LSU AgCenter representatives recently visited South China Agricultural University to sign a memorandum of understanding. From left to right, David Picha, director of AgCenter International Programs; Jane Niu, AgCenter agricultural economics instructor; Krishna Paudel, AgCenter agricultural economics professor; Ying Tan, associate professor in the South China Agricultural University College of Economics and Management; and Gail Cramer, head of the AgCenter Department of Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness.

LSU AgCenter representatives recently visited Nanjing Agricultural University to sign a memorandum of understanding. From left to right, Guanghua Lin, professor in the Nanjing Agricultural University College of Economics and Management; Krishna Paudel, AgCenter agricultural economics professor; David Picha, director of AgCenter International Programs; Gail Cramer, head of the AgCenter Department of Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness; Crystal Zhu, dean of the Nanjing Agricultural University College of Economics and Management; and Jane Niu, AgCenter agricultural economics instructor.

News Release Distributed 01/08/15

BATON ROUGE, La. – The LSU AgCenter is developing partnerships with five major agriculture universities in China that will allow students and faculty to participate in exchanges and cooperate on research.

Representatives from the AgCenter visited China from Dec. 1 to 14 to sign memoranda of understanding with South China Agricultural University in Guangzhou and the Hebei Institute of Geographical Sciences in Shijiazhuang. Discussions on future collaboration were held with China Agricultural University and Peking University, both in Beijing, and Nanjing Agricultural University in Nanjing.

The AgCenter delegation included AgCenter International Programs Director David Picha and Gail Cramer, Krishna Paudel and Jane Niu of the Department of Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness.

Picha said AgCenter faculty will benefit from collaboration with the universities, which are leading agriculture research institutions in China. International Programs will also organize a study abroad program in China for LSU College of Agriculture students.

“It’s very beneficial for our students to participate in a study abroad experience to learn more about the agriculture sector, in addition to understanding more about the culture and history of a country like China,” Picha said.

Several students from the Chinese universities plan to come to LSU as visiting scholars or graduate students, Picha said.

Many current LSU graduate students are from China, Picha said, and the AgCenter has collaborated with Chinese institutions before. However, most research agreements in the past have been with individual departments instead of entire agriculture universities.

“China is one of the world’s leading agricultural producing countries and has extensive research programs in all areas of agriculture,” Picha said. “We need to be responsive to that and collaborate with appropriate partner institutions for the benefit of our agriculture research and outreach programs. The amount of agriculture sector development and overall economic progress in China has been phenomenal in the past 20 years.”

Olivia McClure