MANHATTAN, KAN. — Kansas State University on Sept. 18 celebrated the opening of the Western Star Global Grain and Food Center with a ribbon-cutting celebration that university and government officials called one of the most important days in the university and the state's history. The ribbon cutting comes a little more than two years after groundbreaking on the facility was held.
"Today, we open much more than a building," said Dan Moser, Eldon Gideon dean of the College of Agriculture at KSU. "We open doors to new opportunities, innovations and a brighter future."
The 178,000-square-foot, three-story Western Global Grain and Food Center is the largest agricultural construction project in KSU's history, a $130 million investment designed to create room for researchers, students and industry partners to work side by side. It is also the final piece of KSU's $216 million Agriculture Innovation Initiative.
The facility includes specialized teaching and research laboratories, pilot-scale processing spaces, flexible interdisciplinary research areas, a 236-seat lecture hall and designated collaboration spaces. It also connects Call Hall and Weber Hall, which serve other areas of the ...