VIDEO INTERVIEW: Talking stakeholder collaboration and technological advancements in animal agriculture with Stephen Cisneros from TEXAS A&M AGRILIFE RESEARCH

In this exclusive interview ahead of the Animal AgTech Innovation Summit, Stephen Cisneros, Executive Associate Director at Texas A&M AgriLife Research, answers questions about animal agriculture, stakeholder collaboration and advancements in intelligent agricultural systems.

1. How does Texas A&M AgriLife Research work with the different stakeholders in animal agriculture? (00:50)
2. Why is it important to get all of these major players, be them the industry stakeholders and the established names, down to the start-ups that are trying to make a name for themselves all in one place? (02:07)
3. You're hosting a fireside chat conversation on the topic of advancing intelligent agricultural systems. Can you give us a little bit of a preview as to what that's going to look like? (03:34)
4. What are you excited to see at the Animal AgTech Innovation Summit and who are you looking forward to meeting? (05:22)

Jamie Reid: Hi everybody. I'm Jamie Reed. I'm the business development partnership manager for the Animal AgTech Innovation summit and it's my pleasure today to be joined by Stephen Cisneros from the Texas A&M AgriLife Research. Good morning, Stephen.

Stephen Cisneros: Good morning, Jamie. Thanks for having me.

JR: No problem at all. Pleasure to speak to you as always. You're going to be joining us in Dallas in well, as we're recording today. Three weeks from now, 22 days. So it's all coming up very, very quickly.

Obviously A&M have been a big supporter of the event and the AgriLife Research part of the organisation is joining us as a platinum partner this year, bringing a fantastic team of people along to really dive deep into the conversations. I guess for our audience that are watching this today, we've got a couple of questions we'd like to ask. First and foremost: How does Texas A&M AgriLife Research work with the different stakeholders in animal agriculture?

SC: Oh, thanks, Jamie. I think great question. So Texas A&M AgriLife Research is the AG and Natural Resource agency for the state of Texas.

We conduct research with 600 scientists across all aspects of the ag industry, but specifically we engage stakeholders through unbiased research supporting discovering innovation, sustainable production, focus on the economics of that production, and then how does agriculture affect health? With those 600 scientists across the state conducting research.

This depth allows us to provide broad thought leadership on future opportunities and directions in the animal agriculture sector. So, we touch everything from soil to space, believe that agriculture is a foundational asset to our livelihood, from the food you eat to the water you drink to the clothes you wear. And so just super excited to engage with different stakeholders in this space to specifically talk about animal agriculture and what that means to the US and specifically the state of Texas.

JR: Yeah, absolutely. And you touched upon it there with the types of people that we're going to have visiting and attending and getting involved in the conversations in Dallas.

Why is it important to get all of these major players, be them the industry stakeholders and the established names, down to the startups that are trying to make a name for themselves all in one place, like at the Animal AgTech Innovation summit?

SC: With this being in Dallas in our backyard, we had to get involved. You know, we feel as a leadership team for AgriLife Research that there is no substitute for one-on-one interface. This opportunity allows us to collaborate with leaders in this space and it's an exciting space. It is fast-paced, all different types of development going on in innovation. And so just being able to have that connectivity in that one-on-one interface is extremely important to us and the team of scientists that we're bringing to Dallas.

Additionally, just the opportunity to participate in multiple discussions and have different viewpoints and conversations on similar topics to see where some of this advancement in technology is going and how that relates back to research and what may be needed there from a from an entity that can collaborate and provide that unbiased research and support both to public and private stakeholders.

JR: Yeah, fantastic. And also, there's going to be a lot of interesting people that are coming to the summit that are really keen to learn more about all the solutions and the facilities and the partnerships and the technical elements that the AgriLife Research units can offer them.

You're going to be talking extensively about some of these topics during the event. And one of the specifics is you're hosting a fireside chat conversation on the topic of advancing intelligent agricultural systems. Can you give us a little bit of a preview as to what that's going to look like?

SC: Absolutely. So you know the world anticipates a 30% increase in population growth by 2050. And so we have a significant amount of growth and we're having to feed that population typically with less assets with regards to land and water, you know policy changes regularly occurring. And so we really want to just talk with the panel about how intelligent systems are needed to meet the growing demands of animal production. And doing it on less assets or less land than what we have today on top of that, we'll dive into how healthier animal and production systems can deal with waste and other challenges that they're currently facing and how some of the development of that technology is addressing those issues. And then again, just being able to talk with some of our partners from the private sector that we're currently conducting research with about how our unbiased research and collaboration are essential to rapidly develop and scale these solutions to benefit the industry and consumers.

Our takeaway from visiting with stakeholders really across the US is there is a hunger to adopt these different technologies. It's just a matter of getting the information out there to them and showing them how they work to benefit the producers at the lowest level so that they can ultimately continue to work in this space and meet the demands that we face.

JR: Yeah, excellent. And now I'm going to throw a curveball at you. Obviously, for the people watching this, they'll probably know that we work out some questions and things we want to talk about beforehand. I'd like to throw a curveball at the last minute.

Stephen, personally, for you, what are you excited about seeing at the event or are there specific types of businesses that you're trying to target or you want to learn more about? Give me a sort of like the top two or three things you think you're going to be excited about seeing?

SC: So for me personally, I'm wearing two hats in this role, right? So I serve as the COO of an ag and natural resource agency and so super excited to not only visit with some of our current collaborators from the private sector that are that are on the agenda either speaking or attending, but also look for new opportunities and understand what advancements are occurring in this space.

On the personal side, I grew up in animal ag, animal production, specifically on the beef cattle operation in South Texas and I'm currently involved in another operation here in Central TX. And so again, just seeing the advancements, I think being able to bring these individuals together underneath one roof and see the direction that we are going to advance this space so that we as producers can maintain our operations and do it in a manner that is supporting healthier lives. But doing it in a way that maybe economically sustainable. And so just really excited, I mean, when you take a look at the depth of the individuals that you'll have speaking and the list of attendees. Just really, really excited. I think it's going to be an unbelievable event. We are happy to participate and really look forward to engaging all of the attendees here in the next few weeks.

JR: Yeah, we're really super excited as well. As I said three weeks to go until, we get to see each other face to face and hopefully we can help facilitate some of those conversations for you.

For all those watching, we've got three weeks. As I said, we're going to keep bashing that on home because we are going to reach capacity pretty quickly. Please do get registered to come to the summit if you're going to be at the summit, make sure you grab Stephen, grab any of the A&M colleagues that are going to be there. You've got an exhibition booth, space in the networking area, over the two days, plenty of opportunities to engage with Stephen and his colleagues. So do reach out, get in touch, make those meetings happen and yeah, we'll see you in Dallas in a few weeks from now. So for now, Stephen, thank you so much. And we'll see you very soon.

SC: All right, Jamie, I appreciate it. Thanks and gig, em.

JR: Take care.