MendelU partners with LSU College of Agriculture in joint course
October 08, 2021
LSU College of Agriculture and a university in the Czech Republic offered a joint class for the first time during spring 2021.
International Comparative Analysis of Regional Food Systems (AGEC 4700) was jointly developed by LSU and Mendel University (MendelU) faculty.
With travel restrictions related to the pandemic limiting student and faculty international exchange programs, faculty from both universities took advantage of virtual learning to launch the course.
Matt Fannin, professor in the LSU Department of Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness, and Ivo Zdráhal, Radka Redlichová, and Francois Stefanus Lategan, with the Department of Regional and Business Economics at MendelU, developed the course. The course focused on analyzing food systems between the agricultural sector and the rest of the region’s economy and quality of life and treating each equally. The idea for the class emerged from Fannin's participation in several exchanges with European universities over the past decade.
These exchanges included a summer school program in Ireland, where North American and European university students and faculty engaged through the International Comparative Rural Policy Studies Program (ICRPS). Witnessing the cooperation between these universities sparked the idea to develop a course hosted in partnership with MendelU.
LSU College of Agriculture and MendelU have had a robust strategic partnership since 2014. Students and representatives from each university organized and participated in many joint opportunities, including summer schools, student and faculty exchange, and joint symposiums. Ivana Tregenza, associate director of the AgCenter Global Network and LSU College of Agriculture director of International Relations, has worked toward building the partnership with MendelU. She recognized that the value of having the LSU Department of Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness partner with the Department of Regional Development and International Studies at MendelU.
The LSU Department of Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness centers much of its research and teaching on the economics of agricultural production for an individual farmer. While in the Department of Regional and Business Economics, MendelU’s curriculum focuses on the economic value of regional development.
By creating a course that shares concepts central to both departments, students develop a more comprehensive understanding of economic practices and systems thinking.
Fannin visited with faculty in the Department of Regional and Business Economics at MendelU and discovered a shared interest in the common ground between agriculture and larger regional issues facing both the Czech Republic and Louisiana.
"It was an enjoyable experience delivering this course with the Mendel University faculty. They brought the strength of teaching using case studies to complement my instruction in system dynamics modeling. The students benefited from this dual teaching strategy." Fannin said.
The course introduced students to case studies, such as the South Moravian wine industry in the Czech Republic, that exposed them to thinking about systems in practice. Students learned about systems thinking and constructed their own system dynamics models to understand challenges in developing sustainable food systems.
As a part of that activity, students were assigned individual regions of Louisiana and the Czech Republic. They evaluated how change from natural growth, in-migration, and out-migration of a region's population created changing demand for local food production in the absence of agricultural trade.
In addition to case studies, students presented a comparative analysis of the European Union Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) and the United States Farm Bill Policy on agriculture and regional food systems.
They also gained an understanding of the geographic footprint required to meet the caloric requirements of a large growing urban population and the challenges faced in these regions' desire to consume local food products.
Feedback to the course has been positive, and plans call for increased application of system dynamics to additional shared LSU and MendelU courses and expansion of the online course to include additional Central and Eastern European universities.
By Annabelle Stokes Lang