This is a new program that has the potential to combine both OAES and OCES funding to be directed to high priority issues in DASNR. This program promotes the team concept to include emphasis on existing and the establishment of new OAES, OCES, and combined OAES/OCES integrated teams. These teams will integrate research and/or extension efforts across disciplines and agencies in priority areas. Specific purposes of this program are to:
Proposals may be submitted in any of the areas listed below. These areas are DASNR 2nd Century high priority areas. A list of initiative teams that were identified in the 2004 planning process is attached. Some of the initiative teams may submit proposals under more than one of the DASNR 2nd Century high priority areas.
21st Century Plant Enterprises: Agricultural technology is changing rapidly with new genetics and crop protection strategies. It is essential that DASNR continue to develop the best management and marketing strategies that include reduced input costs and greater profit margins for production of crops with higher yields and superior quality to keep Oklahoma farmers competitive and sustainable. Oklahoma's climate is diverse and subject to the extremes of hot dry summers and cold wet winters, thus the selection of cropping enterprises is limited. Government farm support programs are changing and there is the potential of reduced profit margins for farmers. Thus, there is a need to meet new market opportunities and demands and to continue to seek and evaluate alternative cropping systems to determine if they are adaptable and/or compatible to Oklahoma climatic conditions and to determine if they are profitable and sustainable. Escalating fuel, fertilizer and other input costs with static commodity prices has placed Oklahoma farm and ranch operations at high risk. Alternative tillage methods, water management, and cropping systems to include crops for oilseed production, bio-fuel and ethanol production, plastics, pharmaceuticals, and nutraceuticals should be considered.
Natural Resources Quality and Management: Enhancing and replenishing natural resource quality with the goal of minimizing environmental impact is a central issue for sustaining production systems, promoting economic development, and improving the quality of life in Oklahoma. Maintaining and improving the quality of renewable natural resources such as soils, water, air, forests, and wildlife is essential to grow Oklahoma's economy. Development of prudent and economically feasible practices is essential for sustaining agricultural production, maintaining landscapes and biodiversity, creating recreational sites and leisure opportunities, as well as the management of wastes, riparian zones, ecosystems, erosion and sediments, pollutant discharges, and storm water control for the protection of surface, groundwater, and air quality.
21st Century Animal Enterprises: Oklahoma's agricultural economy is dependent on numerous animal enterprises, which generate more than 70% of Oklahoma's gross agricultural receipts. Great economic progress has been made in the past with beef industry programs developed by DASNR scientists such as Oklahoma Gold, Oklahoma Green Gold, Oklahoma Quality Beef Network, and the new current Master Cattlemen Program. These concepts need to be expanded to additional areas of beef production and to other food animal industries, such as swine, poultry and dairy. This initiative involves the improvement of food animal programs and development of new technologies to enhance efficiency and to identify value-enhancing processes, including new areas in genetics, trait marker identification, and molecular genetics. Research and development must be accelerated to increase the value of food animals to improve meat yield, taste, texture, safety, consistency, processing, and other characteristics. Given the highly competitive global market, research and extension programs that lead to a marginal gain in the price realized for Oklahoma-produced animal products will have a large aggregate impact on Oklahoma producers. The potential for developing spin-off companies for assessing marbled beef carcasses, nontraditional uses of livestock that carry disease resistance and enhanced production and quality characteristics, new alternatives to antibiotics and to aid food safety, and even molecular farming using livestock to produce medicines, nutraceuticals and tissues for xenotransplantation processes is high; potentially adding value to livestock production in Oklahoma.
Resilient and Healthy Families: Needs of an aging population, lack of retirement planning, high divorce rates, teen pregnancies, child abuse and high risk behaviors in children and youth have been identified by county extension advisory committees as critical issues important for Extension to address. During OCES Listening Sessions held throughout the state, 60% of the counties identified family issues as critical, while 38% of counties specifically identified senior citizen issues as critical. Nursing home care costs continue to rise, with the average per day cost of nursing home care at $112 per day in Oklahoma. This industry is big business and no doubt an economic development engine in a number of rural counties. Both nursing home workers and family care providers lack training and coping skills. With the retirement of the baby boom generation this population will swell. Oklahoma has the second highest number of children being raised by grandparents. More than 10% of Oklahomans over 65 live in poverty, which exacerbates this situation. Extension can be a significant player working with agencies and organizations to develop capacity to address these issues more effectively. While much of the above are extension activities, there are great opportunities to conduct research and extension programs regarding nutrition, health, and food safety.
21st Century Biological Technologies: The 21st century has opened with dramatic advances in biosciences. Advancement in genomics and post-genomic sciences have opened new avenues of study and paved the way for rapid progress in multiple areas of biology and bio-life sciences. Gene transfer can now be achieved across totally unrelated species and previously impenetrable biological boundaries. Before the genomic revolution, disease- and pest-resistance was dependent totally on traditional breeding techniques. Tremendous benefits may result from application of genomics to plant and livestock technology, some examples being enhanced crop and meat yield and quality, drought resistance in crops, disease and pest resistance in both plants and animals, introduction of vitamins and other nutrients to supplement human or livestock diets via their normal staple crops, production of vaccines, enzymes, proteins, and drugs via plant and animal pathways, and production of crops with optimized biomass fuel potentials. All of these processes have the potential for new start-up businesses and enhanced economy for the state.
4-H - Developing Future Leaders: Programs in health and wellness addressing obesity and type II diabetics, character education and environmental education are growth areas in 4-H, boasting 20% of current enrollment, and have the potential for reaching youth who could most benefit, but are not traditionally involved in 4-H. Increasing numbers of youth in urban programs suggest 4-H programs and staff must enhance their expertise and broaden their reach to meet the needs of today's youth.
Economically Strong and Empowered Communities: Healthy successful communities are characterized by three attributes: a diverse resilient economy, an effective efficient infrastructure, and leadership. If any of these are missing, a community will have trouble surviving. If rural communities are to have a bright economic future, agriculture must remain profitable, community leadership must be developed to engage citizens, entrepreneurs must be supported, the environment protected, health care must be available and community resources must be accessible for families and businesses. DASNR will develop methods for assessing community needs and improvement of programs to be of greatest impact in areas such as: agricultural enterprise vitality, value-added products, manufacturing, recreation and tourism, home-based and micro-enterprises, community strategy development, infrastructure including roads, water, electricity, health care, digital communications, local government efficiency and leadership skills development. Directing resources to meet these needs in the future will be important to reaching the goal of healthy economically strong rural communities in the future.
Seed Funds: Funding is targeted specifically to strengthen a team's competitive position for external funding and development of "cutting edge" programs. This may be done by providing for preliminary exploratory experiments, development of prototype programs or systems, specialized pieces of equipment, services, and related needs in preparation for solicitation of extramural funding that will support high priority initiatives identified by DASNR.
Equipment: Equipment which is clearly for multi-disciplinary use which will obviously increase competitive advantage and which will encourage program redirection to identified high priority initiatives or increase research and/or extension capacity.
Educational Materials: Funding needed to develop manuals, videos, inactive computer programs, websites, etc. with which to extend research results to stakeholders.
Travel Funds: Funds to allow team members to meet with potential cooperators or clientele groups and pursue development of multi-state initiatives, present proposals to potential sponsors, develop mini-sabbaticals, develop program delivery, participate in professional exchanges and other activities related to program development to meet the needs of identified high priority initiatives.
Temporary Staff: OAES funding may only be used for temporary undergraduate student help and graduate research assistantships. OCES funding may be used for "temporary staff" personnel such as programmers, editors, graphic artists, graduate and undergraduate assistants, etc. as needed to provide support to the initial development of a new program.
Faculty, area, and county staff are eligible to apply for funding.
Proposals may be for research funding only, extension funding only, or integrated research and extension funding. The proposal budgets should clearly divide the source(s) of funding requested. Multi-disciplinary and integrated research and extension proposals are strongly encouraged.
Integrated proposals should have at least one team member with whose dominate appointment is in research and one whose dominate appointment is in extension. The overall research/extension FTE balance of the team should be consistent with the purpose and budget for the proposal.
The total amount invested in the TIP program for FY06 will be up to $1,300,000. Approximately $667,000 from OAES for projects combined with $333,000 from departmental/unit match and $300,000 from OCES funds will be available to the TIP program. This program is not intended as ongoing sources of support; therefore, total funding will be limited to $100,000 from OAES and $30,000 from OCES funds for two-year budgets for any one project. Integrated projects may receive up to $130,000 for the two-year period. All funds will be awarded on a one-time basis. Salary cost for technical employees will not be allowed with OAES funds. The only salary costs allowed to be paid from OAES funds are salaries and wages for students and graduate assistantships. OCES funds may be used for temporary employees as well as students and graduate students.
All proposals requesting OAES funds will require a departmental match of one dollar for every two dollars requested from OAES funding requested. This match should come from one of the following sources:
Matching funds from these sources will be viewed more favorably in the review process. Matching funds from current state appropriated funds for individual project leaders are discouraged, but may be considered in exceptional circumstances. Restricted and/or competitive grants and contracts may not be used as matching funds.
Project duration will not exceed two (2) years and a detailed budget is required for each year. A new account will be established for each project selected for funding. Dual research and extension accounts will established for multi-functional projects. Any funds remaining at the end of the funding period will revert back to OAES and OCES. The availability of the TIP program will be contingent of the availability of OAES and OCES funds on a year to year basis.
Proposals should contain a cover page containing items 1 through 4 in the list below, up to two pages addressing the items 5 through 7; and one budget page for each year addressing items 8 and 9.
Deliverables will include an interim progress report halfway through the project and an in-depth fiscal and programmatic report at the end of the project. The report format will be developed to coincide with reporting guidelines for the accomplishment and results report outlined in the new upcoming five-year plan.
Submit an original and seven (7) copies of the proposals to Jan Madole (X47196), Agriculture Sponsored Programs Office, 241 Ag Hall, no later than 5:00p.m. November 30, 2005. Awards are anticipated by January 3, 2006. First year awards will end December 31, 2006. Second year awards will end December 31, 2007.
| Requested OAES TIP Funds |
Departmental Match For OAES Funds1 |
Requested OCES TIP Funds |
TOTAL | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Year 1 | Year 2 | Year 1 | Year 2 | Year 1 | Year 2 | |||
| Graduate Research Assistantships |
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| Student Wages | ||||||||
| Temporary Employees | ||||||||
| Fringe Benefits | ||||||||
| Supplies | ||||||||
| Equipment | ||||||||
| Services | ||||||||
| Travel | ||||||||
| Other (list) | ||||||||
| TOTAL | ||||||||
Source & Account Number of department/unit match for OAES funding:
Department/Unit Approval(s):