St. Louis Post-Dispatch
10-15-06
Danforth pushes for agricultural institute
By Eric Hand
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
With research funding for agriculture at a standstill, Missouri officials are trying to
generate momentum for a new $1 billion national institute that would fund
agricultural science that could lead to drought-resistant plants, new sources for
biofuels and healthier foods.
Former Washington University Chancellor William Danforth is calling for a
national institute of food and agriculture and expects that, if such an institute
were created, some of the new funding would go to plant scientists in St. Louis.
Danforth headed a U.S. Department of Agriculture task force and found that the
agricultural research system was old-fashioned, poorly funded and in need of a
healthy dose of competition.
"Important innovations are not going to come from traditional forms of agricultural
research. They're going to come from basic science," said Danforth, who
published an editorial Friday in the journal Science outlining what he sees as
problems in the agricultural research system. "I came to the conclusion that the
Department of Agriculture was not doing a very good job of that."
The proposed institute would be modeled after the National Institutes of Health.
Sen. Jim Talent, R-Mo., and Rep. Gil Gutknecht, R-Minn., both have introduced
bills that would establish the institute, though no action is expected this year.
Federal funding for agriculture research has long lagged behind that of other
agencies. For example, this year's research budget of the NIH - $27.8 billion was 12 times that of the Department of Agriculture.
That is partly because life-changing medical advances are easier to grasp,
Danforth said. The agricultural research that has made U.S. foods safe and
efficient is taken for granted.
"In order to get this good food, we're using too much water. ... We're using lots of
energy to get it. And our farmers are faced with more foreign competition than
ever before," he said.
Imports could soon overtake U.S. agriculture exports, which have shrunk in the
last decade. If fish products are included, the United States has run an
agricultural trade deficit since 1997.
Tom Van Arsdall, director of the National Coalition for Food and Agricultural
Research, says new investment is needed to spur research in biofuels, plant and
animal diseases, and foods that could help in America's obesity problem.
The proposed institute not only would increase available research funding, but
would make scientists compete for that money.
For more than a century, Congress has used formula grants and earmarks to
distribute most agricultural research funding to universities and agricultural
experiment stations. Danforth says these steady streams make sense for placebased agriculture research - like breeding the best blueberry for western
Michigan.
"The needs in Minnesota are different from California, which are different from
Florida," he said. "On the other hand, if you want to study drought tolerance, you
can study it anywhere."
Competitive grants require scientists to submit proposals for the money. Peer
scientists rank these proposals on merit. Only 8 percent of USDA research
funding is competitive, compared with 90 percent of National Science Foundation
research.
If agricultural research money moved to a purely competitive system, states in
the Southeast would suffer, while states in the West and northern Midwest would
gain money, said Wallace Huffman, an Iowa State University agricultural
economist who modeled winners and losers based on research institution
quality and prior dependence on federal formula funding. Missouri and Illinois
would make modest gains in attracting funding.
Danforth said new funding could go to St. Louis plant scientists, such as those at
the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center in Creve Coeur, the research institute
that Danforth was instrumental in founding.
Huffman doesn't support the elimination of place-based research funds, since his
models show that that money has a greater impact than competitive grants on
state agricultural productivity.
Van Arsdall says his coalition - which includes many agricultural experiment
stations dependent on federal formula funding - would only support the new
institute if it were created with new money, rather than by draining existing
research programs.
Bills to overhaul agricultural research have been proposed in the past, and task
forces have recommended changes time and time again. Danforth hopes the
timing will be right next year, when the Farm Bill comes up for renewal.
"It's no more certain than the Cardinals winning their next game," he said. "But I
think there's more of an urgency than ever before."