Desmond Jolly to receive the 2026 Bradford–Rominger Agricultural Sustainability Leadership Award
The Agricultural Sustainability Institute (ASI) at UC Davis has announced that the 2026 Eric Bradford and Charlie Rominger Agricultural Sustainability Leadership Award will be given to Dr. Desmond Jolly, Cooperative Extension Economist Emeritus, University of California, Davis, and Director Emeritus of the UC Statewide Small Farm Program.
This prestigious annual award will be presented to Jolly on Monday, May 11, at a ceremony featuring distinguished speaker Dr. Molly Anderson, William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of Food Studies Emerita at Middlebury College in Vermont.
The Bradford-Rominger Award recognizes and honors individuals who exhibit the leadership, work ethic and integrity epitomized by the late Eric Bradford, a livestock geneticist who gave 50 years of service to UC Davis, and the late Charlie Rominger, a fifth-generation Yolo County farmer and land preservationist.
Desmond Jolly's career with UC Davis in 1971. Having grown up on a farm in Jamaica, his studies focused on food cost and food access, among other issues. He received his M.A. and Ph.D. in Economics from University of Oregon. After briefly teaching at the Federal City College in Washington, D.C., Dr. Jolly joined UC Davis as Statewide Specialist in Consumer and Agricultural Economics, working with the department of Agricultural and Resource Economics. There he focused on consumer economics, sustainable agriculture, specialty crops, and the intersection between agricultural science, technology, economics, and broad societal values.
He was asked to serve on the Consumer Advisory Committee to the California Department of Food and Agriculture, and not long after was recommended by CDFA Director Richard Rominger to sit on the State Board of Food and Agriculture. Jolly was appointed in 1980 by Governor Jerry Brown. His research focus turned to agricultural issues such as farm scale, diversity and sustainability, and emphasized marketing challenges for organic agriculture; one early, pathbreaking study looked at consumer preferences for organic products and willingness to pay price differentials based on perceived differences in safety and wholesomeness. Jolly received appointments to the Technical Advisory Committee for UC ANR’s Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program (SAREP), as well as to the National Advisory Board for the UC Santa Cruz Agroecology Program.
Many of his interests coalesced when in 1995, Jolly was appointed director of the UC Statewide Small Farm Program (SFP), which included both a network of small farm Cooperative Extension Advisors throughout California and the Small Farm Center at UC Davis. Under his leadership, the SFP became a national leader and innovator in advocating and providing resources for socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers, including Latinx farmers, women farmers, and Black farmers. In addition to raising funds for the program through USDA grants and other sources, Jolly created pathways for farm advisors to provide learning opportunities on topics from specialty crops to farmers markets. His cutting-edge program topics included new and specialty crops, food safety outreach, farmers market management and agricultural tourism in the US as a strategy for small farm viability and consumer education. He co-created the UCANR California Agritourism Program that still exists today. Through UCANR-published books, he has also highlighted the work of women farmers and ranchers, and of organic farmers around the state.
Known for his broad view, expertise, and collaborative approach, Jolly was appointed by US Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman to the USDA’s The National Small Farm Commission in 1997, again facilitated by Richard Rominger. As Vice Chair, Jolly was critical in the formulation of its seminal report, “A Time to Act: A Report of the USDA National Commission on Small Farms,” (1998), which contained 148 recommendations for addressing deficiencies in USDA programs and policies. These recommendations were recently reiterated in the USDA Equity Commission report in 2024.
As a young man who had just received his bachelor’s degree, he recalls, “my ambition was to become a change maker, someone who could actively contribute to society and influence positive outcomes.”
Jolly was nominated by Dr. Kristin Reynolds of The New School in New York City; Navina Khanna of HEAL (Health, Environment, Agriculture, Labor) Food Alliance; and Dr. Damian Parr of the Center for Agroecology, University of California Santa Cruz. They wrote, “Every facet of farming in California has been influenced by Dr. Jolly’s life-long commitment to working for sustainability and equity in agricultural systems and the environment.” They pointed out that their nomination letter explained only a glimpse of his “ease with collaboration and the depth of care he has always held for students, farmers, communities, and the environment, and . . . his innovative and bold leadership in agricultural education, extension economics and policy.”
After the Bradford-Rominger award is presented to Dr. Jolly at the May 11th ceremony, distinguished speaker Dr. Molly Anderson, William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of Food Studies Emerita at Middlebury College in Vermont, will speak about polycrisis and the importance of small farms, agroecology and localization in moving forward.
Past winners of the Bradford-Rominger award include: Associate Professor of Cooperative Extension at UC Santa Cruz and Associate Cooperative Extension Organic Agriculture Specialist at UC ANR, Joji Muramoto; Sonoma County Director/Livestock & Range Management Advisor and UC Cooperative Extension Director and Farm Advisor, Stephanie Larson; pioneering farmer at Good Humus in Yolo County, Annie Main; UC Cooperative Extension livestock waste management specialist, Deanne Meyer; UC Agriculture and Natural Resources (UC ANR) advisors Rachael Long, Rachel Surls, and David Lewis; Sustainable Conservation Director of Resources (and UC Davis alumnus) Daniel Mountjoy; UC ANR advisor Rose Hayden Smith, specialist Ken Tate, and advisor Mary Bianchi; UC Davis alumna Kelly Garbach; and UC Davis lecturer emeritus Isao Fujimoto.
Eric Bradford and Charlie Rominger Agricultural Sustainability Leadership Award Ceremony
4:00 - 7:00p.m., Monday, May 11, 2026
UC Davis Student Community Center, Multipurpose Room
This event is free and open to the public. Students are encouraged to attend.
Register to attend the Bradford-Rominger award ceremony at registration.ucdavis.edu/Item/Details/1394