(Continued from Pago Al)
people and organizations from all
segments of the dairy industry
from producers to distributors to
retailers have come together. All
are singing from the same hymnal
and now we are getting on the
same page. And our voices are
getting louder and louder.”
At Penn State, Steele sees new
programs that cover what is going
on today in marketing, production
and distribution. He believes there
is a new face on Penn State’s re
search and extension, especially in
the dairy arena. This is occurring
in Dairy and Animal Science, in
Vetemarinary Science, and m Ru
ral Economics and Sociology.
“The message I want to bring
is that students now see a future
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Penn State’s Ag
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in agriculture. The number one
major in the College is in animal
science. You can spend time read
ing the papers and you would be
surpassed at this. Just two years
ago, our number one major was
environmental resource manage
ment. Animal science and agron
omy and the plant sciences en
rollments were down. But there is
an about face. Not that environ
mental programs are not impor
tant, but we have figured out how
to integrate them into the animal
science curriculum.
“We are doing a good job of
turning out students ready for the
work force. We can do better. We
do a good job in the technical side
of the food sciences but we need
to more on the business side. We
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have responded by putting minors
in the curriculum”
Steele agreed that m recent
years the funding for agriculture
research has been decreasing in
part due to what lias been coming
through from USDA. But he said
m the past year, the budget has
increased, and grants from private
industry now make up a large part
of the competitive grants that
come to Penn State. Of course the
moneys coming from USDA has
increased too. Other sources for
research funding come from the
National Science Foundation and
the National Institute of Health.
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“The future of agri
culture is all about food
and fiber,”' Steele said.
“I’m convinced there
will always be people
on this planet and they
will need to eat. So,
there will always be an
agriculture segment,
but it will be different.
This has always been
so. When we left the
last century, we came
to 1889 wondering
what would be coming
in the future. We had
subsistence agriculture
back then. But with the
invention of refrigera
tion and the develop
ment of a transportation
system change was in
evitable. When you can
move product off the
farm and get it to
someone who wants it
or needs it, agriculture
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Lancaster Farming, Saturday, January 2, 1999-A25
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Robert Steele
takes on a totally different face.
“Now we are entering the com
puter and information technology
age, and we have just scratched the
surface. When you have bright
clever people, wonderful things
will happen.
“Part of the mission of exten
sion has been redefined. When ex
tension was officially formed in
1914 it was called upon to help a
relatively uneducated group of
people to improve their lives in
production agriculture. The county
agent for the most part was more
educated than the farmer. This has
changed a lot. The farmer is now
as educated as the extension agent
and we have the challenge to keep
the county agent informed of the
latest information available. And
the needs have changed. Often the
need is not for animal nutrition or
genetics but in business and labor
management. If you are to have
larger operations then you will
need more outside labor.
“Not only the type of informa
tion to be transferred through ex
tension has changed, the methods
of transfer have also changed.
Along with multi-county agents
who are experts in their fields, we
have the world wide web and
computer science looking to ex
tension to stay on the cutting
edge. The rapidly revolving tech
nology has caused us to restruc
ture extension.
“If I could tell all your readers
something, I would recommend
they step back and look at a
broader view. When you do this,
things look a lot better than when
you are focused on day to day
problems which we all have. Be
ing out ot Pennsylvania for 35
years and now back for a short
while, I see a lot of room for op
timism. The optimism we see
right now in the dairy industry I
hope we can transmit to other
segments of agriculture.
“And I would hope that m five
years if we ask students graduating
this year, they will say we have
prepared them for the “real” world
of agriculture. We are quite proud
of the students and our student in
ternship program that adds to their
reassume. We realize the intern
ships help students get jobs and
we hear from employers that we
need to do more of it.
“I’ll come back to the partner
ship issue,” Steele said “With
Penn State’s agriculture produc
tion programs, partnering with
food science, forestry resources,
and the wildlife segments, we tri
ple the size of our voice in the
world. An then add agribusiness
and community interests and we
have the partnership that Penn
State wants to have with and for
agriculture ”
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