College of Agriculture & Natural Resources Department of Agricultural, Food, and Resource Economics

Non-AFRE Co-Principle Investigators: Kirkpatrick Lawton, Coordinator (Crop & Soil Science). See other AEC faculty involved on project listing.

Project Name:           Colombia - College of Agriculture at Medellin and Palmira
Donor:                        International Cooperation Administration (forerunner of Agency for International Development), U.S. Department of Agriculture, Kellogg Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation
Contract No:              TECW-13-11
Account No:               Not available
Location:                    Colombia
Duration:                    December 1951-April 1959 (with activities extending to June 1962)
Budget:                       $914,032 (lCA); $102,000 (U.S.D.A.); $161,173 (Kellogg)
Documents:               (Click here to view)

Key MSU Faculty:     Kirkpatrick Lawton, Coordinator (Crop & Soil Science). At Medellin, key faculty were P. Herbert (Forestry); L. Robertson and H. Pettigrove (Crop & Soil Science); W. Snyder (Dairy Science); E. Weaver and J. Johnson (Animal Husbandry) Gar Woods (Agricultural Economics). At Palmira, key faculty were C. Hansen and C. Albrecht (Agricultural Engineering); V. Freeman, C. Sheppard, and H. Newland (Animal Husbandry); L. Kyle. H. Riley (Agricultural Economics); K. Lawton (Crop & Soil Science)

Project Goals:           To study and evaluate agricultural teaching, research, and extension programs in Colombia and to recommend means for their improvement as a basis for the long-range development of the nation's agriculture; to strengthen the undergraduate curricula in agriculture and to introduce the land-grant college philosophy of service to people.

Cooperating Institutions:      National University of Colombia, Bogota; Facultades de Agronomia at Palmira and Medellin, Colombia

Project Summary:     MSU's long-term experience in support to institution building developments in Africa, Asia, and Latin America began in 1951 with a program of cooperation with Colombia's Colleges of Agriculture at Palmira and Medellin. This project was financed primarily by the International Cooperation Administration. It focused on curriculum development and staff training, oriented largely to the crops, soils, animal, horticultural, agricultural economics, agricultural engineering, and forestry sciences.

Formal classroom and laboratory field instruction at the degree level was supplemented by 30 special non-degree short courses enrolling over 650 off-campus farmers and agribusiness personnel. Thirty-one Colombian faculty members pursued degree and/or non-degree participant training programs at MSU. All graduate degree training programs included "hands on" experiences as a means to relate theory to practice and vice versa.

Among project accomplishments are the establishment of the Instituto de Forestal at Medellin to train foresters, the construction of a new dormitory and a new agricultural engineering building at Palmira, and the development of a dairy herd, a swine herd, and poultry flock at Medellin. With the assistance of the Kellogg Foundation, a new dairy processing plant, agricultural engineering building, and forestry summer camp were constructed. The Rockefeller Foundation provided funding for the planning and development of buildings, teaching and laboratory facilities, and library holdings. In Colombia, some 13 farmer bulletins were produced covering poultry, swine, beef cattle and dairy feeding and management as well as forage crops, variety and soil management recommendations. A list of these bulletins is available in the reports produced by Kellogg located in University Archives and Special Collections, Main Library.

Selected Documents From/About This Project: 

• MSU Library and Archives Document Holdings – Colombia Project
• Michigan State University – Colombia Project Terminal Report to I.C.A.  (Period, December 12, 1951 – March 31, 1959)
• Reseña  Historica De La Facultad De Agronomia De Medellin