As the people who must provide the research needed to keep
U.S. agriculture at its best, administrators and scientists of
land-grant universities are beginning to understand their
implications clearly.

The real problem they see is that too many of the people who
fund their research are thinking “farmer” instead of “food.”
They’re seeing support of agriculture as helping a tiny minority
instead of the food-eating whole of their constituents.

“State and federal support of land-grant universities has
declined in many states,” said Gale Buchanan, dean and director
of the University of Georgia College of Agricultural and
Environmental Sciences. “As a result, we have lost substantial
capacity to carry out our research.”

Buchanan said the CAES has lost more than 400 state-funded
positions since 1990. “Our programs are very successful,” he
said. “But they’re often taken for granted.”

With their budgets declining, presidents and key
administrators from more than 200 agricultural colleges across
the nation have joined with industry representatives to seek
new funding sources. To work collectively, a series of
listening sessions were scheduled in Ohio, Texas, California,
and most recently, Georgia.

“Our funding is on a collision course,” Buchanan
said. “Having
the presidents of our land-grant universities working together
to
do something about this is like having Tiger Woods in your
foursome or Herschel Walker in your backfield. It definitely
gives you a leg up.”

The nation’s food supply should be of concern to everyone in
the United States, said Peter Magrath, president of the National
Association of State Universities and Land Grant Colleges.

NASULGC, along with the National Coalition for Food and
Agricultural Research, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and UGA,
sponsored the final listening session June 3 at UGA.

“We’ve got a real problem in terms of the erosion of support
in the area of food,” Magrath said. “We need funding to maintain
in this country a safe, secure and nutritious food supply. After
all, 100 percent of us need to eat.”

Researchers commonly apply for grants from Federal agencies
and other organizations to supplement their research efforts.

Information gathered from the four national listening
sessions
will be used to design and develop a strategic plan for
increasing federal support of food-related research, extension
and education programs at state universities and land-grant
colleges.

The funding plan will identify appropriate sources of federal
funds that aren’t considered traditional partners of food and
agriculture.

Partnerships will be explored with agencies such as the
National Institutes of Health, the Environmental Protection
Agency and the departments of commerce, energy and state.

“I think we’re going to have to become more creative and seek
new partnerships and begin to depend more on the private
sector,”
said UGA President Michael Adams. “We won’t apologize for
depending on the private sector for funding support. Our fates
are intertwined.”