Writer: Steve Hill, (979) 845-2895
Contact: Dr. Jim Stansel, (409) 753-3045
BEAUMONT — Panamanian President Ernesto Perez Balladares visited the Texas state rice research station in Beaumont Thursday, hoping to strengthen both his country’s agricultural industry and its ties to the Texas A&M University agriculture program.
“It’s very impressive. It’s very interesting,” Perez Balladares said of the technology and rice production and management projects he viewed. “I think it can benefit our people, and I hope we can take advantage of it.”
He was part of an entourage that included Panama vice president Tomas Altamirano Duque, Minister of Agriculture Carlos Souza Lennox, and more than two dozen farmers and other representatives of the Panamanian rice industry.
The trip was part of an ongoing cooperative effort between the Texas A&M agriculture program and Panama that includes several projects. Perez Ballardes took a one-hour tour of research plots during the 50th annual rice field day at the Texas A&M University Agricultural Research and Extension Center west of Beaumont.
Dr. Jim Stansel, resident research director at the station, said wet weather and disease challenge rice growing in both locales.
“We’ll be able to share a great deal of what we know, but the things they learn will also help them feed information right back to us. There will be a great deal of mutual support of the two industries,” he said.
Perez Balladares visited Texas A&M University in College Station on Wednesday, where he was briefed on Texas A&M activities in Panama relating to engineering, agriculture and maritime studies.
The relationship between Texas A&M and Panama is fueled in part by the presence of numerous A&M alumni in both public and private sectors in that country. Several Aggies were among the visitors Thursday, including Julio Sosa, the consul general for Panama in Houston, who graduated from Texas A&M in 1961.
Jorge Altamirano, a rice grower and mill owner who is also son of the vice president, also said commonalities between the two rice industries are readily apparent. One difference, however, is that Panama exports no rice, he said, and doesn’t anticipate doing so.
“We only grow about 75,000 hectares commercially,” he said. “Panamanians eat a lot of rice — about 140 pounds annually per capita — and world market prices are so low we’re not doing any exporting.”
He added, “We’re really looking forward to gaining as much knowledge as we can here.”
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