Excerpts from the Preface: The Great Plains Systems Research Unit, Fort Collins, Colorado hosted a symposium entitled "Towards a Sustainable Agriculture for the Great Plains" January 19-20, 1989. Our goals for the symposium were to explore opportunities for joint projects and to develop a network for collaboration among federal and state scientists of the Great Plains. During the symposium, participants: • presented problems and challenges from a regional perspective, • presented conceptual frameworks for describing and analyzing agroecosystems, • described methodologies suitable for regional analyses, • identified and described natural resource data bases, • determined research requirements for development of sustainable agricultural systems for rangelands and croplands, and • discussed both institutional and 'grassroots’ mechanisms for establishing a regional network of scientists.