Dr. Bob Rowland with Kansas State University (left) and Dr. Max Rodibaugh (center), a swine practitioner from Indiana, were the last two speakers at the Boehringer Ingelheim Vetmedica’s (BIVI) Area Regional Control of PRRS seminar last week in Chicago. They are pictured here during the final segment of the seminar featuring a roundtable discussion with all presenters.
Max, who serves as chairman of the PRRS Task Force of the American Association of Swine Veterinarians, says building industry cooperation and support is critical to having a plan to control PRRS. “There has been a flurry of activity this summer and fall of different groups working on ideas for PRRS and we see a need to pull those together so we can keep that information in one place and disseminate it to the industry,” he says. The task force is considering a website specifically for PRRS control.
Bob Rowland is a professor at K State’s college of vet medicine and director of the PRRS CAP project which provides funding for PRRS control research through USDA. Ultimately, he says funding for PRRS control has to come from every segment of the industry. “I outlined kind of a NASCAR concept in which we bring together a lot of little legs on a caterpillar and use that to fund a large project,” Rowland says. Even though the swine industry is going through some very tough times right now, Rowland believes it is the ideal time to attack PRRS control as producers change to adapt to the economic situation.
Listen to or download back-to-back interviews with Drs. Rodibaugh and Rowland here:
Her name is Dr. Montserrat Torremorell, but most people just call her Dr. Montse (mont-see). She is an international expert in swine health at the University of Minnesota, joining the College of Veterinary Medicine earlier this year as the Al Leman Chair in Swine Medicine. So, she definitely knows her stuff when it comes to porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome, better known as PRRS.
The largest integrated dairy producer in Jordan is Hamoudeh Group and the U.S. Grains Council Corn Mission team visited their largest facility northeast of Amman which houses about 4,000 cows. Before getting a tour we heard a presentation from Marwan Hawari, pictured center showing some grain test results to team members, at their feed mill. I’ll have a video clip from that location to post soon.
The National Poultry Company in Jordan is managed by Mousa Wakileh who met with the U.S. Grains Council Corn Mission team. Mousa would like to see more education of traders and producers in order to increase imports of corn from the U.S. He’s also predicting a 50 percent increase in poultry consumption per capita in Jordan over the next five years which would also increase demand for American feed grains. According to Mousa, America is the preferred supplier of corn in Jordan.
“BASF and the NAAA are each devoted to sustaining and improving the field of agricultural aviation,” said Jim Gaffney, BASF Technical Market Manager. “This scholarship presents an opportunity for us to work together to help foster scenarios in which new pilots are provided with a foundation for success in the field of aerial application.”
Here is the perfect present for that tractor lover on your list – 
Only 200 of these tractors have been produced to benefit the NAFB Foundation. Numbers 1-5 were auctioned live during the Foundation Auction and Reception at the NAFB Convention – one of which was purchased by Monsanto’s Tami Craig Shilling, pictured here with Lyle Orwig of Charleston-Orwig (who also bought one, if I remember correctly.)