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Indian American leads Purdue's new agricultural institute
The institute helps farmers develop value-added products, collaborating with food science, economics, and agriculture experts.
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Dharmendra Mishra, associate professor of food science at Purdue University. Mishra also directs Purdue’s new Institute for Food Product Innovation and Commercialization. / Purdue Agricultural Communications photo/Joshua Clark
Indian American food scientist Dharmendra Mishra will lead Purdue University’s newly launched Institute for Food Product Innovation and Commercialization, aimed at helping farmers transform raw agricultural products into market-ready food and beverages.
The institute, a collaboration between Purdue’s food science and agricultural economics departments. is funded by a $1.5 million grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture Rural Development.
“This grant is focused on farmers who want to add value to their product,” said Dharmendra Mishra, institute director and associate professor of food science. Entrepreneurs face many steps and challenges in converting commodity crops into new products for retail sales. “We want to remove those hurdles for farmer-entrepreneurs,” he said.
The institute combines expertise in food manufacturing, safety, marketing, and entrepreneurship to guide participants through the product development process in three phases: online training, a one-day workshop on food product lifecycles, and personalized on-campus feedback.
Key resources include the university’s Pilot Plant, which simulates commercial-scale manufacturing, and the Food Entrepreneurship and Manufacturing Institute (FEMI), launched in 2021. FEMI has previously supported projects such as Purdue’s Boiler Chips ice cream and Boilermaker Hot Sauce.
The institute also collaborates with agricultural economists from Purdue’s Center for Food Demand Analysis and Sustainability to help farmers assess market potential.
“There’s only so much agricultural commodity you can produce,” said Kenneth Foster, the institute’s assistant director and professor of agricultural economics. “We put it on a truck, barge, train or plane and we ship it somewhere else and people add value to it,” Foster said. “What can we do to support value-adding at the local level so more of that stays in the local community where the product is produced?"
Board members from Indiana’s agriculture organizations will guide the initiative, which Mishra says will benefit students and farmers alike.
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