Highlights

RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, NC – The Centers of Innovation for Agribusiness & Energy were presented with a 2009 Innovator Award from Southern Growth Policies Board on June 8, 2009 in Biloxi, Mississippi as part of the Southern Energy: Abundant, Affordable, and American conference. Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour presented Bill Boone, Director of the Georgia Center of Innovation for Agribusiness, with the Innovator award for the state of Georgia at the conference’s Governors’ Reception and Innovators’ Award Ceremony.

“This award was the result of an entire team of people, not only the Centers of Innovation for Energy and Agribusiness, but also Donnie Smith, the Governor’s Agriculture Liaison and the Bioenergy One Stop Shop participants,” said Boone. “This team has worked together for over four years to promote bioenergy in Georgia.”

“We are honored to be recognized among such a distinguished group of Innovators,” said Jill Stuckey, Director of the COI for Energy. “It’s an exciting time to be a part of the renewable energy industry, given rising public awareness and the rapid advances in technology.”

The Southern Energy: Abundant, Affordable, and American conference focused on the issue of energy-related economic development and represented the culmination of a year-long series of activities around the theme Southern Energy – including community forums, state events, an online survey, the publication of a regional asset map on bioenergy, and recommendations from The Southern Common Market on Alternative Fuels.

Each year, Southern Growth Policies Board honors innovative Southern initiatives that are improving the quality of life in the region. The 2009 Innovator Awards recognize creative initiatives in the region that encourage economic opportunities relating to bio-products, alternative energy, and/or energy efficiency. Awards were presented to an organization in each of Southern Growth’s member states — Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, and West Virginia.

About Southern Growth Policies Board

Southern Growth Policies Board is a regional public policy think tank based in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina. Formed by the region’s governors in 1971, Southern Growth Policies Board develops and advances visionary economic development policies by providing a forum for collaboration among a diverse cross-section of the region’s governors, legislators, business and academic leaders and the economic and community development sectors. Southern Growth provides its members, and the region, with authoritative research, discussion forums and pilot projects in the areas of technology and innovation, globalization, workforce development, community development, civic engagement and leadership. To learn more about Southern Growth Policies Board, visit www.southern.org.