Wrapping up the Global Dairy 500 Conference was Dr. Pearse Lyons, Alltech President. Dr. Lyons summarized many of the presentations with a series of take home messages. The focus was on the future of dairy farming, the integration of a brand, methane production, cow comfort, tourist attractions, education, milk marketing with nutrition also being a key topic. Additionally, a strong message that came out of the presentations was to “record the data” and that body conditioning is critical. As Dr. Lyons said, “Talk to the cow and the cow will talk to you.”
During his closing remarks Dr. Lyons introduced the Agri Aware program that Alltech has sponsored. The educational program for school children of all ages now has it’s first video module featuring “A Day in the Life of a Dairy Farmer.” We watched the video and then Dr. Lyons called on participants to go back home, take the program and have it translated into their languages.
You can listen to Dr. Lyons remarks below. And don’t forget to check out my photo album from the event. If you didn’t attend you can see what you missed!
The final panel discussion at the Global Dairy 500 Conference focused on future technologies in the dairy industry. Presenting were Matthew Smith, Alltech and Dr. Karl Dawson, Alltech.
I spoke with Dr. Dawson immediately following his remarks. He says some of the technologies in methane recovery offer a new cost saving line for the farmer by producing bioenergy. Feed management technologies offer a lot as they change, especially in nitrogen management. He says their goal was to bring these to the attention of the dairy farmer so they will consider them as they make future plans.
You can listen to my interview with Dr. Dawson below:
What are the 5 things you would do differently in dairy today? That was the question our opening panel on the final day of the Global Dairy 500 Conference had to answer. Amazingly they each seemed to have very similar answers.
I spoke with panelist Nigel Lok, Nigel Lok Family Trust, South Africa. He says they milk about 700 cows.
Before getting back to the dairy portion of the Global Dairy 500 Conference I have one more video clip from our visit to the Kentucky Horse Park. This one was during our ring show that included a set of miniature horses pulling a wagon. I thought you’d enjoy it.
The participants in the Global Dairy 500 Conference were treated to a show at the Kentucky Horse Park that included many different horse breeds and traditional costumes.
I spoke with rider of the Arabian horse named D’artagnan.
He’s 11 years old and on loan to the Park by his owner.
The Kentucky Horse Park opened in 1978 and is the world’s only park dedicated to man’s relationship with the horse.
I also shot a video clip which includes an interview with the other horses and riders.
You can listen to my interview about the Arabian horse below:
The future of milk marketing was the subject of our last panel of the day here at the Global Dairy 500 Conference. The afternoon activities include tours of the Alltech headquarters and a dinner at Kentucky Horse Park.
I spoke with Harm Holman, European Dairy Farmers, Netherlands after the session concluded. He’s pictured tall and in the middle. Harm says he milks 140 cows.
He says it’s very important to be an entrepreneur that has to make a profit and to be competitive. Like other panelists he sees larger farms and less farmers in the future. In his part of the world he says that those who have the most simple systems are doing the best. He also believes that becoming more efficient and lowering input costs is vital to success in dairy farming today. He’s optimistic for the best farmers in the future, meaning that not everyone will survive in the next 5 to 10 years.
I mentioned the breakout discussion groups that took place at the Global Dairy 500 Conference. The Alltech YouTubers put together a nice video to give you a very good perspective of what it was like to participate.
To provide a global perspective on dairy systems the Global Dairy 500 Conference featured a panel with participants from the USA, New Zealand and South Africa. I spoke with Bryan Beeston, Dairy Business Centre, New Zealand, seated on the right. He’s a dairy farmer involved in a collective type dairy company.
Bryan says he moved to New Zealand to start a dairy farm and the opportunities there worked very well for him. He says they have younger farmers and opportunities that allow them to stair step their way into a dairy farm. One way they accomplish this is with a share milk system that allows someone to get started with a vested interest in the dairy and they get paid based on how efficient and profitable they are. They can then move up to owning their own cows and plants.
Bryan is very enthusiastic about the future of dairy farmer. He says there are areas like Asia where a lot of opportunity exists to help feed people in a growing economy.
At an international conference like the Global Dairy 500 Conference translators are absolutely necessary. We have many of them here. During a break this morning I spoke with Irina Zablith (right) who is not only a translator but a veterinarian from Brazil. She’s translating into Portugese.
She says it’s simultaneous translation. They do get some pre-talk information like power point slides but not an actual written speech. She says it becomes challenging at times when a speaker talks very fast.
Irina says the global market has grown to the point of needing more translations so she started working with groups of Brazilians who would travel to other countries and needed her service. She travels to conferences like this several times a year.
Going back to basics and taking care of the “walking fermenter” was the subject of Juan Tricarico’s presentation at the Global Dairy 500 Conference. I just love that term and Juan explains it in my interview with him.
Looking into the future for the dairy farmer Juan says dairy farmers need to be efficient with nutrient use. He believes there needs to be a change in the way we feed dairy cows and that includes better use of forage. He says that a lot of producers are already feeding healthier diets that sustain reasonable milk levels. He does recommend that the forages farmers are working with are the best they can possibly have.
Trends and technologies in the diary industry was the subject of the first presentation on day two of the Global Dairy 500 Conference. Presenting was Jay Johnston, Ritchie Feed and Seed, Canada.
Jays says “it is not a fun time” in the dairy business. That means it’s time for dairy farmers to look at efficiency closer than ever. He says “we’re leaving 15-20% on the table.”
When it comes to trends he says “we’re trying to get that 20% back.” He says he’s working on a new protein product that will help with costs savings. Feed components are a very important he says.
He does encourage dairy farmers to keep smiling because he believes things will get better.
One of our domestic dairy producers attending the Global Dairy 500 Conference is Daniel Williams, seated to the left in the photo. Daniel has an 800 cow dairy in Madison, GA.
When it comes to challenges he says right now it’s “money.” That includes becoming more efficient and watching what you spend and on what. He thinks the Conference has been very helpful, especially one of the morning speakers the first day.
Like others I’ve spoken with, he says that all dairy farmers in the world are having trouble making it right now. He thought that getting to talk with other farmers has made him feel better about where he’s at with his operation right now.
In the theme of global dairy farming we had discussion dinner tables with international people like at my table where we had farmers from the USA, Colombia, Brazil and South Africa.
There were six different topics for each discussion dinner room. Mine focused on silage but others included mastitis and somatic cell count control, reproduction, the importance of grazing, economics of scale: large herd sizes and toxins and toxicology.
Dinner time last night at the Global Dairy 500 Conference featured multiple subject discussions. You picked your topic and then participated in a discussion after eating.
I attended the Silage Discussion Dinner led by Matthew Smith, Alltech. You can see Matthew getting his slides ready for the start of the discussion. He works for the company in New Zealand and has focused on silage during his career. When it comes to silage he says he encourages producers to “get excited about it.” He says the important thing to remember is how important it is as a feed ingredient. Deciding what seed to put in the ground is one of the most important decisions to make up front according to Matthew.
Here at the dinner his hope was to present silage as “good news.” He says cutting your way around the corners with silage in your operation is just not the way to go.
You can watch a portion of Matthew’s discussion dinner here.
The afternoon breakout sessions at the Global Dairy 500 Conference are summarized immediately in a group setting and the session is led by Dr. Pearse Lyons, President of Alltech. Here is one of the participants stating what his discussion table talked about.
We get a break after this session until a series of discussion dinners this evening which I’ll be participating in so there’s plenty more to come. The Conference doesn’t conclude until mid day on Wednesday.
To get a feel for the discussion you can watch a video of Dr. Lyons speaking to another discussion group participant.
It’s always good to hear what other dairy farmers have to say. In this video clip you can hear several of the farmers attending the Global Dairy 500 Conference talk about their industry and the challenges facing it. Topics include the economy, overproduction of milk, silage quality, and people management.
After the morning sessions and lunch the Global Dairy 500 participants sit at discussion tables. These breakout sessions are very lively and interactive and on many different topics.
I followed along with one led by Brent Lawrence, Alltech. Brent handles the southeast territory of Florida and Georgia. At his table were dairy farmers from the USA, Germany, Korea and the Ukraine. He says the main topic dealt with the sustainability of the dairy industry. They discussed the need to educate the public and be environmentally friendly.
I shot a video clip so you can get a true feel for what the sessions are like.
The Global Dairy 500 Conference is a truly international one. There are farmers here from all over the world which requires a lot of translators who are working very hard in their booths at the back of the conference presentation rooms.
One of the groups I ran into early is from Germany. They were all enjoying an early sample of Bluegrass Sundown, a blend of bourbon, coffee and Irish Cream. It is fantastic btw. I had to sample as well.
In the middle of this happy group is Henry. He spoke very good English so he got volunteered to speak with me. He has about 450 dairy cows and also row crops on his farm. He says he’s always on the search for new technology because it will make him more efficient. Henry echoes a comment I’ve heard a number of times today and that is that dairy farmers globally are suffering with the same problems, namely the price of milk.
He says the economy is the biggest challenge facing him and getting better production. He says he spoke to a farmer from Ohio who has just moved out of the dairy business due to the economics. He is looking forward to talking with other farmers.
To tell dairy farmers attending the Global Dairy 500 Conference what to “leave in and what to take out” was Mike Hutjens, University of Illinois. Mike is very passionate about the diary business and so enthusiastic that our translators had to get him to slow down so they could translate for our international audience.
Hutjens addressed feed questions and says he boiled the answers down to a few main points or suggestions. To start with he suggests looking at forages and forage quality. Then he suggests maintaining milk production and not giving up milk production. He says to look at feed additives since many are very cheap right now. He says the price of milk may come back short term and it’s important to have the right team on the field using a football analogy. When it comes to nutrition he says that when you go with the premise that you can’t give up milk, then you have to look at substitute feed choices that may be more economical.
When it comes to questions from the attendees here he says he gets asked a lot about new corn varieties and chopping the silage and how long to store it. He says producers are asking how to make things work more efficiently for them where they are. Looking ahead he still sees some tough times but with some bright spots like reasonable feed costs.
Wrapping up the Global Dairy 500 Conference was Dr. Pearse Lyons, Alltech President. Dr. Lyons summarized many of the presentations with a series of take home messages. The focus was on the future of dairy farming, the integration of a brand, methane production, cow comfort, tourist attractions, education, milk marketing with nutrition also being a key topic. Additionally, a strong message that came out of the presentations was to “record the data” and that body conditioning is critical. As Dr. Lyons said, “Talk to the cow and the cow will talk to you.”
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The final panel discussion at the Global Dairy 500 Conference focused on future technologies in the dairy industry. Presenting were Matthew Smith, Alltech and Dr. Karl Dawson, Alltech.
What are the 5 things you would do differently in dairy today? That was the question our opening panel on the final day of the Global Dairy 500 Conference had to answer. Amazingly they each seemed to have very similar answers.
The participants in the Global Dairy 500 Conference were treated to a show at the 
The future of milk marketing was the subject of our last panel of the day here at the Global Dairy 500 Conference. The afternoon activities include tours of the Alltech headquarters and a dinner at Kentucky Horse Park.
To provide a global perspective on dairy systems the Global Dairy 500 Conference featured a panel with participants from the USA, New Zealand and South Africa. I spoke with Bryan Beeston, Dairy Business Centre, New Zealand, seated on the right. He’s a dairy farmer involved in a collective type dairy company.
At an international conference like the Global Dairy 500 Conference translators are absolutely necessary. We have many of them here. During a break this morning I spoke with Irina Zablith (right) who is not only a translator but a veterinarian from Brazil. She’s translating into Portugese.
Going back to basics and taking care of the “walking fermenter” was the subject of Juan Tricarico’s presentation at the Global Dairy 500 Conference. I just love that term and Juan explains it in my interview with him.
Trends and technologies in the diary industry was the subject of the first presentation on day two of the Global Dairy 500 Conference. Presenting was Jay Johnston, 
One of our domestic dairy producers attending the Global Dairy 500 Conference is Daniel Williams, seated to the left in the photo. Daniel has an 800 cow dairy in Madison, GA.
In the theme of global dairy farming we had discussion dinner tables with international people like at my table where we had farmers from the USA, Colombia, Brazil and South Africa. 
Dinner time last night at the Global Dairy 500 Conference featured multiple subject discussions. You picked your topic and then participated in a discussion after eating.
The afternoon breakout sessions at the Global Dairy 500 Conference are summarized immediately in a group setting and the session is led by Dr. Pearse Lyons, President of Alltech. Here is one of the participants stating what his discussion table talked about.
After the morning sessions and lunch the Global Dairy 500 participants sit at discussion tables. These breakout sessions are very lively and interactive and on many different topics.
The Global Dairy 500 Conference is a truly international one. There are farmers here from all over the world which requires a lot of translators who are working very hard in their booths at the back of the conference presentation rooms.
In the middle of this happy group is Henry. He spoke very good English so he got volunteered to speak with me. He has about 450 dairy cows and also row crops on his farm. He says he’s always on the search for new technology because it will make him more efficient. Henry echoes a comment I’ve heard a number of times today and that is that dairy farmers globally are suffering with the same problems, namely the price of milk. 
To tell dairy farmers attending the Global Dairy 500 Conference what to “leave in and what to take out” was Mike Hutjens, University of Illinois. Mike is very passionate about the diary business and so enthusiastic that our translators had to get him to slow down so they could translate for our international audience.