NCR-SARE March 2008 Meeting Highlights

March 4-7, 2008, Ramada Mall of America, Bloomington MN

The NCR-SARE Farmer Rancher Grant (FRG) Review Committee met March 4-5, 2008 to prepare a portfolio of recommended FRGs and the NCR-SARE Administrative Council (AC) met March 5-7, 2008 at the same facility. The two groups met together the afternoon of March 5, 2008.

The NCR-SARE AC:

· Approved 50 Farmer Rancher Grants (FRGs) for funding totaling $399,299 and selected nine alternates in case some of the selected proposals decline funding. (Alternates were selected so that there was at least one in each of four topic areas and to provide a variety of funding requests so that there is flexibility in selecting alternates to replace any declined projects.)

· Approved 15 Graduate Student projects for funding totaling $148,040 and selected one alternate. Maximum grant limit was $10,000 per grant.

· Approved 15 Research and Education (R&E) projects for funding totaling $1,846,808 and selected one alternate. Maximum grant limit was $150,000 per grant.

· Approved an increase in the maximum size of future R&E grants to $175,000. The call for 2009 R&E preproposals will be released in April 2008 and preproposals will be due in June 2008. We anticipate that about $1.8 million will be available for this program in 2009.

· Recommended that two of the proposals received in response to the NCR-SARE call for Diversity Proposals be sent back to the authors for revisions and that the Diversity Committee then decide which proposal to fund. There is a total of $100,000 available for grants in this program.

· Recommended that the Circle of Sustainability group that will be holding listening sessions with tribes in the Dakotas be converted to a regular NCR-SARE Committee and that the Committee be allowed to include and pay travel expenses for non-AC members.

· Approved State Plans of Work for all 12 states in the NCR pending revisions which are to be approved by the NCR-SARE PDP Review Committee. Each state was eligible to submit a proposal for up to $50,000 per state.

· Approved the PDP annual plan of work.

· Approved a draft of the PDP call for preproposals which was to be released shortly after the March 2008 NCR-SARE meeting. 2008 PDP preproposals will not be limited to bioenergy, as was the case in 2007, and individual projects may request up to $75,000 in funding. Preproposals will be due in late May 2008.

· Elected Juan Marinez to fill the Michigan extension position and Hans Kandel to fill the North Dakota research position. Doug Karlen was re-elected to fill the at-large NCR-SARE ARS position. Nominations were not complete for the Missouri farmer rancher position, the at-large representative of the NCR Extension Directors, and for the NCR at-large non-profit position, so a ballot will be mailed to AC members to fill those positions. Jim Koan, Michigan farmer rancher; Bob Wills, past-chair and agribusiness representative; Amy Bacigalupo, at-large non-profit representative; and John Shopland, Missouri research representative will be leaving the NCR-SARE AC.

· Elected Ken Rider, organic farmer from Ohio, to serve as the at-large representative on the NCR-SARE Executive Committee. Tom Larson, organic farmer from Nebraska and co-chair of the Technical Committee was elected vice-chair of the AC and of the Executive Committee. Other members of the NCR-SARE Executive Committee are Brad Brummond, past-chair; Doug Karlen, chair; Tom Coudron, co-chair of the Technical Committee; and Bill Wilcke and Paula Ford, ex-officio members.

Other NCR-SARE AC actions:

· Al Kurki, a W-SARE staff member who has facilitated the NCR-SARE R&E grant program evaluation effort will be invited to attend the fall 2008 NCR-SARE meeting to discuss the NCR-SARE R&E grant program evaluation.

· At the fall 2008 NCR-SARE meeting, the NCR-SARE Compass Committee will lead a discussion of how the NCR should provide guidance to reviewers about GMOs and other controversial technologies.

·  It was suggested that the fall 2008 NCR-SARE meeting be held the week of November 17, 2008 in Omaha NE.

View photos from the March 2008 AC Meeting