5 Great Careers in Agriculture

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Careers in Agriculture

  • Agricultural Engineer
  • Nursery/Florist
  • Horticulturist
  • Food Scientist
  • Wildlife Biologist

Careers and interests in agriculture are very important to life of planet Earth. No matter how technologically advanced humanity becomes as a species, our human connection to all other life cannot be replaced. It is important to stay connected, and the following five careers do just that, according to the United States Department of Agriculture.

1. Agricultural Engineer

Do you enjoy solving problems? Do your imagination and creativity allow you to think outside the box? If so, then this career could be very rewarding for you. You will need a strong background in higher mathematics and science like physics and chemistry, and you should consider rounding that out with computer science and engineering sciences. You can find employment with government research and educational facilities, consulting firms, farmsteads, alternate fuel producers, and irrigation and drainage system manufacturers. Pursuing a career in this field will allow you to design and improve agricultural facilities for storage and handling and animal confinements, and machinery like tractors and harvesters.

2. Nursery/Florist

Perhaps you have the spirit of an artist and a flair for design. Being a florist is a wonderful way to monopolize your creativity honed by an education in agriculture. Design arrangements for all sorts of occasions, and expose some beauty in the world. If you want to run the business, then include business classes in your course work. Retail florist shops still represent the majority of the industry. If you want to focus on the living and growing aspects of such a career, then you will have the opportunity to advise like-minded people about their yards, gardens, and their connection to the environment around them.

3. Horticulturist

These days this career involves so much more than the culture of garden plants. Why not cultivate living things or help others to do so? Explore courses in biology, chemistry, genetics, landscape design and construction, and other plant sciences. Get a job in educational institutions, government, or industry, as a cropping systems engineer, plant specialist, crop inspector, or research scientist. You can also pursue a career in plant breeding, plant propagation, crop production, and genetic engineering. Horticulturists can improve the nutritional value, quality, and yield of crops, while investigating the production of crops that are naturally more resistant to diseases, environmental stresses, and insects.

4. Food Scientist

Have a say in how we preserve our food on a micro and macro level. This field deals with the consequences of the preservation processes currently being used concerning qualities like color, flavor, nutritional value, safety, and texture. Courses in biochemistry, chemistry, engineering, and microbiology are necessary to work in this field. In addition to quality food specialist, food scientists can be product developers, production supervisors, or troubleshooters for retail suppliers or government agencies. Opportunities abound in research, food inspection, consumer education, and, with a graduate degree, careers in food microbiology, food chemistry, and food engineering are also an option.

5. Wildlife Biologist

Help humanity to conserve and manage natural resources through research, data collection, and analysis. Patience, curiosity, and persistence are some of the qualities that will help you to succeed as a wildlife biologist. Courses that provide an ideal background for this field include biological and physical sciences, statistics, economics, English, geography, and history. Your job is to take the very technical and tedious and relate it to people in layman's terms. You can connect with these people as a local or state environment specialist, or in the private sector, as an ecologist, behaviorist, nutritionist, population expert, geneticist, or physiologist.

Related Resource: 20 Most Affordable Online Master's in Agriculture Degree Programs

These are just a few of the careers in agriculture that await the "green-minded" person. They are all worthy pursuits and purposeful in perpetuating successful life for all living things on the planet.