The following
is information about CoAg international programs for students,
faculty, alumni and the public.
For more information about CoAg’s international
efforts,
contact Richard Guthrie,
CoAg associate dean,
Phone: 334-844-3211
guthrrl@auburn.edu.
Bringing the
Experience Home
The CoAg International Scholars
Program, which features monthly seminars delivered by faculty,
staff and students who have experienced international travel,
began in January 2003 and is sponsored by the E. T. and Vam
York Endowment for Excellence in Agriculture. This endowment
is used to encourage CoAg and Alabama Agricultural Experiment
Station personnel and graduate students to broaden their research,
training and outreach activities globally.
The seminar is held the last
Friday of each month usually from 11:45 a.m. to 1:00 p.m.
on Ag Hill and thus far has featured a wide range of presentations
involving research, training and outreach in India, Chile,
Taiwan, Argentina, Brazil and Costa Rica. Presenters describe
both their technical work and experience in these countries
and their cultural and social experiences.
For more information on the
seminars, contact Billy Earl, International Programs business
assistant, at 334-844-9210 or at earlbi@auburn.edu,
or visit the Web site at
http://www.ag.auburn.edu/international/scholarships/grad%20isp1.pdf.
Study Tours Take
Alabamians Around the Globe
There’s nothing like a
trip overseas to help illuminate the “big” picture,
and that’s exactly the goal of the CoAg Office of International
Agriculture (OIA).
OIA has for several years sponsored
study tours abroad to such countries as Hungary, Germany,
Poland, China, Argentina and Brazil. The tours offer participants
a broader agricultural perspective and allow them to exchange
information and establish professional linkages with other
countries. Participants are required to cover their own costs
for the tours.
The most recent OIA trip was
also OIA’s first trip to South Africa. Participating
in the 16-day journey were eight CoAg faculty and staff members
— including AU agronomy and soils professor and expert
tour guide David Bransby, who immigrated
from South Africa to Auburn in 1987 — and five guests.
Charlie Mitchell,
a CoAg professor of agronomy and soils who participated in
the trip, kept a journal of the experience which will soon
be available online at the OIA Web site (http://www.ag.auburn.edu/
international/index.htm).
The OIA will be arranging future
study tours in 2004. For information on those tours, including
a planned May 2004 return to South Africa, contact the OIA
at 334-844-3205.
Foreign Farmers,
Foresters Tour Alabama
As part of the CoAg international
effort, folks from several foreign countries are getting to
know Alabama.
Earlier this summer, for example,
five foresters with the India Ministry of Agriculture and
Forestry conducted a study tour of Alabama’s forest
industry with the help of George Young, coordinator of International
Programs for the Alabama Cooperative Extension System.
Young arranged the visiting
foresters’ tour with financial support of the Food and
Agricultural Organization of the United Nations. He worked
with Extension forester Ken McNabb, Alex Boldog of the U.S.
Forest Service and two county Extension coordinators —
Jimmy Smitherman in Bullock County and Buck Farrior in Escambia
County — to teach the visitors about Alabama’s
forest industry. The delegation interacted with local foresters
throughout the state and also met with representatives of
the Alabama Forestry Commission. In addition, they visited
the AU Solon Dixon Forestry Center in Covington County, where
student foresters receive a portion of their education.
The delegation also learned
about Alabama’s flora and fauna as they toured the Conecuh
National Forest. There they observed management systems to
protect unique plants, such as sun dew and pitcher plants,
and also visited a red cockaded woodpecker colony and discussed
the management practices utilized for the increase in population
of this endangered species.
Young notes that this is just
one of many examples of visiting groups that he and other
faculty host from many countries around the world. The visitors
come from Japan, Nigeria, China, Germany, Poland, Hungary,
Romania, Vietnam, Turkmenistan, Russia, Moldova, Argentina,
and Brazil, to name a few countries of origin.
For more information about these
visits, contact Young at 334-844-3513 or at younggj@auburn.edu,
or visit the Web site at www.ag.auburn.edu/dept/aec/faculty/gyoung.html.
Stallworth’s
Generosity Provides Tickets to Ride
The care and concern of loyal
alumnus Bill Stallworth is making it possible for the College
of Agriculture to provide financial assistance for students
to have an international experience as a part of their academic
program.
The AU International Endowment
was established in 2000 to help defray a portion of the expenses
that a student might incur pursuing an educational experience
abroad.
To receive funding from the
AU International Endowment, students must develop a proposed
program of study that explains, in detail, how the experience
fits within their overall curriculum. The student must also
submit a complete budget for the experience and show how financial
assistance from the endowment will be utilized. Two faculty
recommendations also are required.
To date, four students have
been funded by the program and the results have been remarkable.
Christina van Santen
of Auburn, Ala., a recent CoAg graduate in agronomy and soils
and biosystems engineering, furthered her agronomy and soils
studies at Humboldt University in Germany. In addition, she
gained “real world” work experience at a German
agricultural cooperative.
Caden Buskist
of Auburn, a CoAg horticulture major, spent a full year in
New Zealand at Christchurch Institute of Technology (CIT).
While there he earned a certificate in horticultural science
from the CIT. He has returned to Auburn to finish his degree
here.
Chris Williams
of Cleveland, Ala., a recent CoAg graduate in animal sciences,
studied in China and learned more about the progress being
made by China’s developing regions. While there, he
taught English at a Chinese university. He plans to spend
the next year in China.
Sara Johnson
of Virginia, a CoAg student majoring in biosystems engineering,
has just returned from Morocco, where she also learned about
the problems of impoverished and developing economies.
Webb Holmes
of Marion, Ala., another recent CoAg animal sciences graduate,
went south in August to spend six months as an intern on a
farm near Ponta Grossa, Parana State in Brazil.
The College hopes to fund a
significant number of students in the future so that they
might receive the great value of an international experience.
Anyone interested in helping build this endowment should call
334-844-2345.
International
Program in Aquatic Sciences Spanning the World
The International Center for
Aquaculture and Aquatic Environments (ICAAE), a CoAg unit
historically associated with Department of Fisheries and Allied
Aquacultures, has long been a major source of international
interaction for Auburn University.
The International Center for
Aquaculture was created in 1970 in response to requests from
the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) to provide
technical and socio-economic assistance to developing countries
in aquaculture, inland fisheries and living aquatic resources
management. In 1991, the Center’s name was changed to
International Center for Aquaculture and Aquatic Environments
to more accurately reflect the broad scope of its program.
Since its creation the ICAAE has been awarded more than $30
million in contracts and grants.
The mission of the ICAAE is
to advance knowledge of aquatic and environmental resources
through research and education, participate in activities
to protect and conserve aquatic and environmental resources,
and work to enhance quality of life for people who depend
upon aquatic and environmental resources for their livelihood
and well-being.
The Center seeks to accomplish
its mission by: providing technical assistance in components
of watershed management, including water harvesting, water
quality, aquaculture, soil conservation, conservation farming
practices, and other relevant disciplines; supporting research
on management of watersheds and aquatic resources; conducting
formal and informal training in aquatic resources subjects;
and enhancing faculty and staff capacity and student experience
by supporting participation in international activities.
Current activities include the
Alabama Water Watch Program; water resource management and
education projects in the Philippines, Ecuador, Brazil and
Thailand; a pond dynamics/aquaculture collaborative research
support program; and a distance education program in South
Africa.
For more information about ICAAE,
visit the Web site http://www.ag.auburn.edu/icaae/
or contact its director, Bryan Duncan, at 334-844-9201, or
at duncabl@auburn.edu.
Associate Dean
Visits European Theater
Richard Guthrie,
CoAg associate dean who directs the Office for International
Agriculture, recently traveled overseas to Romania, Germany
and Belgium with the Alabama National Guard and Reserves.
The trip is an annual activity
of the Alabama National Guard and Reserves and is called Civic
Leader European Theater Orientation. Each year a group of
legislators, business people and other civic and government
leaders from throughout Alabama are invited on the trip to
help establish liaisons and partner with emerging countries.
Alabama is a partner with Romania in the Partners for Peace
program, which is a NATO activity that partners emerging countries
that are candidates for NATO membership with Western countries,
particularly the United States.
Guthrie had participated in
the trip three years ago as a representative of Alabama’s
higher-education sector. While on that trip, Guthrie managed
to negotiate two forestry projects between Romania and AU.
He was invited back again this year as a representative for
agricultural and forestry development because the U.S. Ambassador
to Romania requested the presence of someone associated with
these Auburn projects.
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