U.S. Senator Ken Salazar

Member of the Agriculture, Energy and Veterans Affairs Committees

 

2300 15th Street, Suite 450 Denver, CO 80202 | 702 Hart Senate Building, Washington, D.C. 20510

 

 

For Immediate Release

June 24, 2005

CONTACT:    Cody Wertz – Press Secretary

                        202-228-3630

Jen Clanahan – Deputy Press Secretary

                        303-455-7600

 

SEN. SALAZAR ANNOUNCES SUCCESSFUL FIRST STEP TOWARDS NEARLY $2M FOR CSU AG RESEARCH, $31M MORE FOR AG PROGRAMS HELPING COLORADO AND U.S. FARMERS

WASHINGTON, D.C. - United States Senator Ken Salazar today announced his successful first step towards the inclusion of $31M in federal funds for federal agriculture programs as part of the agriculture appropriations bill approved by the Senate Appropriations Committee yesterday.

“In Colorado, agriculture is an essential part of our economy. Colorado has more than 31,000 farms and nearly half of our state is farmland. With agriculture contributing $5.5 billion to our state’s economy, it pays to invest in agriculture,” said Senator Salazar.

Senator Salazar delivered more than $1.9 million directly to Colorado State University through agriculture research programs:

  • $817K for Infectious Disease research, the backbone of the first-of-its-kind Animal Population Health Institute at CSU focusing on diseases such as Foot and Mouth, West Nile Virus, BSE, scrapie and Chronic Wasting Disease;
  • $306K for research into Russian Wheat Aphid resistance to help improve the sustainability and development of wheat varieties. Colorado’s wheat crop is estimated at more than a quarter of a billion dollars per year; and
  • $780K for the National Beef Cattle Genetic Evaluation Consortium, an internationally recognized consortium of scientists from Colorado State, Cornell and the University of Georgia that collects, interprets and distributes data to beef cattle breeders across Colorado and the nation so they can producer high quality, affordable beef for U.S. consumers and international markets.
  • Senator Salazar was also active for Colorado farmers through a number of national programs, including:
  • $25M in additional funds for Resource Conservation and Development Councils across the nation, bringing the program funding total to more than $51M. Colorado has 77 Resource Conservation and Development Councils. For example, last year the San Luis Valley RCDC received a rural development grant of $99,700 to assist a group of farmers in the Valley in cooling and transporting fresh produce to consumers;
  • $2M for the National Organic Program, the USDA program that assists with organic labeling. According to USDA’s Economic Research Service, in 2002, 268 organic farms in Colorado produced $12.5 million in crops on more than 19,000 acres of farmland;
  • $2M for the National Agriculture Imagery Program, which helps enhance commodity imagery catalogues, repositories and data warehouses at the USDA Aerial Photography Field Office located in Salt Lake City, UT. The APFO houses more than 10 million aerial photographs of U.S. farmland to develop data on the growing season to allow planning for agriculture commodities, crop insurance and resource management. The APFO collects data in more than 30 Colorado counties on the Eastern Plains and Front Range.

The FY06 Energy and Water Appropriations bill will now be considered by the whole Senate.

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