The BIAD’s Office of International Training (OIT) is the country’s preeminent international agricultural training program with significant experience in cooperative agreements, logistics, travel, and meeting coordination. OIT coordinates, facilitates, and organizes training courses in varied agriculture and environmental disciplines by utilizing expertise from across the Texas A&M University System as well as experts with state and federal government agencies, the private sector and other institutions of higher learning.
Training Programs
OIT is involved in a wide-array of training programs. Programs are typically structured encompassing time periods of 10-15 days to as long as 3-4 months depending on the trainees’ background, subject matter, and depth of training required to meet educational objectives. Longer term programs commonly match trainees with University faculty mentors that work one-on-one with the trainee. OIT’s mission is to facilitate educational experiences for global agents of change in order to enhance and increase their capacity in the context of food security.
Two programs in which OIT regularly engages is the United States Department of Agriculture’s Foreign Agricultural Service (USDA/FAS) Cochran Fellowship Program (CFP) and the Norman E. Borlaug International Agricultural Science and Technology Fellowship Program (BFP). The CFP provides short-term technical training to participants from middle-income countries, emerging markets, and emerging democracies. The BFP provides training for scientists and researchers from developing and middle-income countries via a 6-12 week research training program and the Fellows work one-on-one with a mentor who is engaged with a U.S. University or research center. In addition OIT engages in programs including the America For Bulgaria Foundation’s Leaders in Agriculture and Agriculture for the Future programs continuing the ideals of Norman Borlaug and expanding the vision of the Borlaug Institute around the globe. OIT is constantly looking for new ways to bring agricultural training, education, and innovation to minds around the globe.
Past Programs
- USDA Cochran Fellowship Program
- USDA Borlaug Fellowship Program
- America For Bulgaria Foundation
- “Agriculture for the Future”
- “Leaders in Agriculture”
Contact Rebecca Skaff for information on the OIT’s international training schedule.