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Central Coast University Gets Grant To Develop More Disease Resistant Version Of Region's Big Crop

Strawberries are the biggest cash crop on the Central and South Coasts.

Now, a university in the region has received a major grant to try to identify types of strawberry plants which are more disease resistant.

Cal Poly San Luis Obispo’s Strawberry Center will share a $4.5 million dollar federal grant with a team of other university based scientists from California and Florida to do the research.

Cal Poly’s agricultural college, which is the parent of its strawberry center, will get about a half million dollars of the funding. The idea is to try to accelerate the development of disease resistant strawberry plants.

Lance Orozco has been News Director of KCLU since 2001, providing award-winning coverage of some of the biggest news events in the region, including the Thomas and Woolsey brush fires, the deadly Montecito debris flow, the Borderline Bar and Grill attack, and Ronald Reagan's funeral. 
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