The Road to Resiliency

THREE-TIME ALUMNUS SERVES AS USDA FOOD SYSTEMS RESILIENCY SENIOR ADVISER

For Marty Matlock, his experiences growing up on a subsistence farm in rural Osage County, Oklahoma, moved him toward service and food resiliency.

Now, at age 59, he serves as the U.S. Department of Agriculture senior adviser for food systems resiliency in the market and regulatory programs.

Matlock’s hope is to bring his wisdom and experience to help improve the decision-making process to nudge the food supply chain to more resilient footing, he said.

“The U.S. food system is incredibly efficient, it’s incredibly sustainable, and it’s incredibly profitable,” Matlock said, “but very fragile.”

Matlock said resiliency is the ability of a system to keep functioning under stress combined with how quickly it can recover once disrupted. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the U.S. saw just how fragile the food system is, he said.

“What is a success for me will be 10 years from now we have a diversity of meat processing as well as fruit and vegetable production across the landscape,” Matlock said.

“U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack has carved out about $4 billion of the Build Back Better fund to make food systems more resilient in the U.S.,” Matlock said.

The impacts of the money being spent now are expected to show results in two years, he said. Matlock has spent his professional life relying on short-term thinking, he said. Now, his goal is to try and look up more, see the bigger picture, and pick his next path more explicitly, he added. Matlock’s road to becoming a USDA senior adviser has been one achieved through hard work, service, ambition and the occasional failure, he said. That road for Matlock began as a child growing up in Prue, Oklahoma. “My upbringing was comparable to many other rural, working-class Oklahoma families,” Matlock said.

His mother was a homemaker, and his father was a machinist. Some of Matlock’s fondest memories include competing in rodeos, growing up on the land, and graduating with a class of 27 students, he said.

Matlock’s Cherokee heritage came from his father and both parents taught him a sense of community responsibility and a strong work ethic, he said. “You get up in the morning and work because that’s what you do,” Matlock said “The dignity of sweat cannot be overstated.” Matlock said growing up he remembers the famine that struck Ethiopia in the 1980s. The famine gained global news coverage and caught the attention of celebrities like Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie, he said.

The famine also caught his own attention, Matlock said, and sparked a passion to one day feed the world. His passion for alleviating food insecurity directed his collegiate career.

In 1984, Matlock obtained his bachelor’s degree in agronomy from Oklahoma State University. During Matlock’s senior year of his undergraduate program, faculty member and mentor Jerry Grant introduced him to Norman Borlaug, a Nobel Peace Prize recipient. “Norm changed my life,” Matlock said. “He taught me hunger is no longer an agronomic problem. It is an economic and political problem.”

In 1989, Matlock received his master’s degree in plant physiology from OSU, where his primary adviser was Jim Ownby, the former head of the botany department.

“Dr. Ownby was perhaps the most influential person in my young academic career after Norm and Jerry,” Matlock said “He taught me to think like a scientist and opened my mind to the process of discovery science is.” After finishing his master’s degree, Matlock worked for five years at a

In his new role for the USDA, Marty Matlock relocated to Washington, D.C., in December after working remotely in Fayetteville, Arkansas, since August. Photo by Lauren Brockman.

consulting firm. He then returned to OSU and started a doctorate in ecology. After he finished his coursework, he felt a crucial skillset was missing to achieve his long-term goal — positively making a difference in the fight to end hunger, he said.

That goal led him to change his doctoral degree path to the biosystems and agricultural engineering department. “I worked with an incredible group of scholars at OSU, and they gave me the skills to make things better,” Matlock said.

After completing his doctorate, he took his first job as an associate professor at Texas A&M University where he worked alongside Borlaug.

While working at Texas A&M, Matlock researched redfish living in Laguna Madre but experienced difficulties keeping them alive, he said. He began working with oxygenation and water systems to solve the problem.

He ended up recruiting help from Scott Osborn, a former colleague, Matlock said. From there, the two co-founded BlueInGreen, a water quality solutions company.

In July 2006, Matlock became an associate professor at the University of Arkansas. About nine years ago, a former provost approached Matlock to consolidate all sustainability programs on campus and begin the University of Arkansas Resiliency Center, he said.

“It is a great way to work in an interdisciplinary space to solve complex problems,” Matlock said.

During his time as executive director of the center, Matlock was an empowering leader who genuinely cared about his students and the work being done, said Osnar Grios, University of Arkansas Resiliency Center graduate research assistant.

While at the University of Arkansas, Matlock served on diversity committees and created diversity-inclusive opportunities for students.

Matlock was appointed as the chair of the Racial Justice Committee for the National Council for Science and the Environment.

“We evaluated what the NCSE was doing to become anti-racist and identify areas we could do better in,” Matlock said.

Additionally, he created a summer undergraduate research experience program for Native American students at the University of Arkansas. The program is funded by the National Science Foundation and awards tuition and stipends to Native American scholars attending the program.

ULTIMATELY, YOUR PURPOSE IS TO TEND YOUR GARDEN, YOUR COMMUNITY’S GARDEN AND YOUR FAMILY’S GARDEN.

MARTY MATLOCK

Marty Matlock, USDA senior adviser for food systems resiliency in the market and regulatory programs, installs a water treatment system for shrimp aquaculture in Malaysia. Photo courtesy of Marty Matlock.

Matlock said to honor his heritage, he valued using his education to give back to the Cherokee Nation. For 15 years, he served as the chair of the Cherokee Nation Environmental Protection Commission. “Marty always ensured emerging topics that impacted the region were addressed in a thoughtful, science-based manner,” said Chad Harsha, Cherokee Nation Secretary of Natural Resources. Harsha said Matlock has addressed environmental issues and emerging topics within the region well, allowing the Cherokee Nation to advance the conversation on numerous environmental matters. However, to focus on his new position as a USDA senior adviser, Matlock said, he has stepped down from all leadership and diversity initiatives as well as his teaching position at the University of Arkansas to avoid potential conflicts and focus on his work.

He worked remotely in Fayetteville, Arkansas, until December 2021, Matlock said, then he and his wife of 35 years, Stephenie Foster, moved to Washington, D.C.

The couple has three adult children: Sierra, aerospace engineer in Madison, Wisconsin; Arvcken Noquisi, Ohio State University moving images and sonic arts junior; and Foster Matlock, University of Arkansas biological and agricultural engineering junior.

Matlock’s parents instilled in him a sense of community responsibility and the importance of hard work, he said, while mentors and friends like Borlaug helped him better develop his perspective on the purpose of life. “Ultimately, your purpose in life is to tend your garden, your community’s garden and your family’s garden,” Matlock said.

“The only regret I have is not spending more time with the people I love,” he said. “That’s the one thing you can’t get back.”

Never lose focus on relationships with loved ones — always keep those a top priority, Matlock added.

“There is not a single job accomplishment, accolade, credential, or paycheck that is more important than relationships with your family and your friends,” Matlock said.

LAUREN BROCKMAN