MSU President Geoff Gamble foresees big ag boom – in fiscal year 2003 the university’s research grants totaled $82.3 million.

Despite declining state financial support, the president of Montana State University foresees agricultural research playing an integral part in revitalizing the state economy.

By JIM GRANSBERY
Of The Gazette Staff

Geoffrey Gamble, who’s led the Bozeman-based land grant university for three years, said Tuesday that he does not envision the closure of any of the seven agricultural research centers across the state, including the one at Huntley. Gamble replaced Mike Malone, who died in December 1999.

Research grants and private sector funding are providing expanded studies and facilities for the development of new knowledge that will produce new crops and techniques, he said.

He said the College of Agriculture and the Agricultural Experiment Station with its satellite centers are positioned well for the future. He said that in fiscal year 2003 the university’s research grants totaled $82.3 million.

Grant volume alone is not a measure of success, he said, but it is a benchmark for comparison.

"There has been a 400 percent growth in grants in the past eight years," he said. "In 2004, those grants will total $100 million with 25 percent going to agricultural research."

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He pointed to a state program that provided $6 million to the university, with $1 million going directly to agriculture.

Gamble said a veterinary molecular biology facility, built by a private developer next to the university, is a significant achievement in that the entire project was completed in 13 months compared to an estimated six- to eight-year wait through a state building program.

Plans for an animal science center to complement the plant science center will give Montana’s livestock producers expanded research products.

"This will focus on livestock applied genetics," Gamble said. Baylor University is producing the bovine genetic map using Angus cattle from Montana.

"We may discover a locus of genes that control heat tolerance in cattle, or a cold tolerance," he said. "This is an exciting future."

Gamble said agriculture research in Montana will always have to focus on production commodities such as wheat and barley, but they can be brought into the 21st century.

The Agricultural Experiment Station and research centers are funded separately from the university. The state has stepped away from its financial support because it has been unable to keep pace with the cost.

The state’s budget is thin, and the research centers are highly stressed because the traditional sources of funding have all declined, he said. They don’t have the flexibility.

Yet, Gamble is sure all the centers, which are spread across the state so research can compliment the soils and climate, will remain open.

"In the next 10 years they will probably not be doing the same things as they are now, but, yes, we’ll keep them open," he said.

He said a matching fund program passed by the Legislature in 2001 will allow for the stations to catch up with some of the deferred maintenance needed at the centers. The $1 million appropriated must be matched dollar for dollar. Yellowstone County commissioners recently pledged $25,000 over four years for the program. The Huntley center was closed during a cost squeeze in 1995, but was reopened in 1998.

Gamble said he uses Yellowstone County’s donation as an example for other counties that host the centers.

He pointed to research on high-protein soybeans at Huntley as the kind of new knowledge that is derived from research and provides another crop alternative for regional farmers.

Gamble said students in the College of Agriculture will be beneficiaries of MSU’s scholarship endowment program.

The program set out to raise $10 million two years ago. It has raised, or had pledged, up to $16 million, Gamble said. He expects it to hit $20 million, which would provide scholarships for students wishing to attend Montana State.

He said a new recruiter for the College of Agriculture has already increased enrollment.

The university is searching for a new dean of the agriculture college and director of the Experiment Station.

Gamble said he has encouraged the interim dean and director, Jeff Jacobsen, to apply for the permanent position.

Jacobsen is soil scientist who has headed the Department of Land Resources and Environmental Sciences and served as an Extension Service soil scientist. He came to MSU in 1986.

A selection will be made in the new year, Gamble said.

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