Farm of the Future
K-State launches model farm to study regenerative agriculture practices
By Pat Melgares
Drone Photo Matt Campbell
Along a 100-acre tract of land on the north end of Kansas State University’s Manhattan campus, researchers are trying to uncover clues to one of the great challenges of farming in regions -- like Kansas -- where summertime temperatures are brutal and water sparse.
The team has launched a project that will test ways in which agricultural producers can sustain their farms’ natural resources for future generations, while also generating a profit and providing food for a world population that will top 9 billion by 2050.
At their core, these aren’t new concepts. Farmers and ranchers have always talked about being good stewards of the land; taking care of the soil, water and air is ingrained in rural culture, akin to helping their children, grandchildren and future generations provide for their own families.
But there are many aspects to stewardship. Today, the philosophy is encompassed in the term regenerative agriculture, which seeks to restore and enhance the health of ecosystems, particularly soil, by working with such natural processes as soil biology, carbon sequestration, water retention, pest and disease control, livestock grazing and more.
Used in combination, regenerative practices can create a farm in which there is zero waste; everything put onto the land is either reduced, reused, recycled or repurposed, including animal waste. The concept is known as a circular bioeconomy in which nothing put into the land ever leaves the land.
“Regenerative agriculture offers a sustainable solution to many environmental and social problems facing our world today,” said Chuck Rice, a university distinguished professor in Agronomy. “(At K-State), we believe that regenerative agriculture can transform agriculture into a more sustainable, profitable and resilient system.”
‘Game-changing’ research
In late 2022, K-State’s Office of Research announced a funding opportunity known as the Game-changing Research Initiation Program, or GRIP, to provide startup funds to university faculty who wish to study “global grand challenges facing our people, society and the planet,” according to the call for proposals.
GRIP was launched to encourage the formation of teams of K-State faculty members representing many disciplines.
Rice was a member of one such team originally awarded GRIP funds, and it was all the encouragement he needed to begin assembling what is an all-star cast, of sorts. As of summer, 2025, the team includes researchers with expertise in soil health, cropping systems, crop modeling, sociology, animal sciences, economics, precision agriculture, engineering, food and nutrition, corporate marketing and biology.
Together, they will work to establish a regenerative agriculture model farm on land that is part of the university’s North Farm, about one mile north of Bill Snyder Family football stadium near the intersection of College and Marlatt avenues in Manhattan. Researchers plan to split the land into 20-acre fields to test familiar Kansas cropping systems, with and without such management strategies as cover crops, fallow, livestock grazing and more.
According to Rice, the farm will “serve as a test bed for regenerative agriculture practices and the appropriate measures to determine the environmental footprint of regenerative agriculture.”
“If we're successful in establishing this farm and doing the type of research that we think needs to be done, then....,” Rice said.
Renewing the land
Like much of the university’s agriculture research, K-State’s team will be testing management techniques to figure out if they make sense for Kansas farmers. The work centers around six areas, known as the principles of regenerative agriculture:
- Minimal tillage.
- Keeping residue on the soil.
- Maintaining a living root.
- Crop diversity (cover crops and crop rotations).
- Integrating livestock.
- Considerations of context (such as people, time, soil properties and climate).
“I think the difference with this project is the approach and the perspective from which it is designed,” said Rachel Cott, an assistant professor of crop science in K-State’s Department of Agronomy. “Oftentimes, we as researchers are working on a very small piece of a larger puzzle, and we don’t always know what’s happening on the other side of the board.”
An example: Cott notes that agronomists know how planting cover crops impacts yields and weed suppression, “but how would grazing cattle on those cover crops provide an overall benefit to the farm, or impact the nutrient cycling and microbial communities to support a crop three years from now?”
Or, perhaps of more specific interest to farmers, how do these practices impact their crop yields and the marketability of grain that was grown on land where cattle grazed?
“This model farm will establish a longer-term study with many perspectives contributing,” Cott said. “The term, ‘transdisciplinary,’ is often used as a buzzword, but it is so important for researchers to seek different ideas and understand as many angles as possible when we’re working with farmers.”
K-State agricultural and biological engineer Trisha Moore will lead efforts to build a lifecycle assessment of the farm, or a systematic process to analyze environmental impacts through every phase of production.
“One of the primary impacts we’re interested in is greenhouse gas emissions from this farm because that relates to energy use, and ultimately the bottom line for producers,” Moore said. “Tracking carbon isn’t just about its effect on the climate; it also relates very closely to money on the farm.”
Knowing where the environmental impacts are can help researchers and farmers understand where the trade-offs are. “We can minimize one impact, but it’s important to know how that may (change) others,” Moore said.
Helping farmers make decisions
Gaurav Jha, an assistant professor of precision agriculture in K-State’s Department of Agronomy, said the regenerative agriculture model farm will include sensors in every field that provide real-time data on precipitation, soil moisture, temperature and nutrient levels.
“This is information that enables farmers to make better in-season and data-driven decisions that will help them optimize crop growth and reduce unnecessary fertilizer, pesticide and herbicide applications,” he said.
The university, Jha said, plans to employ precision agriculture tools and other innovative technologies that are being worked on by faculty in agronomy and other departments. These tools include drones, robotics, satellites, sensors, biologicals and crop breeding. Jha said technology makes it possible for researchers to evaluate every point in the field, pixel by pixel through the lens of spectral cameras.
“But honestly, farmers don’t really need precision agriculture all of the time, so some of what we will learn is the best uses of this technology,” Jha said. “Farmers need to think about their return on investment for any crop that is being grown.”
During the K-State Risk and Profit Conference in August 2024, graduate student Delide Joseph presented preliminary results from his thesis work that evaluated whether adopting regenerative agriculture practices were related to farm profitability. In a study that compiled responses from 605 farmers on five conservation practices – tillage, rotations, cover crops, grazing and management – Joseph reported observing high rates of adoption in several parts of Kansas, especially among younger operators.
Joseph’s thesis, completed in May, also reported that Kansas farms that had a higher soil health score also were more profitable.
Jenny Ifft, the Flinchbaugh Agricultural Policy Chair in K-State’s Department of Agricultural Economics who supervised Joseph’s work, said it’s going to take time to figure out which regenerative agriculture concepts translate best to farm profits.
“Farmers are taking hundreds of actions on their farm,” Ifft said. “They have unique land, weather and overall circumstances. So, to try to measure how regenerative somebody’s farm is and how that relates to profitability is difficult.”
“But,” she adds, “the better data we get, and the better statistical methods we put in place, the more we can push this information forward.”
‘Scary good’
The early interest in K-State’s proposed regenerative agriculture model farm has been high, not only on the Manhattan campus and in the state, but among a growing number of national and international businesses whose products are connected to agricultural production.
There are some obvious examples. Rice said food companies like McDonald’s, PepsiCo, Costco, Nestle, King Arthur Flour, Bimbo Bakeries and others are closely watching K-State’s work in regenerative agriculture as they consider what their consumers will demand in the future.
But the project also is drawing interest from such companies as Nike and a Brazilian tanning and leather company that are equally interested in learning more about the lifecycle of the products they sell, such as leather for shoes and other products.
“These are companies that care about their brand, and there is a level of environmental consciousness and being ‘green’ that is important to them,” said Esther Swilley, department head and the L.L. McAninch Chair in Business Administration for K-State’s Department of Marketing.
Younger consumers, Swilley notes, are increasingly reporting in surveys that they want to know how the products they buy are produced.
“Corporate America has a sense that (regenerative agriculture-related production) is something that will be important to consumers, so they want to be all in on it,” said Swilley, whose role on K-State’s team centers around being able to make connections and foster communication between researchers and those businesses.
Rice said involving corporate America on the farm could help to more quickly advance technology that supports regenerative agriculture.
“I’ve been telling people that the potential for this project is scary good,” he said. “Nothing is set in stone (with corporate partners), but we are in conversations with several companies about helping to support our overall effort.”