The American Simmental Association is headed to the Texas Panhandle for Fall Focus 2024. Farm Director KC Sheperd is talking with ASA’s Chip Kemp and Callie Cooley about this event set for August 23-27 in Amarillo, Texas.
The Texas Panhandle is an epicenter of beef production and is also home to industry-leading educational institutions like West Texas A&M University and Texas Tech University. The event offers a unique opportunity for beef industry producers and enthusiasts to learn about the latest updates on industry issues, technology, science, and more, straight from the experts themselves.
“Once a year, we get together in a thought-provoking, yet pretty intimate atmosphere where serious seedstock folks and some bright minds from the scientific community, and a lot of commercial folks get together and talk about some of the pressing issues across our industry,” Kemp said.
Friday, August 23, will include a tour of West Texas A&M University’s research feedlot, an ultrasound demonstration, a panel discussion about trends in the beef industry, a meat laboratory tour, a beef sensory panel, a tour of the Panhandle-Plains Historical Museum, and a Sod Poodles baseball game.
“We are certainly looking forward to that opportunity to visit with some of those experts in some of those areas,” Cooley said. “The education symposium the next day is the same thing. There are several topics that are going to be not only relevant and specific within the panhandle region, but they are certainly relevant to a broader audience. We are really looking forward to some of those topics and presentations.”
Saturday, August 24, industry-leading experts will cover topics including yield grade challenges and tallow value, beef on dairy, understanding consumer demand, the Ogallala Aquifer and water challenges, and labor. Attendees will also have the opportunity to attend a dinner recognizing the 2024 Golden Book Award and Lifetime Promoter recipients and retiring ASA Board of Trustees members.
The event will also include an ASA Board of Trustees meeting, which is open to participants and will include several opportunities to ask questions and share feedback. A set of dynamic speakers will be at this year’s event, Kemp said, talking about marketing, water issues, genetic evaluation, beef quality and carcass issues, and more.
“We have some of the greatest minds in the business coming to talk this year,” Kemp said.
To listen to Kemp and Cooley go into depth on individual speakers and topics to be featured at the event, click the listen bar above the story!
Everyone is invited! Registration for Fall Focus 2024 is free but required for planning. To see the whole schedule and learn more, head to fallfocus.org, or read the July/August issue of the Register magazine.
