As co-owner of Hoaganie Farm Products, a cattle and grass farming operation just outside of College Station, TX, P. Wade Ross is a fourth generation farmer, on land that has been in his been in his family since the 1800’s.
P. Wade’s parents, W. Wade & Anita Ross, established the Texas Small Farmers & Ranchers Community-Based Organization in 1998. Previously serving as the organization’s Education Director, P. Wade accepted the role of Chief Executive the wake of the pandemic shut down, to help keep the mission of serving Black Farmers moving forward into the “connected age”.
Recognized around the state of Texas as a voice and change agent for small farmers of color, Mr. Ross serves on numerous boards, coalitions, and collaboratives throughout the South. This includes recently being selected to serve East Texas in the newly formulated Delta Regional Food Business Center.
In the past year, P. Wade has been featured in articles by CNN, The Dallas Morning News, Wall Street Journal, and The Austin Chronicle around the important subject of racial equity and social justice.
From their massive past efforts, Texas Small Farmers & Ranchers/ CBO is credited by many for the large number of census responses from black farmers–it is said to be unprecedented in the history of census of Texas. In 2012, his father and organization founder W. Wade Ross, received USDA’s Secretary’s Honor Award “for forging partnerships and other entities leading to changes that promote sustainability”.

Plenary Speaker

A Rising Tide Raises All Boats

In this brief presentation, P. Wade Ross will share his family journeys since acquisition of their family land in the late 1800’s, their families, separation and return to the land, recent struggles and conflict within their family farm and within their organization around the topic of regenerative ag and adopting climate smart practices, the state of Black Farmers, and solutions to move the economic needle to benefit all.

Carrie Balkcom Is the Executive Director of the American Grassfed Association. AGA is the National, multispecies entity organized to protect and promote Grassfed and pasture-based farmers and ranchers.
AGA has standards for ruminants, dairy, pork and poultry.
AGA is the leader in pasture-based production and the oldest grassfed certification in the United States. AGA certifies ruminants, pork and dairy. AGA is the only USA only grassfed certification.
Carrie grew up on a Florida cattle ranch and has stayed connected to the agriculture and livestock industry. She has spoken, presented or coordinated for the past 25 years numerous regional and national conferences; and is well known in agricultural, culinary and sustainable agricultural circles.
AGA has been advocating for a change to the policy of allowing offshore beef to be labeled product of the USA, and through the hard work of allot of folks including AGA, this egregious mislabeling has been changed by the USDA. The rules go into effect at the end of 2025. AGA also works on federal food policy that affects pasture based American Family Farmers.

Roundtable Facilitator

Don owns and operates Grassfed Livestock Alliance, LLC (GLA), a
coalition of Grassfed producers. GLA was formed in 2006 to provide a
fair and sustainable market for family farms and ranches that put their
care, labor, and reputation into the quality of meats they raise. GLA
currently supplies local Grassfed beef to Whole Foods Market locations
in Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas and Oklahoma.
Don grew up in Austin, Texas and currently ranches in the Texas Hill
Country with his wife, Debbie, where they raise conservation heritage
Texas Longhorn cattle. Don is a past president of American Grassfed
Association and is currently on its Board of directors and chairs its
Standards/Certification Committee.

Roundtable Facilitator

Kathy is the food advocacy manager at TomKat Ranch Educational Foundation. The ranch exists to practice and promote regenerative agriculture, inspire and catalyze action to transform five million acres to regenerative land management, and to shift five million eaters to purchase food raised from regenerative farms. Growing up in California, Kathy studied nutrition/dietetics at CSU Chico State and is passionate about food and farming. She has been with the ranch since 2007 and, in 2008, helped launch the ranch’s grassfed beef business, LeftCoast GrassFed. Kathy is on on the board of American Grassfed Association and is the vice president. At TomKat Ranch, she works on various projects, including Beef2Institution, improving the quality of school food, overcoming processing issues for ranchers, certification adherence and implementation, and building consumer demand for regenerative agriculture.

Roundtable Facilitator

Robyn Paulekas is a Senior Mediator and Program Director at Meridian Institute. She has led and supported both domestic and international projects on agriculture, water, conservation, outdoor recreation, and climate change—often working at the nexus of more than one of these issues. She currently facilitates a group of ranchers, researchers, NGOs, and others who are exploring the intersection of western rangelands and data. They are digging into some big, hard topics like public land grazing, as well as drought and ranch resilience.

Robyn has extensive experience finding and catalyzing collaborative solutions. Prior to Meridian, Robyn applied geospatial information to find solutions to water-related conflict in the Klamath Basin in Oregon. At the University of Wyoming Ruckelshaus Institute of Environment and Natural Resources, she supported multi-stakeholder dialogues on energy, climate change, and endangered species.

Away from work, Robyn can be found chasing her two wild and curious sons through the mountains, prairies, and rivers of the West.

Roundtable Facilitator

Supporting Innovation and Flexibility in Public Land Grazing

Deborah Clark is a partner with her husband Emry Birdwell at the Birdwell and Clark Ranch near Henrietta, Texas. Deborah and Emry have worked for the past 20 years to improve rangeland conditions through holistic and regenerative management practices. Recently, a sheep enterprise was added to the stocker operation. Deborah now focuses on “saving the ranch”. External challenges include pipelines, highway development, transmission lines, and a proposed reservoir that would decimate the current grazing management and inundate 2,000 acres of prime riparian habitat and native tall grass prairie. Deborah and Emry put the ranch into a conservation easement and Deborah leads efforts on a local, regional, and statewide basis to defeat the proposed reservoir.

Roundtable Facilitator