Coming together in community – Animal Agriculture Alliance Stakeholders Summit strengthens connections and builds up voices for the animal agriculture

Having a vocal, connected, and proactive community has become an absolute necessity in animal agriculture, especially when it comes to sharing our achievements outside the barnyard.

Building this community is a key priority behind the Animal Agriculture Alliance’s annual Stakeholders Summit. This year’s Summit, held May 4-5 in Arlington, Virginia, brought together more than 300 representatives of our diverse, innovative, and dedicated community. In keynotes, panel discussions, and networking opportunities, it was so exciting to see leaders from all paths come together over a shared commitment to advancing animal agriculture’s future.

From farmers and ranchers to journalists, social media gurus, academics, security (and crisis communications!) experts, communication professionals, and more – the Summit continues to attract the best and brightest, and we at the Alliance are honored by attendees taking the time out of their busy schedules to participate.

Our keynote speaker Ray Starling, former White House agriculture advisor and North Carolina Chamber of Commerce General Counsel, shared some tough truths about gaps between food “insiders” who understand the food system and are proud of its achievements and “outsiders” who are convinced that the food system is irrevocably “broken.” The influence of this second view is large and growing – even internet searches and artificial intelligence tools are more likely to return results that agree with it.

Finding ways to bridge this gap – which Ray describes in his excellent book Farmers Versus Foodies– will make all the difference in securing animal agriculture’s future and sustaining generations to come. It won’t be easy.

Political, economic, and consumer perspectives are far more diverse and less connected to agriculture than in the past. Agriculture stakeholders must constantly challenge ourselves to be present in the wide range of conversations where minds are made up and to share information that helps others understand how we can work together with shared values toward common interests.

Education, communication, and research all have a part to play. At the Summit, some of the specific themes addressed included: how to best communicate and engage with consumers, how technology and agriculture can be used to advance environmental sustainability, how to strengthen supply chains, and how to ensure that animal agriculture is part of all conversations about the future of food.

As Aimpoint Research® Senior Intelligence Analyst Danielle Cummins put it in her presentation: “It’s not just about facts. It’s not just about education. It’s about trust.” Consumers, she said, are not a monolith, and it’s important to remember they are also customers. If they don’t trust the food we make, animal agriculture will lose its place on the plate.

When it comes to environmental sustainability, animal agriculture needs to be able to both walk the walk and talk the talk. Experts in our panel on corporate social responsibility discussed building platforms and skills to tell positive stories that have the power to counter misinformation and adversarial voices.

The Summit also featured trusted opinion leaders and social media influencers like dietitian Nicole Rodriguez and author Michele Payn, CSP, who encouraged animal agriculture stakeholders to build partnerships across the supply chain and with communicators to help fix the “disconnect between who’s talking about our food supply and who is actually connected with it.”

For more great lessons and calls to action, don’t miss our Summit highlights report, available here. We’ll continue to work with all of our partners, including through the Protein PACT, to continuously enhance animal agriculture, connect stakeholders, build bridges, and – most importantly – continue supporting our members who produce the food families rely on.

With so much work to do, it’s never too early to hold the date for our 2024 Stakeholders Summit! We hope to see you May 8-9 in Kansas City, Missouri.

You can always find more information about the Alliance and how to support our mission here.

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