Parnagian Foundation has donated $10,000 to the Armenian National Agrarian University. The donation will be used for development initiatives at ANAU. Parnagians had donated another $10,000 in December 2019 for similar purposes.

The Foundation was established in 2000 by the Parnagian family who has been running the Fowler Packing Company founded in Fresno, California by Sam Parnagian in 1950. Since 1970 Sam was running the company with his four sons, Dennis, Ken, Randy and Philip. Sam died in 1980. Dennis Parnagian was the President of the Company for a long time. Today, the third generation Parnagians are managing the business.

The company is involved in grape and citrus growing and packaging services; it is now one of the largest agribusinesses in the United States.

Rector Vardan Urutyan, then Director of ICARE Foundation, first met with Dennis Parnagian in Fresno a few years ago. That meeting started a good personal friendship that grew later into a friendship with ICARE and later the Agrarian University. In addition to the support promoting technological progress in our university, Mr. Parnagian is ready to accept ANAU students as interns in his company.

“Armenians seem to have an innate love for the soil and the food it can produce”, Dennis Parnagian once said. Being among the most active civic leaders in the “Armenian” California, Parnagians also cherish reliable relationships with individuals and institutions in Armenia to address development opportunities in the Motherland, in good times and tough times like the current post-war situation.

In his recent letter to Rector Urutyan, Mr. Parnagian says, “Armenia has seen this misfortune before and it always survives, and so it shall this time. It’s never easy, but it does show how strong the Armenian Spirit is. I believe it’s our spirit and our faith that keeps us strong and together.”

These words by Dennis Parnagian and the support by Parnagian Foundation mean much for us in the Armenian National Agrarian University. Rector Urutyan, students and faculty of the university are thankful to Dennis Parnagian and the entire Parnagian Family for being by our side in this period of transformation of our university into a modern agritech excellence center. Parnagians, the honorable representatives of the California and US Armenian diaspora, have shown an excellent example of dedication to the goals of the transformed Agrarian University as the driving force of the Armenian agriculture and dedication to the spirit of the Armenian Dream.