California’s top agricultural official will share her vision for the agribusiness community at the Agricultural Business Management Conference Nov. 10 in Fresno, hosted by Fresno State’s Center for Agricultural Business.
A luncheon address by Karen Ross, secretary of the Department of Food and Agriculture, will keynote the 30th annual event at the Radisson Hotel and Conference Center downtown.
Conference participants will receive information from experts in areas such as water storage and delivery, immigration and labor issues, international exporting opportunities and global food production, said conference chair Mechel Paggi, director of the Center for Agricultural Business.
The event is hosted annually by center and co-sponsored by Bank of America Merrill Lynch and the California Agricultural Technology Institute (CATI), based at Fresno State.
Opening the half-day conference with an 8:15 a.m. address will be Corny Gallagher, senior vice president and agribusiness executive for Global Commercial Banking at Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Gallagher’s team coordinates the bank’s agribusiness and food products portfolio. His topic is “The California Central Valley’s Role in the Challenges and Opportunities of Feeding a Hungry World: 9 Billion by 2050.”
At 9 a.m., Terry Barr, senior director of industry research at CoBank, which specializes in lending to rural enterprises, will expand on Gallagher’s remarks by addressing “Volatility and Emerging Opportunities” for California agribusinesses.
James Christie, president and managing partner of Sacramento-based Bryant Christie Inc., which specializes in helping American firms gain access in the global marketplace, will present an international markets update.
Following a morning break, Dr. James T. Lapsley, adjunct associate professor in the Department of Viticulture and Enology at University of California, Davis, will talk about the San Joaquin Valley wine grape and nut industries in the past and implications for the future.
California water will be the focus of a discussion led by Kamyar Guivetchi, manager of Statewide Integrated Water Management for the Department of Water Resources and labor issues will be discussed by Monte Lake of CJ Lake, based in Washington D.C.
Conference registration is $100 before Nov. 4 and $125 after that date.
For more information, call 559-278-4405 or visit http://cab.cati.csufresno.edu/.
(Text by Steve Olson, publications editor of the California Agricultural Technology Institute)
