Academic focus: Sustainability of livestock and food production systems
Research summary: I study the role of animals in sustainable food systems at the farm, ranch, region, landscape and supply chain scale. My lab combines modeling and field studies to understand how farm/ranch management and public policy affect environmental, social and economic impacts of livestock production systems. We are particularly interested in how system structure mediates the effects of changes that are intended to improve sustainability outcomes (sometimes resulting in unintended consequences and rebound effects).
What do you like to do when you’re not working?
I enjoy listening to jazz music, mountain biking and rollerblading with my dogs. Also, having lived in Denver for the last few years, I love a good brunch!
What brought you to Cornell CALS?
The moonshot initiatives demonstrated Cornell CALS’ investment in continued leadership in solving some of the most pressing challenges for our food and agricultural systems. I saw this role as an opportunity to join a forward-thinking team with a critical mass to expand the positive impacts of my work.
What do you think is important for people to understand about your field?
My field is transdisciplinary; our research questions frequently take us outside of disciplinary and institutional boundaries. I think it’s important to internalize the idea that different groups of people can look at the same data and come to different conclusions, and that these divergent insights are equally important for solving systems-level challenges.
Why did you feel inspired to pursue a career in this field?
An interest in food security. I spent a semester in São Paulo, Brazil, as an exchange student at the Universidade de São Paulo-FZEA. A conference I attended there expanded my view of myself as an animal scientist from being a pre-vet student to being a scientist with a knowledge base and skillset I could apply to solving food systems challenges. Afterward, I had the opportunity to participate in several sustainable food systems convenings and noticed that animal scientists were frequently absent from the table. I knew that animals played an important role in food systems and saw an opportunity to contribute.
What advice do you have for students interested in your field of study?
Be open-minded and stay curious. Take courses that interest you outside of the requirements, attend talks from other disciplines (especially social sciences, though I also attended a lot of agronomy and agroecology seminars), and make friends who are studying something completely different from you. Lastly, learn how to connect with people (network). I learned about the possibilities in my field of study when I connected with mentors and folks from industry, local government and practitioners. If you’re unsure how to get started with this, your academic advisor or a professor whose research/teaching interests you are great people to ask.
Learn more about Jasmine from her CALS profile and LinkedIn.
