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Spring 2004 |
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Cover Story
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Iowa State has received a $299,000, three-year grant from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) to partner with the University of Agricultural Sciences in Bangalore, India, in the areas of agricultural sustainability, economic policies, and higher education. Iowa State is one of six U.S. universities to participate in the project, with each university partnering with an Indian institution. Cornell University, Ohio State University, Michigan State University, Purdue University, and the University of California at Davis also received grants. The project revives a relationship in the area of higher education that was begun in the 1950s, says the project’s Iowa State coordinator, Ramesh Kanwar, professor and chair of agricultural and biosystems engineering. At that time, USAID helped India establish several agricultural universities, using as a model the U.S. land-grant mission of teaching, research, and extension. The Indian universities were instrumental in helping their country achieve self-sufficiency in grain production and even in becoming a grain exporter.  “At that time, there was a tremendous synergy between our countries’ academic communities,” said Kanwar, who received his B.S. in agricultural engineering from Punjab Agricultural University, one of India’s original “land-grant” schools, established by Ohio State University. “But since about the early 1970s, relationships between the U.S. and Indian agricultural universities were more or less broken, and India’s educational institutions have been rather isolated.”Because Iowa State was not one of the 1950s partners, and because the grant was highly competitive, Kanwar said he was surprised but pleased that Iowa State has received the grant. Iowa State has been increasingly visible in India in the past five years in a higher education project with the World Bank, in which approximately 25 Iowa State faculty members visited the country, he said. The cross-disciplinary project will also include faculty from economics, agronomy, education, and agriculture. Project participants will study marketing and trade policies, sustainable food systems, and sustainable soil and water practices. They will also make recommendations on how their partner institution can strengthen its curriculum, research, and outreach. “To enter a global marketplace, India must expand its scientific base and make reforms in its agricultural policies,” said Kanwar. “We plan to learn from each other in several areas of science and engineering.” |
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