Update from NAWG Research and Technology Committee
Farm and Ranch October 29, 2010 The President of the Oregon Wheat Growers League, Darren Padget, is also chairman of the National Association of Wheat Growers Research and Technology Committee. Padget talked to NAWG’s Melissa Kessler at the organization’s recent fall meeting about what the committee worked on. Padget: “Well right now kind of our priorities are biotech wheat and its release, how it goes and getting an understanding of that. How it is all working. We had a guest speaker there that explained that this is not going to be an easy process as wheat has 16,000 genes and I believe the human being has three. Rice has 1/40 of the genes that wheat does. So it is going to be a long process bringing that out and we are trying to wrap ourselves around that. That is the number one issue that I see.” Earlier this year NAWG hired a director of government affairs for research and technology. Padget: “Jane DeMarchi. Wow! Talk about a find. She has hit the ground running. And really that is the constant you have as we turn over the chairs such as myself and people on the committee. Jane has a lot of experience. She seemed to wrap her mind around it quickly and she is a great asset. Good communication. She is coming up with new ideas and we have a person dedicated to that now. So, that is pretty huge.” DeMarchi will provide coordination of efforts to commercialize biotech wheat. I’m Bob Hoff and that’s the Northwest Farm and Ranch Report on Northwest Aginfo Net. ? ? ? ?
