Tuesday, June 21, 1988/The Battalion/Page 3
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By Mike W Thomas
Reporter
I Since 1979 Texas A&M has
Rgned formal agreements with 50
■oreign universities and research in-
Htitutions in 21 countries. Each
iwn-and-out,Agreement allows A&M and a for-
far/borrowertSign institution to work on research,
“SDI stinks' 11 share ideas and to exchange fac-
times nmilMltyand graduate students.
, : w Most recently A&M has become
the exatemat*^ third American university to sign
npering, “NoHn agreement with the Conference
doney now. Bes Grandes Ecoles, a French re-
lo?" 1 asked viatch-industry-governmental con-
r ’ Hsrtium that represents 140 institu-
gun ire. Bons. The Massachusetts Institute of
Iden friendiB'echnology and the University of
n DOD’sMcyCnhfornia at Berkeley are the only
Jther American schools that have a
formal agreement with the Grandes
oles.
Cathleen Loving, International
laordinator for the Office of Inter
national Coordination, said the
memorandums of agreement estab-
, Jsh a formal link between two insti
tutions that can gain mutual benefits
t hat SDI wi
t of incoming
could spend
than ..
.in out of did
redit
• t hanked r
bv cooperating on research effort*
“The basic agreement recognizes
each other’s skills and expertise and
then states that we will agree to ag
ree,” Loving said. “Dollar amounts
and numbers are not usually speci
fied in the basic agreements.
“Before an agreement is ever
signed there must be grassroots sup
port from the faculty and deans who
would be involved. We want to be
sure that each agreement will be
fruitful so we must make sure that
there is enough interest before
drafting the agreement.”
Lbving said lack of time is the
most common problem preventing
some agreements from being signed.
“Occasionally we will be contacted
by a university that is interested in
research being done by a member of
our faculty,” she said, “but when we
contact that faculty member we find
that he or she has too many prior
commitments to be able to devote
time to working with this other insti
tution, so the agreement cannot be
made.”
The number of agreements that
A&M has signed has been steadily
increasing since 1982. Last year 10
agreements were signed with univer
sities in China, Colombia, Czechoslo
vakia, Denmark, France, Germany,
Hungary, Mexico and Scotland. So
far this year A&M has signed 5
agreements including the Universite
Catholique de Louvain in Belgium,
the Gansu Grassland and Ecological
Research Institute in China, Fudan
University in China, the Direction
De L’Enseignement Superieur Des
Telecommunications in France and
the Conference Des Grandes Ecoles.
“Having our faculty work closely
with these foreign institutions helps
to provide cultural diversity at
A&M,” Loving said. “The research
being done is also often spilled over
into the classroom, exposing stu
dents to the most up to date ad
vancements in their field.
“The ideal is to not seperate tea
ching from research.”
Not all of the agreements that
A&M has made deal strictly with sci
ence and technology. The first
agreements signed in 1979 were
with four Brazilian institutions and
three Mexican schools and dealt with
agricultural research. In 1986, A&M
signed agreements with The Kob
lenz School of Corporate Manage
ment in Germany and the University
of International Business and Eco
nomics in China. The agreement
signed in May with Fudan University
in China has been directed toward
the College of Liberal Arts.
The Office of International Coor
dination promotes cooperation with
foreign insitutions with the Interna
tional Enhancement Grant Program.
This program lets professors with
tenure apply for grants of $20,000
to do research with foreign institu
tions.
Loving said that although most of
the agreements provide many dif
ferent benefits for both institutions,
A&M also signs agreements with in
stitutions in developing countries to
help fight poverty and pestilence.
Officials announce
agricultural loans
for Texas farmers
AUSTIN (AP) — Officials an
nounced Monday that the state is re
ady on a $5 million program to en
courage lower-interest loans for
agricultural projects in such areas as
grapes for making wine, various
herbs and spices and oriental vegeta
ble production.
State Agriculture Commissioner
Jim Hightower said “this little dab of
money” will go a long way toward
providing affordable financing for
producing alternative crops, estab
lishing marketing channels and
building food and fiber processing
facilities.
Hightower and State Treasurer
Ann Richards held a news confer
ence to announce details of a pro
gram linking state deposits with cer
tain agricultural loans chosen by the
state.
Hightower said the $5 million
could fund as many as 65 projects
over the next five years. The fund
will be used to generate $36 million
in new revenue, while creating 4,800
new jobs for the state.
The program was authorized by
the 1987 Legislature and approved
by the voters of the state in the No
vember elections.
The measure earmarks $5 million
in state deposits as an incentive for
Texas banks and savings and loan
institutions to make lower-interest
loans for agricultural diversification
projects.
Richards said the state treasury
will allow financial institutions an in
terest rate on a state deposit of 2
points below the market rate for
U.S. Treasury bills.
Lenders, in turn, must agree
pass along these reduced inter 1 ’
rates on loans to qualified borrowf
in agriculture related fields.
The maximum loan for a sing
fiber processing or marketing vei
ture is $250,000. The maximun
loan for alternative crops produc
tion is $100,000.
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iround andstt
heck looked
rial dates set
for defendants
In gang rape
Hightower says Texas looking like Dust Bowl
.■ SAN DIEGO, Texas (AP) — Eight
ol a quarter: t he 10 men accused in a woman’s
■eported abduction and gang rape
aimed loudlv HPP eaiei ^ Monday before a state dis-
Bict judge, who set trial dates next
Bionth for seven in the case.
aduate studemw Judge Ricardo Garcia also on
• forTheBattal Monday overruled defense motions
(juash the indictments stemming
. iBom a 19-year-old woman’s report
phat she was kidnapped the night of
Biarch 26 while walking home from
J nearby relative’s house and raped
repeatedly by as many as 20 men.
I “We’re ready to go to trial,” Duval
Bounty District Attorney Rodolfo
Gutierrez said. “I think our wit
nesses are ready. We’ll be ready on
July 11, which is the first setting that
pe have.”
The South Texas ranching town
jas shaken by the woman’s report
that one of the scenes during her or-
leal, lasting several hours, was a
Tnch where spectators at a cock
fight ignored her pleas for help and
fixiay have joined in the attack.
I Many people in San Diego say
they are related to at least one de
fendant, either by blood or mar
riage.
■ fen men were named in 12 in-
■ictments handed up April 21.
■hree of them were charged only
Pith sexual assault, five others were
charged with sexual assault and ag
gravated kidnapping and one man
was charged only with kidnapping.
■ One defendant was charged with
Kxual assault and two counts of ag
gravated kidnapping.
AUSTIN (AP) — Parts of Texas are so dry
that they resemble the Dust Bowl of the
1930s, State Agriculture Commissioner Jim
Hightower said Monday.
“In Texas, there actually are sections of
our state that already are in Dust Bowl situa
tions,” Hightower said.
The National Weather Service’s latest data
show only parts of North Dakota, South Da
kota, Montana and Minnesota are worse off
than South Texas from a searing drought’s
effects on crop conditions.
“We have the potential, literally, for Dust
Bowl conditions,” Hightower said. “And the
tragedy is, of course, under the Reagan ad
ministration, they have made efforts to do
away with the soil and water conservation
programs that were developed as a result of
the Dust Bowl.
“It’s not just a matter of this year’s drought
— it has been dry through the ’80s.”
He added that dry weather building up
over the years led to the Dust Bowl and
drought of the 1950s.
The worst years of the Dust Bowl, with ex
treme wind erosion in Texas, were 1933-36.
Hightower was asked to comment on the
drought after a news conference with State
Treasurer Ann Richards about a new agricul
tural loan program.
Richards said as she turned the session
over to Hightower that she had heard of a
rain dance in South Dakota.
“We hope the wind moves it south,” High
tower quipped.
“We have an emergency,” he said. “We
need to be treating it as an emergency rather
than just appointing task forces up in Wash
ington, D.C. to decide whether it’s dry or not.
“We need to be responding immediately
with tools that already are in the hands of the
U.S. secretary of agriculture.”
Hightower said his office had appealed to
the secretary to declare certain Texas coun
ties eligible for federal drought assistance.
“They agxeed to do that but they are mov
ing very slowly with the designation process,”
he said, adding that the local and state paper
work had been finished a long time ago.
Hightower said 40 counties have been ap
proved for federal aid but probably 150 need
assistance.
“Even that is not going to be enough and in
some areas it’s irrelevant,” he said. What good
does it do to allow cattle to graze on hay acre
age if there is no hay, he said.
Hightower said ranchers are being forced
to liquidate herds, and farmers and ranchers
are going out of business as a result of the
drought — “it’s devastating.”
Protected woodpeckers could hurt
lumber economy of East Texans
DALLAS (AP) — U.S. Forest
Service officials are worried the fed
erally ordered protection of the red-
cockaded woodpecker might hurt
the East Texas economy, so depen
dent on the timber the birds call
home.
At the urging of environmental
groups, U.S. District Judge Robert
Parker of Tyler last week issued an
injunction against the Forest Service,
instructing it not to clear-cut timber
— harvest all the trees in a given
area — within 1,200 meters of the
woodpecker colonies.
The ruling could affect up to
200,000 acres, one-third of the
state’s federal forest land. Environ
mentalists, who favor selective har
vesting of trees instead of clear-cut
ting, hailed the ruling as a victory.
But Texas Forest Supervisor Mike
Lannan said the decision could have
a “severe impact” on the 12 East
Texas counties that receive a per
centage of federal timber sales.
Those counties receive 25 percent
of the income from such sales —$3.8
million last year. By law, half of the
money is earmarked for schools, the
other half for roads and bridges.
Last year, Sabine County received
about $425,000 from timber sales,
County Judge Royce Smith said.
Half of that, about $212,500, went to
the road and bridge fund.
“That is approximately 35 to 40
percent of the entire road and
bridge budget,” Smith said. “It’s real
important.”
Lannan added that if selective
harvesting becomes prevalent, some
timber income may be lost because
the process is more expensive and
time-consuming than clear-cutting.
But Ned Fritz, chairman of the
Forest Task Force of the Texas
Committee on Natural Resources —
a plaintiff in the lawsuit against the
Forest Service that precipitated Par
ker’s ruling — disputes claims that
the decision will harm the area’s
economy.
In Walker County alone, private
timber growers use selective harvest
ing on at least 60,000 acres, Fritz
said.
Wines from Texas
becoming scarce
LUBBOCK (AP) — The newly
won celebrity of Texas wines has
made the Lone Star libation hard
to find on store shelves and res
taurant wine lists.
While wine columnists around
the country tout the high quality
of Texas wines, those wanting to
sample the bouquet of products
from such wineries as Fall Creek,
Messina-Hof and Llano Estacado
may come up as dry as Chablis in
their search.
In a recent column lauding the
state’s vintages. Vanity Fair mag
azine’s wine critic, Joel Fleish
man, mourned the shortage as “a
great tragedy for wine lovers.”
“It’s very frustrating,” said
Alan Lagarde, a salesman for
Marty’s, a large Dallas wineseller.
“I’ve gotten calls from New York
and California wanting the
wines.”
The wines are in short supply
to begin with and are popular on
restaurant wine lists, Lagarde
said.
Upscale restaurants in Dallas
also are using the wines, which
can range in price from $8 to $19,
to concoct salad dressings, des
serts and meat sauces.
“We have tremendous demand
from accounts all over the coun
try,” Bobby Cox, owner of Pheas
ant Ridge winery, said.
THE WRITING IS
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ON THE WALL,
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Wednesday
Male Dancers from
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$1°° Bar Drinks All Night
$3 00 Pitchers of Mitilda Bay Wine Coolers
FREE Buffet
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