Weed management: the broader context - Ecological Management of Agricultural Weeds - page 507

grams.In 1995 the top 15 programs in entomology and plant pathology in the
USA had an average of 15 and 12 teaching faculty, respectively, whereas the
top 15 weed science programs had an average of only three (Kuhns & Harpster,
1997). Note that these are the top schools; most agricultural universities have
only one or two weed scientists. Due to understaffing, coping with the press-
ing needs of farmers for information on how to use the growing array of herbi-
cides against ever-changing weed communities leaves most weed scientists
with little time for long-term research or basic research on weed ecology.
Consequently, the present imbalance among different pest management dis-
ciplines needs to be redressed if the promise of ecological weed management
is to be fully realized.
Because research on ecological weed management mostly results in proce-
dures rather than products, development of this field depends largely on
public sector support rather than private sector funds. Industry has little
incentive to develop the use of cover crops for weed management, study the
weed suppressive effects of crop rotation, or determine the best ways to
control weeds with livestock. For the foreseeable future, most of that type of
research will have to come from government funded programs, with a minor
additional contribution from private foundations. This is a problem at a time
when government support for agricultural research is at best increasing only
slowly (Westendorf, Zimbelman & Pray, 1995).
As government funding stalls or disappears,small industry grants leverage
larger public sector funds. This occurs because faculty in agricultural colleges
need to obtain outside funding to run their research programs, obtain tenure,
and advance their status within their institution and profession (Strange,
1988, pp. 216-20). Consequently, small (usually less than $10000) chemical
company grants for product-related research can redirect faculty and techni-
cian salaries, land, facilities, equipment, and government research grants
toward investigations of direct benefit to the company. Through this process,
publicly funded weed science tends to be co-opted into herbicide-oriented
research.
A search made in September 1998 of the Current Research Information
System database of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA)
funded projects illustrates this process. Forty-seven projects focused on the
development of herbicide-resistant maize, soybean, and cotton, and cropping
systems based on these resistant genotypes. In contrast, only nine projects
focused on development or use of maize, soybean, and cotton varieties with
improved ability to tolerate or competitively suppress weeds. Although both
technologies are economically useful and could reduce negative environmen-
tal impacts of crop production, current government funded research clearly