Dr. Gary Secor is the winner of the NPC Meritorious Service Award.  Secor became a Professor in the Plant Pathology Department at North Dakota State University (NDSU) in 1978 During his long and distinguished career at NDSU, Dr. Secor has served as the potato breeding coordinator for six years and the interim director of the potato breeding program for three years.
 
His professional areas of work have been diagnosis and management of potato and sugar beet diseases and variety development of potatoes. His work has concentrated on late blight management, seed treatment, harvest dry rot, Fusarium dry rot, zebra chip, and blemish diseases of potatoes, and also disease free potato seed production.
 
Gary's communication skills have made him a sought-after speaker in his field, invited to symposia in many countries including the United Kingdom, China, Canada, Chile, New Zealand, Russia, Ireland and of course many locations here in the U.S.
 
Gary is also known as a philanthropist, "giving back" both his time and his resources to humanitarian efforts in third world countries. (From Potato Bytes)