Extension Specialist,
NC State's Department of Entomology

Professional Achievements:
Dr. Rick Brandenburg has coordinated a pest management program in Ghana that has involved researchers and extension workers to transfer technology to peanut farmers. After 10 years, the trend of declining yield and acreage has been reversed and farmers now view peanuts as an important cash crop in this developing country. This program has become a model for future regional efforts in West Africa.

Dr. Brandenburg has successfully obtained grants from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) for the Peanut Collaborative Research Support Program (PCRSP) to assist in the development of applied research programs and technology transfer and extension programming on peanuts in developing countries such as the Philippines, Thailand, and Ghana since 1989. Most recently, Dr. Rick Brandenburg has been instrumental in the success of the USAID Peanut CRSP project entitled: Improved production efficiency through standardized, integrated, and enhanced research and technology transfer approaches (NCS19, LAG-G-00-96-90013-00) since 1996.

He has one of the longest tenures as a lead scientist of all the current projects funded by USAID. The program in Ghana, West Africa, began in 1996. Peanut acreage had declined and yields were very low due to pest problems. In 10 years, yields have improved and acreage is increasing. In 2004, Dr. Brandenburg was awarded a Certificate of Appreciation by the director of the Crops Research Institute in Kumasi, Ghan, for his efforts to promote peanut research and extension efforts in that country that led to the dramatic increases in acres of peanuts grown, yield of peanuts, and income for poor, rural farmers.

In the latest review of the PCRSP, the External Evaluation Panel (EEP), consisting of an international team of pest management experts from the U.S., the United Kingdom, and Zimbabwe, gave his program an exceptional high rating for its objectives, progress, and especially for the documented impacts and benefits through the extension transfer of research findings. The EEP was so impressed with the progress made and the impacts that one team member provided funding to build five peanut shellers since yields had increased to the point that hand shelling was no longer practical.

Dr. Brandenburg received a letter in 2005 from Henry Azot, the local extension agents with the Ministry of Food and Agriculture in the Ejura district in Ghana. The letter contained a photo of farmers in Ghana standing in front of harvested peanuts. Mr. Azot described the happiness of the farmers because the PCRSP program under the leadership of Dr. Brandenburg had helped increased yields so that farmer income had improved significantly. The key to success had been the leadership effort to ensure all research efforts were made available to extension workers and farmers in a timely manner.

A pest management CD for training extension agents in Ghana has been develop and an IPM manual is underway. The management entity for the PCRSP is seeking a five-year extension of the project and would like to use the success of this project in Ghana to form the basis of a regional training program to train researchers and extension agents throughout West Africa to improve peanut production. The benefits of this program to farmers in Ghana has been documented anecdotally through village visits where farmers describe increased incomes and their ability to make significant purchases including used cars and homes. The benefit of this program has been documented more substantially by Dr. A.A. Dankyi, Agricultural Economist at the Crops Research Institute, in an article that will be published this year in the peer-reviewed journal Peanut Science. Three additional manuscripts will be published in this journal that are associated with research and extension efforts designed to improve management of weeds, insects, and nematodes in Ghana.

Accomplishments:
Dr. Brandenburg's extension programming in the area of pest management has provided opportunities for international travel and collaboration in many countries including: China, Singapore, Thailand, the Philippines, Australia, Mali, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Ghana, Senegal, Tunisia, South Africa, Botswana, and throughout Europe. He has been a long time member of Sigma Iota Rho, the national honor society for international studies and has frequently been asked to speak on programs of international pest management (invited symposium speaker on IPM in developing countries at national IPM workshop in St.Louis 2006). Dr. Brandenburg has received numerous awards including the 1995 Southeast Distinguished Achievement Award in Extension Entomology from the Entomological Society of America, the Outstanding Extension Service Award, CALS, NCSU in 2002, the 2003 Alumni Outstanding Extension and Outreach Award, NCSU, and was named a Fellow in the American Peanut Research and Education Society in 2003 and the Entomological Society of America in 2005.