NEDPA Conference highlights and award winners
More than 400 of the dairy industry’s brightest and best assembled recently at the 2012 Northeast Dairy Producers Association (NEDPA) Conference in central New York State. Presented by NEDPA and Cornell’s PRO-DAIRY, the two-day conference provided dairy producers, agri-service personnel, educators, and students with the global perspective, hands-on strategies, and scientific facts they’ll use to propel their industry to even more progressive and profitable levels.
Guest speakers from the U.K. and U.S. explored a broad range of topics including:
- How U.S. agriculture and dairy industry are impacted by a world increasingly in chaos
- How dairies can capture more value from the marketplace
- Why it’s critical that we speak up to support the consumer’s right to choose in the dairy marketplace
- Why dairy businesses need to take more leadership in the role as educators of the public
- How to minimize challenges and embrace opportunities present in today’s NY dairy industry with the latest technologies and business analysis techniques
- What impact new genomic technologies have on producing herd replacements
- How to use activity-based accounting systems to manage multiple business sites
- How to employ on-farm mass balance assessments to use nutrients more efficiently
- Which management tools best control incidence of “today’s” ketosis
- How updated research champions dairy products’ important contribution to U.S. intake of key nutrients, debunks 1950’s failed theory that fats lead to heart disease and saturated fats raise cholesterol levels
A panel comprised of Cornell researcher, veterinarian and dairy producer also shared on-farm lessons learned establishing successful group-housed feeding systems for young calves in locations across the state. This presentation prompted an extended and spirited discussion with the audience, always eager for battle-tested “take home.”
Left: Durfee, Right: Fisher
NEDPA’s Executive Director Caroline Potter provided the membership with a detailed update on the association’s make up, recent accomplishments, strategic plan for the near future, and then introduced the Board’s recently-elected Directors.
Three honored with awards provided by the family of Richard Popp
Seniors Jordan Fisher and Daniel Durfee, both active in Cornell Dairy Fellows and Cornell University Dairy Science Club, have exhibited leadership and excellence through participation in several work-related internships in the industry, as well as educational trips within the U.S. and abroad. Both expressed eagerness to put their skills to work in production dairy upon their graduation, and spoke highly of their interaction with professors and advisors during their careers at Cornell. Fisher, of Madrid, NY and Durfee, of Chittenango, NY also praised their families for support along the way. Dick Popp challenged the Northeast dairy industry to become one of the progressive leaders in the country. He was keenly interested in dairy students and welcomed them regularly to his western NY farm until his death in 1997. The scholarship check, made possible by his wife Jan and their adult children, is presented annually.
Dr. Dave Galton
Dr. David Galton, long-time dairy professor and winning judging coach, head of the Cornell Dairy Management Group, former director of PRO-DAIRY, and advisor to scores of students, gratefully received the Richard Popp Memorial Leadership Award. He was introduced with words of affection and respect by one of NEDPA’s past chairmen and three former students who are all active in dairy careers. Dick Popp’s daughter Aileen, also one of “Doc’s” students, sent a note of congratulations to be shared in her absence.
NEDPA is a group of forward-looking dairy producers committed to an efficient, profitable, environmentally-responsible and consumer conscious dairy industry in the Northeast. For more information visit www.nedpa.org.