IFAMA Student Competition Winners

Cindy Zimmerman

ifama-13-winnersA team of MBA students from Santa Clara University won first place in the IFAMA Student Case Competition Wednesday at the World Forum in Atlanta.

The competition consists of teams representing universities worldwide who simulate a fast turnaround analysis and presentation which they make to a panel of senior management judges on a corporate hot topic. This year there were 22 teams and two different cases. “We had about eight hours to read it, analyze it, suggest solutions to the business management problem in the case, make a power point presentation and then present it the next day,” said student Ngoc Dao, who is getting her MBA in Supply Chain Management. “I wanted to learn more about supply chain in different industries.”

The rest of the team, consisting of Alvin Chen, Tina Cosentino, Michael Billikopf and Zach Wise, all are specializing in the food and agribusiness areas. These are great future leaders for the industry.

Santa Clara Student IFAMA Competition Winners


IFAMA 23rd World Forum Photo Album

Agribusiness, Audio, Education, Video

DuPont Exec Talks Food Security at IFAMA

Cindy Zimmerman

ifama-13-dupontFood security was the topic for an address Wednesday to the International Food and Agribusiness Management Association (IFAMA) World Forum by DuPont Executive Vice President Jim Borel.

“We need a new generation of food visionaries who can see the tremendous opportunity made possible by the simple fact that people have to eat,” Borel said.

The DuPont executive talked about the need for local solutions, information transfer, sustainability in a broad sense, and collaboration. His best quote was about technology. “There’s more technology in a kernel of seed corn than there is in an iPhone,” and even more than that, there’s more hope to feed the world.

The IFAMA forum also included a workshop on the Global Food Security Index, developed by the Economist Intelligence Unit and commissioned by DuPont to facilitate dialogue about measuring food affordability, availability, safety and quality on a country-by-country basis.

Borel encouraged the IFAMA attendees to seriously consider the question “How will you help feed the world?”

Interview with DuPont Exec Jim Borel


IFAMA 23rd World Forum Photo Album

Agribusiness, Audio, Food

Georgia Ag Commissioner Welcomes IFAMA

Cindy Zimmerman

ifama-13-blackGeorgia Commissioner of Agriculture Gary Black was very pleased to have the International Food & Agribusiness Management Association (IFAMA) host its 23rd annual World Forum in the Peach State.

“Thank you for choosing our capitol city to be the host for this wonderful meeting,” Black said in welcoming the group on Tuesday. “It’s a great opportunity to celebrate what we all have in common – the future of agriculture.”

Black says agriculture is still the number one industry in Georgia, which ranks at the top in several commodities. “Five billion dollar poultry industry, still leading the nation in combined poultry for meat and eggs,” he said. “We lead the nation in pecan production, pulp for paper and wood products, and we’re still number one in peanuts.” But, the ag commissioner is quick to note how much the state has diversified. “We’ve just had the first harvest of olives on the eastern coast of America,” he said proudly and the state’s fruit and vegetable industry is worth over a billion dollars a year.

Tonight’s gala banquet will be held at one of the world’s largest food industry companies, Coca-Cola, proudly headquartered in Atlanta since its founding in 1886.

GA Ag Commissioner Welcomes IFAMA Interview with Gary Black
IFAMA 23rd World Forum Photo Album

Agribusiness, Audio

World Food Prize Honors Pioneers in Biotechnology

Talia Goes

WFPThe 2013 World Food Prize will honor three distinguished scientists – Marc Van Montagu of Belgium, and Mary-Dell Chilton and Robert T. Fraley of the United States.

Building upon the scientific discovery of the Double Helix structure of DNA in the 1950s, Van Montagu, Chilton, and Fraley each conducted groundbreaking molecular research on how a plant bacterium could be adapted as a tool to insert genes from another organism into plant cells, which could produce new genetic lines with highly favorable traits.

The revolutionary biotechnology discoveries of these three individuals – each working in separate facilities on two continents – unlocked the key to plant cell transformation using recombinant DNA. Their work led to the development of a host of genetically enhanced crops, which, by 2012, were grown on more than 170 million hectares around the globe by 17.3 million farmers, over 90 percent of whom were small resource-poor farmers in developing countries.

From their work in the laboratory to applying biotechnology innovations in farmers’ fields, the combined achievements of the 2013 World Food Prize Laureates have contributed significantly to increasing the quantity and availability of food.

Agribusiness, Biotech, Research, World Food Prize

Zimfo Bytes

Talia Goes

Zimfo Bytes

NAMA Executive Committee Looking to Future

Chuck Zimmerman

NAMA Executive Committee Mtg.The Executive Committee of the National Agri-Marketing Association has been doing strategizing and planning at its quarterly meeting in Missouri. We had a beautiful setting for it at NAMA President Paul Redhage’s house!

We want to encourage all of you to put the 2014 Agri-Marketing Conference on your calendar. It will be in Jacksonville, FL next year before returning to Kansas City in 2015. We need companies, media and agencies to support the event and make it the best conference ever. The dates are April 8-11, 2014.

We’ve looked at our strategic plan to make sure we’re staying on track with things like creating and developing industry alliances. We also worked on a draft of the organizational budget for next year. NAMA is in great shape folks and that’s because of all of you who have paid your dues and gotten involved!

Ag Groups, NAMA

Swanson Russell Welcomes New Account Supervisors

Talia Goes

Swanson Russell announces the hire of Amy Bugg and Heidi Grunkemeyer as account supervisors in the Omaha office.

buggBugg focuses on the agency’s agribusiness accounts. A graduate of the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign, she holds a bachelor’s degree in agricultural communications with an emphasis on advertising. Bugg previously worked as both a group account lead and team lead for AdFarm. She also served as an account supervisor for McCormick Company.

An Assumption, Ill. native, Bugg is a graduate of the Missouri Agricultural Leadership of Tomorrow (ALOT), Class XI. She currently serves on the National Agricultural Marketing Association (NAMA) Executive Committee and as an at-large board member of Ava’s Grace Scholarship Foundation.

grunkemeyerGrunkemeyer serves as an account supervisor for the agency’s health care division, heading up accounts including Barnes Jewish Hospital and Siteman Cancer Center as well as Fremont Area Medical Center. A Tekamah, Neb., native, she graduated with a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Creighton University in Omaha.

Grunkemeyer previously worked as an account manager for Swanson Russell in the late ‘90s, and has since worked at Children’s Hospital in Boston and a small agency in St. Louis. She spent the past nine years with Alegent Creighton Health in Omaha, most recently as the director of marketing and communications.

Advertising, Agribusiness, Marketing

Harvest is Plenty, Ag Laborers are Few

Cindy Zimmerman

It was over 2,000 years ago that Jesus said “The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few” and that is apparently very true today in the agribusiness world.

ifama-13-sonny“Here in the United States, just in the next five years based on surveys that we’ve done, we know we’re going to have about 60,000 jobs available in the agribusiness enterprise – and we’re generating only about 28,000 graduates,” said director of USDA’s National Institute of Food & Agriculture Sonny Ramaswamy at the 23rd annual International Food and Agribusiness Management Association World Forum on Tuesday. “Not enough people are wanting to get into the agricultural enterprise although there are fantastic opportunities and we need to be thinking of helping to develop the workforce.”

That’s really the whole goal of IFAMA, to develop the workforce of agribusiness to help feed a growing world population. “Population is the mother of all wicked problems,” said Ramaswamy. “At the core of out ability to feed this population are the farmers.” However, since farmers are being subjected to so many stressors – everything from environmental challenges to political issues – we need talent in a variety of disciplines to support them.

Ramaswamy’s presentation at IFAMA ran about 45 minutes but has a wealth of information so is well worth a listen – lots of great stuff here! IFAMA address by USDA's Sonny Ramaswamy


IFAMA 23rd World Forum Photo Album

Agribusiness, Audio, Food, USDA

Agribusiness Ties to Harvard

Cindy Zimmerman

ifama-13-maryWhen you think of agricultural education, Harvard is probably one of the last institutes of higher learning that comes to mind, but think again.

Mary Shelman is director of the agribusiness program at Harvard Business School and has been president of the International Food and Agribusiness Management Association (IFAMA).

“The very term agribusiness was created by a colleague of mine at Harvard Business School who wrote a book in 1958 called “The Concept of Agribusiness” so we’ve been looking at this field for an extremely long time,” Shelman said in an interview at the 23rd annual IFAMA World Forum this week. In fact, she says the same colleague who coined the term agribusiness was responsible for the creation of IFAMA 23 years ago as a way for industry and the academic community to work jointly toward professionalizing agribusiness education.

Listen to my interview with Mary here: Interview with outgoing IFAMA president Mary Shelman, Harvard Business School IFAMA president Mary Shelman remarks
IFAMA 23rd World Forum Photo Album

Agribusiness, Audio, Education

Novus CEO is New IFAMA President

Cindy Zimmerman

ifama-13-thadNovus International President and CEO Thad Simons will be the new president of the International Food and Agribusiness Management Association (IFAMA) Board of Directors for the next two years. IFAMA made the announcement at its 23rd Annual World Forum and Symposium.

IFAMA is a leading agribusiness nonprofit that brings together the best minds from all sectors of food production and consumption to improve the industry.

During his two-year term as IFAMA’s president, Simons says he will be specifically seeking to focus the organization’s efforts on global talent development for agriculture. I have interviewed Thad many times over the last several years and I can tell you that he is positively passionate about this organization and this mission.

Listen to my interview with Thad here: Interview with Novus CEO and IFAMA president Thad Simons


IFAMA 23rd World Forum Photo Album

Agribusiness, Audio, Food, Novus International