FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Thursday, November 3, 2005

Chambliss, Isakson Announce Agriculture Funds
for Byron’s Southeastern Fruit and Tree Nut Facility

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., Chairman of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry, and Senator Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., today announced final Congressional approval of the fiscal year 2006 funding bill for the U.S. Department of Agriculture including over $700,000 in funding for several projects for Byron.

“These funds will support vital research projects to not only important Georgia’s pecan industry, but also that of the U. S.,” said Chambliss. “As Chairman of the Senate Agriculture Committee, I will continue working hard to provide funding for research that benefits both the state of Georgia and our Nation’s agricultural needs.”

“Georgia as well as the entire nation will benefit from these important investments in the agricultural research being done in Byron,” Isakson said. “I am pleased the Senate saw fit to support these worthy projects."

The bill includes a $200,000 increase for research that will focus on how to minimize the large economic losses to pecans by insects and mites. This research will also focus on losses to prunes crops such as peach, plum and nectarine by insects, mites, nematodes and microorganism.

Additionally, the bill maintains previous funding of $100,000 for research that will focus on minimizing the large economic losses caused by pecan scab disease and alternate bearing of pecan.  Georgia pecan farmers produce roughly 50 percent of the nation's pecan crop, making Georgian the nation's largest producer of pecans. 

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