There’s no better time than Earth Day for a national leader in food preservation to premiere a wide-reaching study about the country’s endangered foods and to discuss renewing America’s biodiversity.

There’s also no better place than Lawrence for Gary Nabhan, a national leader in food preservation and expert in native agriculture, to discuss, specifically, the at-risk foods in the Great Plains region, Nabhan said.

“Announcing this work and launching the next stage of it in farmland where there’s farms and ranches and vibrant rural country, rather than a city like San Francisco or New York, brings the issue back to where we need it,” said Nabhan, also a director of the Center for Sustainable Environments from Northern Arizona University. “We need farms and to protect farmlands and ranchers more than ever before, and talking about that in America’s Heartland is something that really needs to be done.”

Nabhan will discuss the downfall of industrialization of prairies and homogenization of foods during a lecture titled “Geography of Food Endangerment: Strategies for Renewing America’s Food Traditions,” at 7 p.m. Tuesday at The Commons in Spooner Hall. Nabhan, with Slow Food USA and The Renewing America’s Food Traditions Alliance, which he helped found, conducted a wide reaching study of endangered food species. The list is being released along with his latest book, “Renewing America’s Food Traditions: Saving and Savoring the Continent’s Most Endangered Foods,” in May.

“We’re hoping for more engagement of students and faculty at the university in helping locate where some of these rare foods may be and joining efforts to restore them,” Nabhan said.

One of his cohorts, Kelly Kindscher, associate scientist for Kansas Biological Survey and courtesy associate professor of the KU environmental studies program, said, “Gary’s work over the years has been very inspiring to many of us. He’s truly made the links between the importance of people and food enriching our biodiversity and diet.”

Kindscher and Nabhan co-authored a study about the importance of restoring bison on prairies and farmlands. Doing so would bring back some wild foods.

Kindscher, who is responsible for bringing Nabhan to KU for Earth Day, said he’s excited for the lecture and would expect the community to be as well because locally there has been a “real big push … for people to consume local foods.”

The lecture is presented by The Commons, which is a partnership among the Biodiversity Institute, Hall Center for Humanities and Spencer Museum of Art.