VIRGINIA
TECH & NORTH CAROLINA
STATE UNIVERSITY PARTNER
TO RUN FOREST NUTRITION
RESEARCH COOPERATIVE
BLACKSBURG,
Nov. 10, 2003 -- Virginia
Tech's department
of forestry in the
College of Natural
Resources and the
department of forestry
at North Carolina
State University have
recently formed a
partnership to jointly
run the Forest Nutrition
Research Cooperative.
Thomas Fox, associate
professor of forestry
in Virginia Tech's
forestry department,
and H. Lee Allen,
professor of forestry
from NCSU, serve as
co-directors of the
program.
The
Forest Nutrition Research
Cooperative is a forestry
industry and university
cooperative similar
to other co-ops currently
at Virginia Tech.
The Forestry Nutrition
Research Cooperative
was founded in 1969
to conduct applied
research on forest
fertilization in pine
plantations in the
South.
In recent years, the
program expanded its
activities into broader
areas of silviculture
(care of forest trees),
remote sensing, growth
and yield, and basic
research on nutrient
cycling in plantation
forest ecosystems.
The program has also
expanded internationally,
and currently conducts
research on nutrition
of pines and eucalyptus
species in Argentina,
Chile and Columbia.
There
are currently 25 members
of the program including
U.S.-based industrial
forest products companies,
large pension funds,
South American industrial
forest product companies,
large forest consulting
companies, and a number
of forestry suppliers.
These companies own
and manage over 20
million acres of pine
plantations in the
southern United States,
and 3 million acres
of pine and eucalyptus
plantations in South
America.
"This
new partnership will
strengthen the existing
connections between
Virginia Tech and
the forest industry,"
Fox stresses. In the
past, there have been
close links between
the Forest Nutrition
Research Cooperative
at NCSU and the Growth
Yield Cooperative
at Virginia Tech.
The
annual budget for
the program will include
projects involving
graduate students
and postdoctoral students
in Blacksburg. It
will also provide
opportunities for
exchange of graduate
students between the
two institutions.
"This formal partnership
will generate many
opportunities for
us at Virginia Tech
because the strengths
of the forestry program
here compliment those
at NCSU," Fox explains.
