“Your learning has not stopped when you left college, does not stop when you finish your training program, does not stop when you finish whatever it is you’ve done... even if you are in your 30s, 40s, 50s, or 60s, you have to continue to improve your skills and prepare for the future… which is going to be extremely competitive.” – Aidan Connolly.

Our guest is Aidan Connolly, another bright mind of the Global Swine Industry. Aidan is CEO of startup Cainthus and an adjunct professor at University College Dublin and China Agricultural University. He graduated with a bachelor’s degree in commerce from University College Dublin and a master’s degree in international marketing from the Smurfit School of Business, University College Dublin, Ireland. He is also an executive board member of the International Feed Industry Federation (IFIF), the National Chicken Council and the National Turkey Federation, and of the International Food and Agribusiness Management Association (IFAMA).

What you will learn:

• Things that seemed futuristic but are already starting to happen in livestock production;
• What is coming down the pipe and we should watch for, from an innovation standpoint;
• The future of agriculture;
• What separates successful swine professionals from those that are not.

Aidan’s favorite swine-related book: Modern Pig Production (John Gadd)

Aidan’s favorite book unrelated to swine: Sapiens (Yuval Noah)

Edited by Lauro Faccin

Today’s episode will cover “One of the most important decisions in swine production: dietary energy level”.

“If you get dietary energy right you can keep your costs as low as possible… but if you get your energy wrong, you can affect performance and net income in a negative way.” – Dr. John Patience.

Our guest is Dr. John Patience, another bright mind of the Global Swine Industry. Dr. Patience is a global leader in swine nutrition research and internationally recognized speaker, received the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences Outstanding Achievement in Research Award. Received his bachelor's degree in 1974 and his master's degree in 1976 from the University of Guelph, Ontario. He received his Doctor of Philosophy from Cornell University in 1985.

What you will learn:

• Why dietary energy is such an important decision;
• Understanding dietary energy in swine production;
• What is next for dietary energy;
• How can nutritionists figure out the optimum energy in swine diets;
• The importance of adjusting amino acids levels when changing energy level;
• The biggest problems when managing energy sources;
• What separates successful swine professionals from those that are not.

John’s favorite swine-related book: NRC (2012) and Comparative Nutrition of Fowl and Swine (Edwin Moran)

John’s favorite book unrelated to swine: No Man Alone (Wilder Penfield)

Edited by Lauro Faccin

Today’s episode will cover “Food production misconceptions and social media experiences”.

“[…] He gently laid her head down… he got out of the tractor, moved her head around like if she was gently sleeping. That is the type of culture we need to have on our farms. We have so much respect for these animals even after death, that we are still treating them with that dignity and that respect. If that had been videotaped, there was no one that could have argued that that person didn’t respect that animal. So, it goes all the way down to even our dead stock.” – Dr. Marissa Hake.

Our guest is Dr. Marissa Hake, another bright mind of the Global Livestock Industry. Dr. Hake is a graduate of Michigan State University where she received her Bachelor’s degree in Animal Science, a Doctorate in Veterinary Medicine and a Masters in Public Health. She is currently the staff veterinarian for Midwest Veal and is responsible for the welfare and health of over 30,000 veal calves. Dr. Hake spends most of her day working with small, family-owned veal farms throughout Indiana, Michigan and Ohio.

What you will learn:

• How she got involved in livestock and her career so far;
• The biggest food production misconceptions;
• Tips on managing the relationship with activists as well as on-farm experiences;
• The role on social media on tackling food production misconceptions;
• What separates successful livestock professionals from those that are not.

Marissa’s favorite book or resource in general: Bréne Brown’s books, Mindhunter and audiobooks/podcasts

Edited by Lauro Faccin

Today’s episode will cover “A simple tool that is changing swine production around the globe”.

“If you have fat, over-conditioned, sows you're burning a lot of money in feed costs and you're also going to have poor reproductive throughput.” – Dr. Mark Knauer.

Our guest is Dr. Mark Knauer, another bright mind of the Global Swine Industry. Dr. Knauer is Swine Extension Specialist at North Carolina State University, faculty at NCSU and the inventor of the caliper.

What you will learn:

• Estimating gilt weight at breeding;
• Increasing feeding level in late gestation;
• Importance of BCS;
• The Ins and Outs of the Sow caliper;
• What separates successful swine professionals from those that are not.

Mark’s favorite swine-related book: Swine Nutrition Guide

Edited by Lauro Faccin

Today’s episode will cover “Human capital in pig farms: issues and solutions”.

“We need to learn how to help ordinary people do extraordinary things on these farms. Meaningful work is one of the best therapeutic solutions for folks.” – Jonathon Hoek.

Our guest is Jonathon Hoek, another bright mind of the Global Swine Industry. Mr. Hoek has extensive swine production experience and is director of Premier BioSource and Summit Precision Production.

What you will learn:

• His thoughts on human capital availability and retention for the last several years in pig farms;
• Possible solutions and technology help;
• What separates successful swine professionals from those that are not.

Jonathon’s favorite swine-related book: Aspects of swine ecology (David Hollier) and Outdoor pig production (Keith Thronton)

Jonathon’s favorite book unrelated to swine: What's best next (Matt Perman)

Edited by Lauro Faccin

Today’s episode will cover the Evolution of the Australian pork industry and research of global interest.

“The single diet concept suggests that rather than having 5 phases from 20- to 110-kg, you can actually save costs without affecting performance just using 1 diet that might be formulated for a pig at 70- to 77-kg but fed all the way through.” – Dr. Roger Campbell.

Our guest is Dr. Roger Campbell, another bright mind of the Global Swine Industry. Dr. Campbell got his Ph.D. in 1973 in Nutrition and Physiology from the University of Melbourne. After that, he worked for a large integrator in Australia. From 2005 to 2018, he led the Pork CRC as their CEO with hundreds of experiments conducted and dozens of students trained. Recently, Roger opened his own consulting business named RG Campbell Advisory.

What you will learn:

• The development of his career;
• The evolution of the Australian pork industry (students, genetic importing, ASF);
• The Australian pork industry in the next 10 years;
• Recent research outcomes of global interest;
• What separates successful swine professionals from those that are not.

Roger’s favorite swine-related book: Mammalian protein metabolism and NRC (2012)

Roger’s favorite book unrelated to swine: Double helix and Brighter than a thousand suns

Edited by Lauro Faccin

Today’s episode will cover Pork Fat Quality and Diet Formulation: Lessons learned and the impact over the last 40 years.

“The more fat you feed a pig… the more it looks like the fat that you feed it.” – Dr. Jeff Hansen.

Our guest is Dr. Jeff Hansen, another bright mind of the Global Swine Industry. Dr. Hansen graduated with an M.S. from Texas A&M and Ph.D. in Swine Nutrition from Kansas State University. He was previously Director of Nutritional Programs with Murphy‐Brown/Smithfield, the largest pork producer in the world, for over 20 years, and brings extensive experience in nutrition, production management and feed manufacturing. After that, he joined Nutriquest as Director of Technical Sales and Service.

What you will learn:

• How he got involved in pig production and the development of his career;
• Definition of Pork Fat Quality and its importance;
• A Historical perspective on pork fat quality;
• Regional differences in the US based on ingredient availability;
• Thoughts on pork fat quality between different countries;
• Ways to manage pork fat quality;
• What separates successful swine professionals from those that are not.

Jeff’s favorite swine-related resource: Agricultural Research Council

Jeff’s favorite book unrelated to swine: The Servant

Edited by Lauro Faccin

Today’s episode will cover Tackling emerging diseases with producer-driven monitoring systems.

“If we have an ASF outbreak tomorrow… Just having the [disease monitoring] system up and being able to communicate in a timely matter [is essential].” – Dr. Andreia Arruda.

Our guest is Dr. Andreia Arruda, another bright mind of the Global Swine Industry. Dr. Arruda is a veterinarian with a Masters from the University of Minnesota and a Ph.D. in Epidemiology from the University of Guelph. She, then, held a one-year research position at the University of Minnesota as a post-doc and in 2017 joined the Department of Veterinary Preventive Medicine at The Ohio State University as an Assistant Professor.

What you will learn:

• Disease control programs and how do they work;
• Examples of disease monitoring programs;
• How she sees these platforms helping in the case of an emerging disease;
• Insights on how to make these programs sustainable in the long run;
• What separates successful swine professionals from those that are not.

Andreia’s favorite swine-related book: Diseases of Swine

Andreia’s favorite book unrelated to swine: The Paradox of Choice

Edited by Lauro Faccin

Today’s episode will cover the Importance of feed execution and how a production nutritionist values it.

“Our main goal, as swine nutritionists, is to get the right feed, to the right place, at the right time.” – Dr. Kyle Coble.

Our guest is Dr. Kyle Coble, another bright mind of the Global Swine Industry. Dr. Coble is a Swine Nutritionist for JBS, USA, and before that worked for New Fashion Pork in Jackson, MN. In 2010, he earned his B.S. in Animal Science at Oklahoma State University followed by a M.S. in Animal Science with an emphasis in Swine Nutrition in 2012. He graduated from Kansas State University with a Ph.D. in Swine Nutrition in 2015, investigating the effects of different by-product withdrawal strategies to decrease negative impacts on carcass yield and copper supplementation in finishing pigs. In 2014, Dr. Coble was awarded the International Ingredient Corporation Pinnacle Award for Outstanding Young Swine Nutrition Student. In 2015, he was selected as an American Society of Animal Science Young Scholar.

What you will learn:

• How he got involved in pig production and the development of his career;
• Definition of Feed Execution;
• The importance and the biggest challenges of Feed Execution;
• The value of feed execution;
• How to structure a nutrition department and the kind of team roles needed;
• How he gets the production staff on board with feed execution;
• What separates successful swine professionals from those that are not.

Kyle’s favorite swine-related book: Swine Nutrition (Lewis and Southern)

Kyle’s favorite book unrelated to swine: Grit

Edited by Lauro Faccin

Today’s episode will cover Thoughts on Pigs and People.

“Everyone wants to hire more people but it is actually the backdoor that is the problem because people are leaving about as fast as you can hire them. If you can ever get the backdoor fixed, the front door is not a big of an issue.” – Dr. Larry Coleman.

Our guest is Dr. Larry Coleman, another bright mind of the Global Swine Industry. Dr. Coleman obtained his Doctor of Veterinary Medicine degree from the University of Missouri in 1980. Following graduation, he accepted a position at a mixed food-animal practice in Broken Bow, Nebraska. In 1986, Coleman left Broken Bow to spend a year at the North Carolina State University working with swine integrators in that state. He returned to Broken Bow in 1987 and opened his own food-animal practice, where he remains to this day. Coleman's personal veterinary medicine passion is the "art and science" of getting employees to emotionally engage when they are taking care of animals. Coleman joined AASV in 1984 and has served on various AASV committees since that time.

What you will learn:

• How he got involved in pig production and the development of his career;
• His biggest lessons on pig production;
• The key to great pig health;
• Key aspects to create a powerful culture in the production system;
• Tactics that could be implemented today to improve the culture in farms;
• What separates successful swine professionals from those that are not.

Larry’s favorite swine-related resource: YouTube and podcasts

Larry’s favorite resource unrelated to swine: history books

Edited by Lauro Faccin