Berg Agricultural Hall, home to the College of Agriculture, Food and Environmental Sciences (CAFES), will begin building renovations in the fall of 2021. The first and second floors of the building will be under construction until the fall of 2022.  

Berg Agricultural Hall, located on the west side of campus off of Medary Avenue, was built in 1953, according to South Dakota State University Archives and Collections. 

“The renovation will focus on the building infrastructure, Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) accessibility and research laboratories,” John Killefer, dean of the CAFES, said.

The building infrastructure updates will include a new Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning (HVAC) system, fire suppression system and lighting system. 

Seven new research laboratories will be updated, as well. The laboratories will support researchers and graduate students who are housed in Berg Agricultural Hall.

The new labs will also support food science research, weeds research, plant pathology research, plant virology research, entomology and more. An upgraded plant pathology diagnostic service laboratory is also in the renovation plans. 

Office spaces on the first and second floors will receive minimal updates. The hallways in the building will be modernized to match the third floor that was renovated several years ago. 

The Berg Hall renovation is phase two of the Precision Agriculture construction project. 

The Raven Precision Agriculture Center is slated to open this summer. Once that building is open, faculty and staff from the Agriculture Engineering Building and Berg Agricultural Hall will move into their new office spaces. 

This will allow faculty and staff from the first and second floors of Berg Agricultural Hall to move into temporary office space in the Agriculture Engineering Building. 

This renovation project is being funded by South Dakota Corn and South Dakota State University.

The third floor of the building will remain functional during construction.