this project it is clear that there is interest from farmers on learning how they can be more prepared to help their land be more resilient in the face of wildfire. We found that the technical service providers (TSP) that work with farmers do not have access to enough information on the intersection of agriculture, forestry, and wildfire prevention and recovery efforts. Through this project TSPs grew more aware of the Farming through Wildfire course and related educational materials and provided feedback that they have found them helpful thus far. The cross-disciplinary space of forestry, agriculture, and wildfire is evolving and it will be important for funding to continue to support efforts by those working at this important intersection.