Tennessee's two land-grant institutions comprise the tennessee agricultural research and extension system

They work independently and collaboratively to conduct research and extension programs in all 95 counties and to serve the state's 6.9 million people. Tennessee's land-grant institutions conduct research and provide outreach in five key areas to address critical issues affecting the state: supporting food, fiber, and energy systems; enhancing biodiversity and environmental quality; enriching our economy; developing our workforce; and strengthening our health. Extension will continue to provide programs to address the ongoing needs of citizens and agriculture producers across the state. Health issues are a top concern for residents. Extension will strengthen health programming by offering the health and nutrition programs and provide resources for improving dietary and physical activity for limited-resource tennesseans. Extension livestock and forage programs strengthen the state's livestock producers though research and outreach in HAY schools, late gestation nutrition, marketing, and forages. Tennessee extension has developed programs to strengthen and provide value-added opportunities and programs on farm financial management. The consumer economics program helps families increase savings, decrease debt, and financially plan. 4-h workforce development programs are designed for youth to provide needed skills, training, and experiences to participants. Extension continues to develop programs to encourage and provide youth development opportunities. UT agresearch conducts research within eight academic departments and seven physical centers, and at ten agresearch and education centers (REC) located throughout the state. In addition to 'a decade of excellence: ten-year strategic plan for utia, 2018-2028,' agresearch operates under the guidance of its '2021-2024 agresearch strategic action plan' (asap) with the objectives to balance a portfolio of integrated, inter-disciplinary programs, cultivate teams to approach complex problems, advance concepts with structured support, and to ensure research and development capacity with targeted investment. Agresearch is emphasizing four programmatic themes to establish integrated programs that contribute solutions to complex problems. The UT one health initiative, a UT system-wide approach housed within agresearch, is working to preserve and promote human, animal, plant, and environmental health to advance economic growth, and conserve biodiversity at local, national, and global scales. Scholars from across agresearch are contributing to studies that define the factors threatening human and animal health, and the health of our environment. The emerging digital agriculture program draws on the skills of researchers across UT to create a transdisciplinary path to carbonsmart agriculture and benefits from ongoing investment to build capacity in precision livestock farming (PLF). The program incorporates both plant and animal management projects that ultimately will contribute information to refine strategies that offer carbon reductions over today's agriculture systems. Agresearch is realigning the capabilities at its REC's to support the PLF initiative, including the installation of a robotic milking system. The transformational agricultural genomics and synthetic biology program will advance animal and plant-based productivity and resilience. Although early in its development, the initiative already engages faculty across UT to advance state-of-the-art science to design crops that are resilient to climate change. The bioeconomy advancement initiative is an established interdisciplinary, multidepartmental program focused on sustainable fuels, chemicals, and materials from stranded resources. The initiative is embracing the conceptual framework of the circular bioeconomy, seeking to extend the lifetime of renewable carbon in the marketplace.