permaculture

["Lawrence F. London, Jr." <venaurafarm@bellsouth.net>]

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: [SANET-MG] Current information about ATTRA
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2010 14:05:06 -0600
From: Teresa Maurer <teresam@NCAT.ORG>
Reply-To: Sustainable Agriculture Network Discussion Group 
<SANET-MG@LISTS.IFAS.UFL.EDU>, Teresa Maurer <teresam@NCAT.ORG>
To: SANET-MG@LISTS.IFAS.UFL.EDU

From Teresa Maurer
teresam@ncat.org

In response to Larry London's post and concern on November 25, and to
expand on Steve Diver's response on November 26 on the sanet list, I'd
like to provide some additional information about ATTRA.

In 1987, ATTRA was developed and put in place by the national nonprofit
organization the National Center for Appropriate Technology (NCAT). NCAT 
continues to manage the program, which is funded by a cooperative
agreement with the USDA-Rural Business Cooperative Services
(RBS). Headquartered in Butte, Montana, NCAT manages several sustainable
agriculture and farm energy projects in addition to ATTRA project work.
Over the years there have been misunderstandings that ATTRA was a
separate organization, and that has never been the case.

Since 1991, I have been working for NCAT in Fayetteville, Arkansas, and
I now serve (as I have for the past 15 years) as the ATTRA Project
Director. In addition to the NCAT office where I am, we work on the 
ATTRA project from NCAT offices in California, Iowa, Pennsylvania and
Texas. The varied locations have allowed us to provide additional
regional service, collaborations and outreach to enhance and extend
ATTRA's national work. We currently have 30 staff members with practical
farming experience, technical expertise and writing skills, and they are 
supported by additional administrative, computer services and library 
staff. A conscious decision was made to add a phrase to the recognizable 
ATTRA program initials, which better describes what we do, which is why 
you now see:
ATTRA: National Sustainable Agriculture Information Service.

What Larry may be recalling is that the ATTRA project experienced an
extremely rough period due to a severe reduction of Congressional
funding during 2007-2008, from which it has taken awhile to recover.
However, since that time, thanks to grassroots support and
Congressional action, I am pleased to be able to say that NCAT's ATTRA
project has been providing a full range of services (and even some new
ones).

Steve is correct about the ways to stay in touch with our work and you
can find out more by visiting the ATTRA website, www.attra.ncat.org
<http://www.attra.ncat.org/> To learn more about NCAT, the organization
that I work for, and which has operated the program since its inception, 
you can go to www.ncat.org <http://www.ncat.org/>

Thank you for your interest and concern!