At the Cattle Industry Summer Business Meeting, Senior Farm and Ranch Broadcaster, Ron Hays, is visiting with the Executive Director of Nutrition Research at the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, Dr. Shalene McNeill, about merging nutrition research and sustainability science.
Coverage from the 2024 Cattle Industry Summer Business Meeting in San Diego is being powered by Farm Data Services of Stillwater.
“It is easy for us, even as scientists, to live in our bubbles,” Dr. McNeill said. “Sometimes in Nutrition Science, we see that scientists do their research, but they lose sight of the rest of the topics surrounding a healthy sustainable diet.”
She went on to explain that many leading experts in protein research were being asked how their area of study impacts the environment, which led to nutritionists asking how they can become more informed about the entire beef production system.
“We did this to feel confident, as nutrition researchers, that it is part of the protein we should be recommending as nutrition scientists,” Dr. McNeill explained. “We wanted to mix those protein experts with leading ruminant nutrition experts and leading sustainability experts so that they could have a peer-to-peer dialog about this huge, grand challenge that we have in the world: How are we going to supply the world with nourishing sustainable proteins?”
A select group of key leaders, including the Texas Beef Council, who were already considering that question was assembled at the East Foundation in South Texas. Dr. McNeil said “We merged these scientists at a large ranch in South Texas, and they debated. We weren’t there to just educate them with our message. This was an opportunity for them to touch the ground, see first-hand what the cattle graze on, and ask those critical questions.
“As they dialogued, we saw that their worldview expanded. They left with confidence in the way beef is raised. I think we will see them bring that into their peer communities because they were excited about inviting other scientists to ranches and getting that conversation going.”
She reiterated that it is more than educating those leaders rather, it is about giving them a space to solve problems within some of those key topics. Nutrition and sustainability are not two separate topics. They are joined in the world of human nutrition. Ultimately, sustainability is how to sustain human life, and nutrition is a large part of that.
McNeill said, “Our product has to deliver on both, and it does, but we have to educate those scientific communities. Right now, there is a Nutrition Science and a field of Sustainability Science. Unless those people are in the same room talking about sustainable nutrition, we don’t get the conversations that we need to happen for the beef industry.”
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