Popular Pig

Kyle has a passion for teaching. He discovered this passion while working for Kaplan Test Prep as he finished his Political Science degree at Texas A&M University. He has carried this passion throughout his legal career, teaching clients as he helps them to find and understand legal pathways out of labor bottlenecks. His innovation in solving perpetual labor shortages for businesses came shortly after graduating from Vanderbilt Law School. He and his wife, Natalie, began working on various types of immigration visas for their family construction business in Iowa. It was from their perspective as employers that they were able to see the vision for what could be accomplished through foreign recruitment and legal immigration. Kyle and Natalie have built a thriving practice from solid, creative, forward-thinking solutions that provide much-needed relief for their many clients throughout the United States. With one baby boy, three young daughters, and counting, Kyle enjoys spending time with his family on their property in the country, riding four-wheelers, hunting, and raising hogs.

Dave has been a veterinarian for more than 25 years and a computer programmer for more than 30. After a long period as a mixed animal vet he is now an Associate Professor at the University of Melbourne with a PhD in Animal Welfare of cattle, where he undertakes research in dairy cattle medicine, reproduction and animal welfare.  He is also editor-in-chief of the Australian Veterinary Journal and a director of the Australian Veterinary Association.

Dr. Lowe is 1994 graduate of the University of Illinois College of Veterinary Medicine and has been working with swine production companies across the United States since that time. Dr. Lowe completed the college’s Executive Veterinary Program in Swine Health Management in 2000 and returned to campus as a student in 2002 while continuing to practice full time. In 2005 he received a master of science degree in infectious disease management. He has maintained an active research program since completing his master’s, focusing on the management of viral respiratory disease in swine production systems. In 2012 he became board certified in food animal practice by the American Board of Veterinary Practitioners.

From 1997 to 2003 Dr. Lowe was a co-owner of Professional Swine Management, LLC and Carthage Veterinary Service, Ltd. in Carthage, Ill. In 2003 Dr. Lowe joined The Maschhoffs Inc. in Carlyle, Ill., as its director of health and production services. The Maschhoffs Inc. is one of the ten largest pork producers in North America, and Dr. Lowe led its breed-to-wean business and the health services group while the company expanded from 25,000 to 110,000 sows. Dr. Lowe returned to private practice in 2007 while continuing to work with The Maschhoffs, LLC. In 2009 Dr. Lowe accepted a part-time appointment to the faculty of the University of Illinois College of Veterinary Medicine, where he teaches production medicine. In 2011 he founded Lowe Consulting Ltd. to focus on assisting livestock producers with strategic decision making and process improvement. He has served on the American Association of Swine Veterinarians Board of Directors, was the recipient of the 2007 Allen D. Leman Science in Practice Award, and presented the 2010 Howard Dunne Memorial Lecture.

• The Apiam Animal Health conference in Australia.
• Freedom farrowing and EuroTier in Germany.
• Hog hotels and corn production in China.
• Argentina and its government incentivized growth in soy.
• The future of integration in agriculture
• Dr. Jim Lowe’s “golden nugget”

Dr. Amanda Reever was raised on a cattle, hog, and grain operation in Algona, IA, where she developed her interest in animal production and medicine. She received her DVM from Iowa State University in 2022, alongside a Master’s degree in Veterinary Preventive Medicine. Dr. Reever began working for Suidae right out of veterinary school, and she now resides with her husband in Manson, Iowa.

Dr. Brandi Burton is originally from Mt. Prospect, IL, a suburb of Chicago and attended the University of Illinois where she received a BS in Animal Sciences 2015 and her DVM in 2019. Shortly after graduation, she moved to Iowa to start her career with Suidae. Dr. Burton splits her time between veterinary services and field research. She currently resides with her family in Humboldt, IA.

Tara is a New Mexico native, 5th generation dairy farmer, an environmental scientist, and mom of two girls. Daniel, her husband, manages all day-to-day on his family dairy farm while Tara has her own career as an environmental consultant, speaker, and online agriculture advocate. Tara began sharing her story online through her platform, New Mexico Milkmaid, because she found that people often had misconceptions about farmers and modern farming, and she wanted to set the record straight about dairy farm life and on-farm sustainability. She now has a community of more than 73,000 followers. And she has had the opportunity to speak at national and global conferences about dairy sustainability including at the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization Committee on World Food Security and the Forbes AgTech Summit. Tara is also the Co-Founder of Elevate Ag, an online course to provide farmers and ranchers with the tools they need to successfully share their ag story and grow their businesses, and the Co-Founder of Discover Ag, a docuseries and podcast of being agriculture to people in a new way.

Dr. Derald Holtkamp is a Professor in the Department of Veterinary Diagnostics and Production Animal Medicine (VDPAM) in the College of Veterinary Medicine at Iowa State University (Ames, Iowa, U.S.). He received his DVM, MS in Agricultural Economics, and B.S. in Agricultural Business with a minor in statistics, all from Iowa State University. Prior to joining Iowa State, he was a private veterinary consultant. He has also served as a technical services veterinarian for ADViSYS Inc., Vice President of Swine Applications for MetaFarms Inc., Director of Pork Development for E-Markets, Inc., and veterinarian and service manager for Smithfield Foods in Warsaw, North Carolina. Dr. Holtkamp’s research focuses on managing infectious swine diseases, biosecurity, disease risk assessment, and the economics of animal health and disease. He has authored over 50 peer-reviewed publications, is a frequent speaker in the U.S. and internationally with over 240 invited presentations, and has mentored over 260 professional and graduate students. 

Joseph Kerns, President of Partners for Production Agriculture, has thirty years’ experience working with producers, suppliers, and mills to support agricultural operations. He leads a team of professionals with the purpose of understanding the financial parameters around agricultural markets so that those that he works with can thrive and prosper.

From vegetable farm manager to global ISO auditor, David then moved into the poultry sector when he purchased a UK broiler farm in 2004 and continues to operate a contract poultry farm management company in the UK. In 2018, David founded OPTIFarm. OPTIfarm is a very unique data driven support service, currently for poultry and swine, assessing real time farm data against animal behavioural knowledge and human considerations to increase productivity and welfare globally 24/7. David has a broad and open mind regarding the opportunities of data and digital solutions in farming and he has a passion for creating tangible value from digital solutions.

Elizabeth Rumley is a senior staff attorney at the National Agricultural Law Center in Fayetteville, Arkansas. At the Center, her primary research and scholarship focus is on legal issues in animal agriculture, and she frequently lectures on those issues and others to audiences nationwide. She has co-taught a course covering “Animals and Agricultural Production, Law and Policy” at the University of Nebraska College of Law and the University of Oklahoma College of Law, and has developed and teaches a graduate/undergraduate course discussing legal issues in animal agriculture at the University of Arkansas. Additionally, she teaches Environmental Law at the University of Arkansas.  She is licensed to practice law in Michigan, Ohio, and Oklahoma after earning her B.A. from Michigan State University, her J.D. cum laude from the University of Toledo College of Law, and her LL.M. in Agricultural Law from the University of Arkansas School of Law.

Disclaimer: This interview was conducted in May 2022. Since this interview SCOTUS has agreed to hear Prop 12 in the Supreme Court.

Emily Erickson grew up on a small, diversified livestock and crop farm near Dundee, MN.  Her parents bought their farm in the early ’80’s, right as the farm crisis hit.  Her dad raised pigs outdoors, a farrow to finish operation of about 100 sows at the time, and also farmed corn, soybeans and usually oats, for bedding. Emily graduated from South Dakota State University with a B.S. in Animal Science. She was fortunate to fall into an animal welfare role for a production system right at the start of the industry reacting to activists and welfare videos.  Emily spent 13 years internally auditing and monitoring the welfare of a 53,000 sow system.  She has sat on the committees for National Pork Board and Minnesota Pork and is currently still engaged on the Common Swine Industry Audit Task Force, which she has been a part of since the CSIA’s inception.  Emily is currently the Head of Human Resources for Wakefield Pork and lives in Jackson, MN with her two kiddos, August and Hazel, who keep her on her toes!  They enjoy spending time outdoors, going to her parent’s home farm to ride/drive Grampa’s Kubota and spending time with family.