Agricultural producers in the Corn Belt are navigating increasingly complex decisions as they grow food and energy crops while facing a changing climate and greater extremes in temperature and rainfall. Routine decisions such as crop choice, fertilizer use, and irrigation scheduling have wide-ranging impacts on water availability and quality, nutrient loss, agricultural production, and ecosystem sustainability at multiple scales. Sustainable farming and water planning must consider not only local crop yields and socioeconomic drivers, but also competing user needs, environmental concerns, and multi-scale climate feedback.

The Dashboard for Agricultural Water Use and Nutrient Management (DAWN) applies an innovative forecasting and risk analysis system to provide farmers and water managers across the Corn Belt with the most relevant and reliable information for farm-level decision-making.

The DAWN project is supported by a NIFA’s Agriculture and Food Research Initiative - Sustainable Agricultural Systems grant and engages a consortium of scientists, agricultural stakeholders, and institutions. For more information about DAWN go online.