Illinois Agriculture Director Chuck Hartke receives award from biotechnology industry         

[DEC. 1, 2006]  SPRINGFIELD -- Illinois Agriculture Director Chuck Hartke received an award Tuesday for his efforts to promote agricultural biotechnology. The Illinois Biotechnology Industry Organization presented Hartke its 2006 John W. Maitland Jr. Leadership in Biotechnology Award during an evening reception in the atrium of the Illinois State Library.

The award recognizes Hartke's work to expand the use of renewable fuels and to incorporate agriculture into the Illinois pavilion at BIO 2006, a prestigious international life sciences conference in Chicago last April. The Chicago conference was the industry's first in the Midwest and offered Illinois a unique opportunity to showcase its agricultural biotechnology to the more than 20,000 people and 2,500 biotech organizations that attended.

[Illinois Department of Agriculture news release]