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Carlos Bonilla, Oregon State University Hermiston Agricultural Research and Extension Center Director
Carlos Bonilla is the new director of the Oregon State University (OSU) Hermiston Agricultural Research and Extension Center (HAREC). As director, Bonilla serves as a leader at the station, provides support to conduct research and extension, facilitates communication with stakeholders and collaborates with the main OSU campus.
Bonilla hails from Chile, where he gained almost 20 years of faculty experience and worked with many crops similar to those grown on the West Coast of the U.S. He will use his background in agronomy, hydraulic and environmental engineering, and soil science to work on soil- and water-related issues, mainly focusing on irrigation and soil and water quality.
Bonilla saw the position at the HAREC as an interesting opportunity to use his leadership skills to contribute to research that addresses environmental challenges while helping farmers increase yield.
Looking ahead, Bonilla has four goals for the station. He and his team will work to continue cutting-edge research and science to enhance farmers’ competitiveness, maintain a local and regional focus in research to meet grower needs, effectively communicate the relevance and impact of research and discoveries, and develop dynamically adaptable recommendations.
Onion World caught up with Bonilla to learn more about the new man at the helm of the HAREC.
Tell us something about yourself that people might find surprising.
I like driving a lot, which is required for this position at this station. I know some people hate driving on the highway or freeway. But I like to drive a lot. If you put good music in your car and you have a decent car, I like to drive and see the landscape.
As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?
I wanted to be an airplane pilot, and another job was some kind of builder. I have a lot of the skills and enjoy working as a carpenter. I love tools and I have a lot of tools. Since I was a kid, I was working right next to my dad all the time. He’s an engineer, but he was very good at building things.
If Hollywood made a movie about your life, who would you like to see cast as you?
I would like to have the brilliance and the attitude that Harrison Ford has in his movies. He’s a good example of a good actor. He played Indiana Jones and was in Star Wars, and they’re very different movies, and he became a different person in a very easy way. That’s interesting because I like when an actor adapts and puts his skills to a new movie, and that’s something I try to do every day in the way that I talk to people. One of the challenges in this position is one minute you are talking to a farmer, the next minute you can be talking to a politician, the next time you can be talking to a student, and then you are talking to a technician. So you have to adapt in some way to the person you are talking to. It’s not acting, but you need to have the right words to introduce a topic in a very specific way to each of them.
If you had to eat one meal, every day for the rest of your life, what would it be?
A roast beef sandwich, that’s one of my favorites. I will order my standard recipe: a roast beef sandwich with pepper jack, lettuce, tomatoes, green peppers and olives.
What advice do you have for growers competing in today’s market?
Agriculture is something that has been in my family for a while, and I’m very familiar with that and see how hard it is. I couldn’t be arrogant to say I have advice for you guys because farmers know a lot. However, one thing I can say is our purpose is to help in that process, provide them with new technologies, the best practices and the best recommendations for their activities. And they will always find a group of people here ready to help them.
