AIC 2016 Conference Speaker Highlight – Dissemination Strategies and Policies for AgResearch
AIC 2016: Disseminating Agricultural Research – Bridging the gap between idea and adoption takes place April 13-14, 2016 in Ottawa.
Speaker Highlight:
Tracy Herbert, Beef Extension Coordinator 
Beef Cattle Research Council (BCRC)
Tracy Herbert oversees the implementation of the Beef Cattle Research Council’s Knowledge Dissemination and Technology Transfer Strategy to accelerate the uptake of innovations in the beef industry related to production efficiencies, food safety, carcass quality, environmental stewardship and animal health. She manages www.BeefResearch.ca, a comprehensive science-based resource for beef industry stakeholders, and coordinates the development and utilization of various extension resources including fact sheets, decision-making tools, webinars and videos.
Tracy also coordinates the BCRC’s Beef Researcher Mentorship Program and works to improve collaborations that improve technology transfer in Canada’s beef industry.
She has Bachelor of Arts degrees in Psychology and Communications Studies from the University of Calgary. Her family operates a mixed farm with purebred cattle in Northwest Saskatchewan.
Drew Black, Director of Environment and Science Policy
Canadian Federation of Agriculture
The Canadian Federation of Agriculture represents over 200,000 Canadian farmers and farm families and strives to provide a single voice for farmers at the federal level.
Drew Black has worked on environmental policy analysis and research for the past five years at the federal level on a wide range of files with sustainability implications. He sits on a number of different federal advisory committees and value-chain roundtables which seek to address environmental issues in agricultural production and improve sustainability.
Drew works to ensure that producers’ perspectives are heard and considered in the development of federal environmental legislation, regulation and policy and is currently involved in seeking greater recognition for the voluntary actions that producers are taking to limit their impact to the environment and improve sustainability. He has worked on a number of environmental research projects in the past and has more recently worked to coordinate the development of the CFA’s research policy and recommendations for the role of research within the next Agricultural Policy Framework.
Tracy and Drew will be joined by Dr. Andreas Boecker, Associate Professor, University of Guelph to discuss Dissemination Strategies and Policies for Agricultural Research at AIC 2016.
Look for more speaker announcements on the conference website in the weeks to come!