2015 Iowa Hunger Summit

Sustainable intensification of agriculture will be a turning point for future land use required to meet the demand for food and fiber as the world population approaches 9 billion by 2050.

Richard Hatfield, MS Ag Economics Cornell and Managing Partner of Natural Capital East Africa in Nanyuki, Kenya, will present and discuss the Alan Savory TED video. The Savory TED video has received over 3 million viewings, highest in TED history.  Hatfield will provide an overview of the Savory intensified rotational grazing concept and system currently used on over 40 million acres around the globe. It is also used here in Iowa and is currently being implemented at the 8,000 acre Outreach Shallom Farm in Tanzania, East Africa. 

Dr. Ellen Dierenfeld, PhD in Animal Nutrition, Cornell, will present research data developed at the Shallom Farm in 2014 on the Sisal Project overview which was presented at the Hunger Summit in 2014. Dierenfeld will also introduce the 2015 Empowering Women in Rural Tanzania through Dairy Goats project focused on milk, yogurt, and cheese production. This project has been funded by The Rotary Club of Des Moines and The International Foundation.

Dr. Dierenfeld and Richard Hatfield will be available following the meeting for in-depth discussions and comments.

Organized by Outreach, Inc.

About Dr. Ellen Dierenfeld:

Ellen Dierenfeld, PhD brings extensive expertise in Comparative Animal Nutrition and Global Sustainable Agriculture, with over 20 years’ experience in basic and applied animal nutrition research. Ellen has managed several sustainable agriculture initiatives, with field work in six continents focusing on local/alternative feed ingredient utilization and animal production.   Knowledgeable with livestock, zoo, pet, and wildlife species, she has served as the Director of the Wildlife Nutrition Center at the Wildlife Conservation Society (Bronx Zoo), Staff Nutritionist at the Saint Louis Zoo, and the Manager of the Global Sustainability Programs at Novus International, Inc., and currently serves as Lead Scientist for Outreach’s Shallom Farm in Tanzania. Ellen has published more than 150 peer-reviewed articles on animal nutrition and sustainable agriculture, and co-authored the book, `Comparative Animal Nutrition and Metabolism`. She received the PhD in animal science from Cornell University.

About Mr. Rick McNary:

Rick is Vice President of Private and Public Partnerships for Outreach, Inc., a nonprofit based in Iowa with an international NGO in Tanzania.

Rick is an innovator and advocate in the hunger space as evidenced by the development of the Kansas Hunger Dialogue in conjunction with Universities Fighting World Hunger, which gathers top administrators, faculty, and students from Kansas’ institutions of higher learning to collaborate on hunger. The Hunger Dialogue is now being replicated in other states.  Rick is also the 2012 recipient of a National Innovation Award from the Alliance to End Hunger for his Healthy Foods/Hunger Free Community model. 

He serves as Treasurer of the Executive Board for the Alliance to End Hunger in Washington, D.C., where he co-chairs the Alliance’s Advocacy Committee. Rick also serves as an Advisor to the National Hunger Free Communities Network.

Rick is a frequent keynote speaker on the topic of world hunger and blogs for several national and international hunger sites. He is the author of, Hunger Bites: Bite Size Stories of Inspiration.  His novel, Voices on the Prairie, was released in the summer of 2015.  Rick lives in Kansas with his wife, Christine. They have five children and four grandchildren.

About Mr. Richard Hatfield:

Richard Hatfield is a third generation Kenyan who has worked in the conservation sector for 20 years and more recently the development sector.  His focus for the past 8 years has been on regeneration of pastoralist land and communities in Kenya and southern Ethiopia.  His main motivation is that no future can be sustained without healthy land; and that ultimately land degradation is a social issue, hence the need to focus on reinforcing and rebuilding communities.  He has created an umbrella of training colleagues, Natural Capital East Africa, which is involved in training, consultancy to land owners, and land management for land owners. Born and raised in Kenya, Hatfield is a Natural Resource Management specialist who has been working in both the development and conservation sectors in East Africa for the past 20 years; specializing in rangeland rehabilitation and management.  He is highly committed to African ‘triple bottom line’ development (social-environmental-economic). Richard received his MS Ag Economics from Cornell.