Kansas State University has been awarded a $50 million federal grant for a global food security project.

The award was announced Tuesday by the U.S. Agency for International Development. Kansas State will use the funds to establish a Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Sustainable Intensification.

The government’s Feed the Future program funds labs at colleges and universities nationwide to research ways to improve food production and nutrition around the world.

Kansas State’s new lab will identify technologies to help small farmers in West Africa and South Asia improve land, water, soil, crop and livestock management while also improving yields and sustaining natural resources.

Kansas State has three other Feed the Future labs, focusing on sorghum and millet research, applied wheat genomics and the reduction of postharvest loss.