• Agronomy assistants help improve the quality and quantity of the food supply.crops in rows image by david hughes from Fotolia.com
  
  Anyone who has ridden through Epcot's Living with the Land attraction at Walt Disney World in Orlando has seen innovative crop-growing techniques, such as aquaculture and desert farming, being tested to improve our food sources through the field of agronomy. Agronomists and their assistants study ways to improve the nutritional value of crops and seed quality and ways to increase crop productivity. Agronomy is a French term, dating from 1814 and referring to a branch of agriculture concerned with field crop production and soil management.
  
  

Job Outlook

• Agronomists and their assistants research ways to improve food production.three fresh hydroponics tomatos image by Flashon Studio from Fotolia.com
  
  To meet our growing population and subsequent food demands, job prospects in agriculture are better than the average for all other occupations, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. By 2018, a 16-percent increase is expected in jobs for agricultural and food scientists, according to the bureau's 2010-11 Occupational Outlook Handbook. The increase by nearly 5,000 jobs will bring the total to almost 36,000 in 2018.
  
  

Salaries

• The average salary for food scientists and technologists and soil and plant scientists is around $60,000, says the bureau's 2010-11 Occupational Outlook Handbook. Soil scientists, employed by the federal government, earn an average salary of about $80,000. College graduates, the ones most likely to serve as agronomy assistants, received job offers of around $33,500 in plant sciences and $34,700 in other agriculture science jobs during July 2009, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
  
  

Qualifications

• A bachelor's degree in agricultural science is a basic requirement to find work in agronomy. Certification also is available to agronomists through the American Society of Agronomy. While not necessary to find work, the certificate does provide proof of qualifications, advises the Occupational Outlook Handbook. Certification is maintained through continuing education.
  
  

Careers

• Job security is stable in this field---even during difficult economic times---due to the continuing need to develop food sources. About half of those jobs can be found in research and development labs and at wholesale distributors, according to this handbook. The other half include 20 percent working mainly for food and pharmaceutical manufacturing companies, 15 percent working for educational institutions and their cooperative extension offices in local communities, 12 percent working as self-employed consultants in agribusiness and seven percent employed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture at Agricultural Research Stations. "A career in agronomy keeps you in the center of efforts to increase the production of food, feed, fuels and fiber for a growing world citizenry," says the American Society of Agronomy website.