We will miss Susan's contribution to the laboratory, but expect to continue cooperation with her in the future. Susan, we wish you well in your new position. For FY2000, we received additional funds for research on food safety. These new funds will be used to study the use of municipal and animal waste for irrigation, and the associated potential degradation in groundwater quality. Detailed plans for the project are being prepared and we will be hiring a new scientist during 2000 to conduct this research.
Water conservation is an immense challenge.
It is so broad and so critical to society both here and abroad that the opportunities for positively impacting both science and practice are almost limitless. With our present funding and staff, we are able to tackle only a few aspects of this problem. However, the laboratory should be proud of its long history of producing meaningful and useful research results. Our job is to identify those areas of research that are most critical to the long-term sustainability and enhancement of modern society. While water is a renewable natural resource, it is also a limited one, and one upon which the entire planet depends for its survival.