Randall, Ivester Share Importance of New NGTC Agriculture Program With Lavonia Chamber

North Georgia Tech’s new School of Agriculture Program Director, Wayne Randall, was back on his home turf last week to speak to members of the Lavonia Chamber of Commerce at their monthly Lunch n’ Learn event.

North Georgia Tech officially opened its five-semester Agriculture Program to students this semester and both Randall and school president Dr. Mark Ivester were on hand to give an overview of the program and why it’s important for our area.

Randall said Agribusiness is the basis for sustaining life around the world and learning how to get food to those who need it is vital.

“Agriculture is the producer of fuel, fiber, and food for our world,” he told the group. “That’s what we do. The amount of food is tremendous. There are poeple who die everyday in this world of starvation, but we produce enough food in this world to feed every person. The problem is getting the food to them. So, logistics is as much of a problem as production is.”

Students enrolled in North Georgia Tech’s Agriculture Program can earn their associates degree in Agribusiness or Modern Agriculture.

Academic credits are transferable to any state school in Georgia for students who plan to continue on at a four-year college.

Randall said students enrolled in the Program learn more than just good farming practices.  He says a key component to successful farming is knowing how to run a successful business.

“So our Agribusiness program is based around if you want to open your own business or go to work for an agricultural business then you’ll have a background in the finance part of that, the credit part of that, how to get a loan, how to budget for what you’re trying to do, how to create a marketing plan for a business and how to create a farm plan that you might want to put in place,” Randall explained.

Dr. Ivester noted that even though Georgia’s main business is Agribusiness, full spectrum Agriculture Programs in Georgia are sparse.

South Georgia Tech has a program with John Deere to train technicians, Athens Tech has a little bit of poultry science and a vet tech program. Typically it’s sparse throughout,” Ivester said. “But I remember when I was growing up coming out of Stephens County High School, a lot of those young FFA folks that really got excited about Ag would go down to ABAC (Abraham Baldwin Agriculture College in Tifton) and get homesick and come back pretty quick, and they never really had a chance to do anything else up here with their love of agriculture.”

Ivester said North Georgia Tech is leading the charge for agriculture education in North Georgia, and he’s committed to recruiting high school students who want a career in Agriculture.

All of the courses are taught on the school’s Clarkesville campus.

To get more information on North Georgia Tech’s new Agriculture Program, you can go online to
https://northgatech.edu/programs-of-study/environmental-science/agriculture