WSU Ag Research Center and WSU Extension break record for grant awards
Washington Ag Today August 19, 2009 Fiscal 2009 was a record-breaking year in terms of grant awards to faculty members in the Washington State University College of Agricultural, Human, and Natural Resource Sciences and WSU Extension. The WSU Agricultural Research Center, housed in CAHNRS, had grant awards of 33.4 million dollars in fiscal 2009, which ended June 30th. WSU Extension grant awards were about 29 million dollars. In both cases, it is the largest dollar amount of grant dollars awarded in recent history. Ralph Cavalieri, associate dean of CAHNRS and director of the WSU Agricultural Research Center, says the bulk of the credit goes to the faculty who recognize the increasing need for additional resources, especially in light of declines in state appropriations. Cavalieri also attributes a lot of the increase in grants to the availability of a new USDA Specialty Crop Research Initiative. Cavalieri: “And what this boils down to is the state over a century has invested in having in place the Agricultural Research Center at Washington State University, which means we have people, facilities, and land, laboratories, that are dedicated to doing this kind of research. Having that capacity makes it possible for us to compete for these grants so that we can do the job the people of the state want us to do.” I’m Bob Hoff and that’s Washington Ag Today on the Northwest Ag Information Network.
