Two UGA deans testified this past month in Athens on behalf of the Georgia Agricultural Experiment Stations and the Cooperative Extension Service before the U.S. House of Representatives agriculture subcommittee on conservation, credit, rural development and research. U.S. Rep. Frank Lucas (R-Okla.), chairman, and Rep. Max Burns (R-Ga.) represented the subcommittee.
Gale Buchanan of the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences and Sharon Nickols of the College of Family and Consumer Sciences said extension and research programs are vital to the health of the U.S. economy and its citizens. Federal funding, they said, is critical to maintain them.
Buchanan recommended four ways to support extension and research programs: increase competitive grant programs to address critical nutrition, food security and environmental needs; restore cuts made to the Expanded Food and Nutrition Education Program and increase funding; increase funding for institutions that serve minorities; and restore the $20.6 million in Cooperative State Research, Education and Extension Services programs cut this past year.