April 02, 2020 0 Comments
By Dr. Allen R Williams, Ph.D.
As I described in yesterday’s blog, it is getting crazy out there and the panic buying is not subsiding. What is occurring in our nation, and around the world, only serves to substantiate why we need regenerative agriculture now more than ever. It is no longer just about the climate, our water quality, and our ecosystems. They are all still vitally important, but an even more pressing need has emerged.
In the past several decades our agriculture and food systems have become increasingly consolidated and centralized. For example:
Why is this a problem when faced with a pandemic such as the coronavirus? Look no further than your bare local grocery store shelves. Food has to travel more than 1500 miles in the U.S. to get to its final destination of a grocery store or restaurant.
As I explained in my prior blog, we do not have a shortage of food in the U.S., as we have more than 8 billion pounds in frozen stocks. What we have is a transportation problem that is easily overwhelmed.
Centralized food production, processing, and cold storage seem wonderful and awfully efficient when everything is working well. However, when things break down, we find ourselves scrambling for food.
In addition, the larger the farm and the larger the processor, the more people there are that touch your food and everything it comes in contact with. This puts us all at a heightened risk. It's hard not to be in close proximity to your fellow workers in a large, industrial scale food processing plant.
Moving back to regenerative agriculture means we can trend back towards smaller family owned farms that are profitable and support the families that operate them.
This means fewer hands touch the food being produced on those farms. And, more family farms means more local and regional processing. These plants, like Joyce Farms' plant in North Carolina, are substantially smaller than the massive plants operated by the large food companies. That equals fewer hands touching the food in those plants.
Now to be fair, the hands that touch food in any plant, large or small, are gloved hands. But, it is not just hands that transmit viruses - it is the breath of any carrier as well. I am not saying that the big food companies are bad and large plants are bad. No. They have their place. What I am saying is that if they are our only option, we limit ourselves in a number of ways.
Locally and regionally produced food allows for far more options for the consumer. It is easier to transport and get to consumers in a local market. Local and regional production supports rural economies and returns financial stability to the families that live in these rural communities.
More farms practicing regenerative principles equals healthier soil. Healthier soil equals more nutrient dense foods. More nutrient dense foods equals better human health. Better human health equals stronger immune systems and greater ability to fight off challenges like the coronavirus. Better human health is a direct result of supporting a thriving and diverse gut microbiome. That can only come from better foods.
In my next blog I will explain how the gut microbiome is the key to our immune system strength and ultimate health.
Written By Dr. Allen Williams, Ph.D.
A champion of the grass-fed beef industry and the growing Regenerative Agriculture movement, Allen helps restore soil health, increase land productivity, enhance biodiversity, and produce healthier food. He also serves as Joyce Farms' CRO (Chief Ranching Officer). Learn more about Allen
February 18, 2019 0 Comments
The message is spreading about regenerative agriculture, and more and more farmers, consumers, and medical professionals are realizing the importance of making a big change, now.
One project taking big strides to promote the regenerative message is called Farmer's Footprint and is led by Seraphic Group and Dr. Zach Bush M.D. It's a powerful documentary series that shows how critical regenerative agriculture practices are in reviving the health of our environment and fighting chronic disease in humans. Their mission is to regenerate 5 million acres by 2025.
The first short documentary of the series was released last week and features our own Dr. Allen Williams. It shares the story of a small family farm in Minnesota transitioning from conventional farming to regenerative agriculture. It also presents eye-opening scientific findings from Dr. Zach Bush about the connection between destructive, chemically dependent farming practices and chronic disease.
Please take the time to watch and share this incredibly powerful film, and learn more about the project at farmersfootprint.us
Farmer's Footprint | Regeneration : The Beginning from Farmer's Footprint on Vimeo.
February 14, 2019 0 Comments
The love story between livestock and our land began a long time ago as large herds of grazing ruminants like bison roamed from coast to coast. Their natural behaviors helped shape the land as we know it.
As Dr. Allen Williams has explained, “from an ecological perspective, grazing and browsing ruminants have been an incredibly important part of every grassland, prairie, savanna, and woodland system. These ecosystems evolved under the influence of these grazing and browsing ruminants.”
After Mother Nature set them up, the animals and land flourished together, with a true give and take relationship. In the spirit of Valentine’s Day, let’s take a closer look at why these two are so good together:
The land feeds the livestock with plant life
Grazing spurs plant regrowth and increased soil life
Historically, bison traveled across our nation in herds and would graze an area, then move on to another, never overgrazing any one spot. As the herds moved, the partially grazed plant life left behind would begin trying to regrow as quickly as possible.
To do that, the plants draw in carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and use it to make sugars. They use some, and exchange some with soil microbes in exchange for important nutrients also needed for growth.
So basically, while the animals are enjoying a nutritious meal from the land, they’re also giving back by strengthening the soil. Each time they return and regraze (after complete regrowth), the process repeats, creating more and more microbial life in the soil and a variety of plant life above ground.
The land feeds the livestock with plant life
Livestock give the soil a protective cover
As livestock graze the land, they are also trampling the ground, creating a flattened cover of plants and grasses that protects and insulates the soil. As the trampled "mulch" of plants decomposes, more organic matter (carbon) is added to the ground. This helps build fertile and biologically active topsoil that is critical for ongoing productive and profitable farming.
The ground cover also creates a perfect environment for micro life, like bacteria, fungi, earthworms and dung beetles (all of which are important for forming new soil).
The land feeds the livestock with plant life
The livestock naturally fertilize the land
As livestock graze, they digest grasses and naturally fertilize the land, giving plant life access to all the nutrients needed to grow. Healthy soil can make use of this above-the-ground fertilization very effectively, but if the soil is already degraded, with no life and no dung beetles, it's unable to carry out this natural process.
As you can see, the relationship between livestock and land is strong - they need each other. Aside from providing meat, livestock plays a number of critical functions on a farm. Unfortunately, in recent years, industrialized farming drove quite a wedge between them. Farmers looked to machines and chemicals to do what livestock took care of naturally, which is expensive for the farmer, leads to dependence on chemical inputs, and produces food that lacks flavor and nutrients.
The fact is, livestock and farms belong together. In today’s world, we no longer have the natural, large roaming herds of bison that can carry out these functions. But by managing our farmland using regenerative practices, including adaptive multi-paddock grazing, we have a chance to put livestock and land back together, forever!
The Secret Is Out! Cows Are Not The Problem... It's How They're Raised.
Allen Williams on Replacing Monoculture Farms with Adaptive Grazing
Dr. Allen Williams Participates In New Study Of Adaptive Multi-Paddock Grazing
Adaptive Grazing: So Old It's New
October 12, 2018 0 Comments
We are so excited to finally debut a new documentary project, sponsored by Joyce Farms, produced by Finian Makepeace of Kiss the Ground and featuring Dr. Allen Williams, Ph.D, Joyce Farms' Chief Ranching Officer and a leading expert in soil health and regenerative agriculture.
A Regenerative Secret pulls back the curtain on Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) and their detrimental impact on our ecosystem. More importantly, it offers an incredible alternative that most farmers, producers, chefs, and consumers aren't even aware of yet - regenerative agriculture.
In the video, Finian visits Allen Williams' farm in Alabama, where Allen demonstrates how regenerative methods can completely restore soil health, and at a rate that we previously never thought possible. These methods can also help reverse climate change by pulling excess carbon out of the atmosphere and putting it back in the soil where it can be used. You may end up asking yourself - why isn't everyone doing this? The main reason is that they just don't know. Help us spread the knowledge by sharing this video!
We hope A Regenerative Secret inspires more and more farmers to embrace regenerative agriculture, and encourages chefs and consumers alike to seek out responsibly raised products from farms that have implemented these practices. The future of our food system and planet depend on it.
If we continue using industrial and even sustainable organic farming methods, we are threatening both the long-term availability of the land to farm as well as our overall health. Regenerative agriculture practices can quite literally regenerate the land by rebuilding the soil, leaving it far better than our generations found it.
Learn more about Dr. Allen Williams, Ph.D
Learn more about Joyce Farms Regenerative Agriculture practices
July 20, 2018 0 Comments
In May, our Chief Ranching Officer Dr. Allen Williams, Ph.D. wrote a blog titled The Circle Of Life: How The Carbon Cycle Powers Our Ecosystem. In that blog, Dr. Williams said this:
“When the carbon cycle is in balance, carbon dioxide is emitted into the atmosphere, then returned to its source in an ongoing pattern. However, since the dawn of agriculture thousands of years ago, humans have been disturbing that balance with degenerative farming practices, like tilling, that kill soil life and release too much carbon dioxide into the air.
Image credit: Kiss the Ground
Thanks to scientists from the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center’s Global Modeling and Assimilation Office, we can see just how carbon dioxide accumulates in the atmosphere and the effect that practices like tilling actually have on CO2 production.
Using real-world data on atmospheric conditions, the emission of greenhouse gases and both natural and man-made particulates over the course of a year, the scientists produced a carbon dioxide visualization that simulates the natural behavior of the Earth’s atmosphere from January 2006 through December 2006.
The screen capture below shows the level of carbon dioxide (shown in red and purple) in the northern hemisphere on April 23. In March and April, when farmers are tilling to prepare to plant their crops, carbon dioxide is at its heaviest. Through the summer and early fall, as plants are growing and absorbing carbon dioxide, atmospheric levels of CO2 go down.
As a result, by September 20, as you can see here, the amount of CO2 in the northern hemisphere is negligible.
Unfortunately, as we go into the fall, carbon is released from the ground through harvesting. More often than not, the ground is left bare after harvesting. With no cover crops through the winter, when plant photosynthesis naturally decreases, the carbon dioxide again accumulates in the atmosphere through the end of the year and into the spring.
This screen grab from November 13 shows just how much CO2 has accumulated in less than two months.
Carbon dioxide is accumulating in our atmosphere in higher concentrations each year, resulting in the long-term rise of global temperatures. However, by eliminating tilling, adding cover crops, and even grazing those cover crops, we can help eliminate the spike of CO2 in the spring. And as untilled land becomes healthier, more and more carbon can be drawn down, and fall/winter CO2 levels from harvesting would go down as well.
Bottom line – tilling releases CO2, and no-till farming, coupled with cover crops and grazing, keeps the carbon cycle in balance. It’s as simple as that.
See the full NASA video below, and click here to learn more about our Regenerative Agriculture methods.
May 09, 2018 0 Comments
Written By Dr. Allen Williams, Ph.D.
Kids learn about natural circles in school like the water cycle. The big idea there is rain falls, then evaporates back into the air, before coming down again as rain somewhere else.
Despite this simple training in circles, most of us think in lines. In a linear world, we fail to see the connection between precipitation and evaporation, or soil health and the quality of our food. In agriculture, line-based thinking has led to problems.
For decades, farmers have believed using chemical fertilizers increases their output of plants. Like a line, they believe one always leads to the other, failing to consider impacts on the rest of the ecosystem. The eventual result is a breakdown of natural cycles on their farms.
By understanding natural cycles, farmers can adapt and work with those cycles to see their land thrive for generations to come.
It’s time to leave line-based thinking behind and start thinking in circles again, and on pastures, the key circle to understand is the carbon cycle.
The carbon cycle has three components: plants, soil and grazers.
Let's start with plants.
All carbon starts in the air as the C in CO2. Through photosynthesis, plants take the carbon from CO2 in the air, combine it with hydrogen from water (H2O) in the soil and, using energy from the sun, make sugar (CH2O). Rather than being left with a puddle of sticky sugar on the ground, a plant’s metabolism takes that sugar and makes all of the complex molecules of what we recognize as a plant.
Water from the soil is the source of hydrogen in all plant molecules, and it cools the plant as it grows. But other elements and minerals are also required for plant growth. All of those non-carbon elements and minerals come from the soil.
We might have once thought that these minerals were just sitting around waiting to be taken in by the plant, but now we know that the microbiological system in the soil has to bring nutrients to the plants. The key here is that growing roots actually leak sugars. Basically, the plant ‘pays’ the microbes with some of its sugars to go out and bring back the nutrients the plant needs to grow.
Root death occurs when more than 50 percent of the plant leaf biomass is removed, so it's critical to keep the roots growing and pumping out sugars to feed microbes by never grazing more than 50 percent of the above-ground biomass. This can be achieved through rotational grazing. In doing this, we keep pumping a continuous stream of sugars into the soil and fuel the soil microbes to provide an ongoing stream of nutrients funneling back to the plant.
There is one important sub-cycle in all this—the nitrogen cycle. Nitrogen actually makes up a very small fraction of a plant’s total mass, but it’s critical for growth. Although air is highly abundant in nitrogen, plants are completely unable to make use of it directly.
But plants grew before synthetic fertilizer was invented, right? This was because microbes in the soil had the machinery to convert the nitrogen into a form plants could access. In healthy soil, microbes are not only mining the minerals from the dirt, they also are pulling the critical element of nitrogen quite literally out of thin air.
The final piece of the carbon cycle is grazing. Most of the biomass in grass, or any other plant, is tied up in complex polymers like cellulose and lignin, which are a stockpile of stored solar energy. This solar power is completely inaccessible to humans, but it is indirectly accessible to cattle. Cattle are part of a group of animals called ruminants, along with sheep and bison that chew the cud regurgitated from their rumen. Rumen is the first stomach of a ruminant, where food or cud is received and partly digested with the aid of bacteria, before passing on to another part of the animal’s digestive tract.
What enables these grazers to access that energy are the microbes in their rumens. Microbes in the rumen break down grass into fats that the animal can then use.
A ruminant is a solar-powered grass harvesting and processing miracle. Cattle that move across the land (using rotational grazing, eating no more than half the grass) leave partially digested biomass (i.e. manure and nitrogen-rich urine) spread evenly in their wake. What gets left behind is everything the grass needed to grow in the first place—a sort of customized fertilizer. Their trampling also provides an armor of plant life for the soil and feeds the soil microbes, producing new carbon and stimulating new soil life.
Together, the cycles of plant, soil and grazer form the carbon cycle in a pasture. It's powered by sunshine, but enabled by a complex and inter-connected circle of cycles where biological life does all the hard work.
With each turn of the cycle, more carbon is stored below the ground and microbes mine more nutrients to fuel more plant growth. The increasing plant growth is more nourishing to the animal because it has access to more nutrients in the soil. This ultimately leads to more nutrient dense foods.
A balanced carbon cycle can also prevent catastrophic climate change caused by excess carbon dioxide in the air.
Our atmosphere has always contained some carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gasses -- nature designed it that way. They play a critical role by trapping heat from the sun and using it to keep the earth warm and able to sustain life.
When the carbon cycle is in balance, carbon dioxide is emitted into the atmosphere, then returned to its source in an ongoing pattern. However, since the dawn of agriculture thousands of years ago, humans have been disturbing that balance with degenerative farming practices, like tilling, that kill soil life and release too much carbon dioxide into the air. Today, carbon dioxide levels in our atmosphere are higher than ever. By understanding and working with the carbon cycle, we can put the excess to good use by putting it back in the soil.
The bigger story isn’t just about cattle, grass and soil, but about all layers of life in an ecosystem. In the end, our objective is to keep this cycle going over and over, not letting carbon get stuck above or below the ground, which allows us to regenerate the land as we use it. We strive to keep the carbon cycle moving, as it drives the circle of life.
March 28, 2018 0 Comments
Dr. Allen Williams, Joyce Farms’ Chief Ranching Officer, is part of a team of scientists involved with an exciting new study of Adaptive Multi-Paddock (AMP) grazing. The study will collect data to analyze how this grazing technique increases farm resiliency, contributes to carbon sequestration, improves soil biodiversity, and impacts animal wellbeing and productivity. Joyce Farms cattle are raised using AMP as part of our commitment to Regenerative Agriculture.
The study is funded by a $1.25 million grant from The Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research (FFAR), a nonprofit established in the 2014 Farm Bill with bipartisan congressional support. The grant was awarded to the Arizona State University Foundation for A New American University, and has been matched with funding from McDonald’s USA for a total $2.5 million investment.
Principal Investigator Peter Byck, of Arizona State University, had this to say about how the research will be conducted and the role of participants like Dr. Williams: “We will study what these innovative farmers and ranchers have been researching for 10 to 20 to 30 years on their own land. We feel these producers are the original scientists with AMP grazing – and they put their livelihoods on the line for their research. We will simply measure their results.”
February 07, 2018 0 Comments
Written By Dr. Allen Williams, Ph.D.
A champion of the grass-fed beef industry as well as cutting edge grazing methodology, Allen helps restore natural soil water retention and reduce runoff, increase land productivity, enhance plant and wildlife biodiversity, and produce healthier food. He also serves as Joyce Farms' CRO (Chief Ranching Officer). Learn more about Allen
Last month, NPR published an article that has sparked significant interest among chefs, farmers, and members of the food and agricultural industries at large. The article, found here, points out that the growing popularity of grass-fed beef may soon stall due to the depleting nutritional quality of the grasses being consumed by grass-fed cattle.
The issue raised in this article is very real, BUT it is indicative of ranchers who are grazing very conventionally, and nothing about our program is conventional.
The issue raised in this article is very real, BUT it is indicative of ranchers who are grazing very conventionally, and nothing about our program is conventional. Every one of the ranches sampled in the study are what we call "set stock" or "conventional" grazers. That means they do either no pasture rotations or rotate the cattle between pastures very slowly.
Recent studies pertaining to impact of different grazing practices on soil health parameters and plant species diversity show that conventional grazing practices contribute to a slow degradation of the soil, loss of soil carbon and organic matter, and loss of plant species diversity. However, adaptive grazing practices (part of the regenerative agriculture methods that we practice and teach) do exactly the opposite.
Adaptive grazing practices build new soil organic matter, increase soil carbon, significantly improve plant species diversity and beneficial insect populations (including pollinators), and improve the water cycle. The animals grazing these pastures are healthier as well.
So, while the research presented in the article is concerning, we already know the solution and are actively practicing it. The solutions is biomimicry and eco-mimicry. We are simulating what nature used to do with the positive impact of the large herds of wild ruminants that used to roam the extent of the U.S.
Over the next few weeks, we will continue to address the concerns brought out in this article with other research, and we would be happy to address specific questions in the comments, or you can send us a message.
October 14, 2016 0 Comments
Written By Dr. Allen Williams, Ph.D.
A champion of the grass-fed beef industry as well as cutting edge grazing methodology, Allen helps restore natural soil water retention and reduce runoff, increase land productivity, enhance plant and wildlife biodiversity, and produce healthier food. He also serves as Joyce Farms' CRO (Chief Ranching Officer). Learn more about Allen
Beyond Meat®, a company that calls itself the Future of Protein™ has recently been the benefactor of investment from what might seem like a strange place. Tyson Foods, a member of the Big Four meat packers, has become a 5% owner in the company that hopes to replace meat with plant-based proteins. According to news reports in the New York Times, Business Insider, and MeatingPlace, the investment is the result of a fundraising initiative by Beyond Meat targeted at providing capital to fund expansion of their product portfolio and distribution.
In a statement by Ethan Brown, Founder and CEO of Beyond Meat, he said, “This investment by Tyson Foods underscores the growing market for plant protein. I’m pleased to welcome Tyson as an investor and look forward to leveraging this support to broaden availability of plant protein choices to consumers.”
At the joint disclosure, a Tyson executive, Monica McGurk, expressed enthusiasm with the investment and added that it “…gives us exposure to a fast-growing segment of the protein market.” McGurk went on to say that the investment will increase consumer choices from the Tyson portfolio of food products and will allow Tyson to satisfy demands from a growing diverse population. She did directly state that Tyson would remain focused on their animal protein base.
Products currently offered in the Beyond Meat portfolio include the Beyond Burger™, single serve meals with Beyond Beef® and Beyond Chicken® protein alternatives, the Beast Burger, and Southwest Style Beyond Chicken® Strips. Most packages have a facsimile of a steer or chicken on them.
Beyond Meat was founded in 2009 as the result of more than a decade of research by a Dr. Fu-Hung Hsieh at the University of Missouri. Hsieh’s research has focused on taking soy proteins and producing meat analogs that are palatable and that appear to be similar to real muscle foods. The Beyond Chicken products are a combination of non-GMO soy and pea protein. The Beast Burger is a 100% pea protein extrusion and is touted as a “soy-free, gluten-free, non-GMO” product.
Whole Foods Markets first started carrying Beyond Meat products in 2013 at select stores. The company’s products are now sold in more than 10,000 stores nationwide.
Other investors in Beyond Meat include Bill Gates, Kleiner Perkins, the founders of Twitter, Biz Stone, General Mills, and the Humane Society of the United States. The former CEO of McDonald’s North American operations, Don Thompson, sits on their board of directors.
The question for us as producers of pasture-based protein products is not whether there will be challenges in the market place from plant-based protein alternatives, but rather how will we respond to that market challenge? There will be a segment of the consumer population that believes plant-based proteins are a better choice for their health and the environment. For those of us in regenerative agriculture, we know that animals in the mix allow for rapid rebuilding of soil organic matter, reduction of erosion, reduced chemical inputs and harmful runoff, increases in plant species diversity, and improvement in pollinator insect, beneficial insect, and wildlife populations.
Animals in the mix allow for rapid rebuilding of soil organic matter, reduction of erosion, reduced chemical inputs and harmful runoff, increases in plant species diversity, and improvement in pollinator insect, beneficial insect, and wildlife populations.
Where crops are grown without the benefit of proper livestock impact, we see serious issues with soil compaction, water infiltration rates, water quality, erosion, harmful runoff, and increased reliance on synthetic chemical inputs and irrigation.
The loss of soil organic matter, soil aggregation, and fertility across farmlands in North America over the past several decades has been staggering. The focus on the current monoculture agricultural model has created a lot of unintended consequences that are proving detrimental to our environment and to human health.
What we have to consider is that animals, particularly the natural mix of large and small ruminants, followed by grassland birds, have played a significant role for millennia in building the tremendous fertility across the grasslands and savannas of the world. For thousands of years these wild ruminants were an essential part of nature’s design moving about in large groups or mobs due to constant pressure from apex predators. The result of their grazing of the grasslands and savannas was incredible diversity and complexity in soil, plant, insect, bird, and animal life.
In regenerative agriculture, we use our livestock and poultry the way nature intended – to build and maintain soil fertility and diversity in soil, plant, insect, and animal life. Moving to a plant only diet will further increase issues brought about by monoculture agricultural systems.
The beautiful thing about raising animals the way we do is that we are reviving nature’s bounty while providing the consumer with protein products that contain favorable fatty acid profiles; are loaded with minerals, vitamins, and antioxidants; and actually improve the environment.
Our problem – the average consumer is unaware of the myriad benefits of raising livestock and poultry in pasture-based systems through regenerative practices. It is incumbent upon us to do a much better job of informing consumers that they do have a choice in their protein purchase decisions.
With so many confusing market claims and labels, the consumer is often left grasping at straws, wondering what is factual and what is simply smoke and mirrors. We must be true to our label claims, clearly communicate to the consumer, and provide factual information to back up those claims. Trust is everything and we must be trustworthy.
June 16, 2016 0 Comments
Written By Dr. Allen Williams, Ph.D.
A champion of the grass-fed beef industry as well as cutting edge grazing methodology, Allen helps restore natural soil water retention and reduce runoff, increase land productivity, enhance plant and wildlife biodiversity, and produce healthier food. He also serves as Joyce Farms' CRO (Chief Ranching Officer). Learn more about Allen
In addition to being part of the Joyce Farms team as Chief Ranching Officer, it’s my privilege to serve on a number of industry boards and committees, including the board of directors for the Grassfed Exchange. The Grassfed Exchange is a volunteer, non-profit organization of regenerative ranchers and grassfed industry supporters that holds the largest grassfed industry conference held annually in the U.S.
Each year the Grassfed Exchange Conference brings together farmers, ranchers, industry professionals and experts, university personnel, and USDA personnel for the exchange of ideas and information through seminars, farm tours and educational presentations.
They also use the occasion to give out awards to the “best of the best” in our industry. The 2016 Grassfed Exchange Conference was held in Perry, GA on April 27-29, with attendees coming from 42 different states and 5 different countries. I’m proud to say that at that conference, Ron Joyce and Joyce Farms were unanimously selected as the Grassfed Exchange Distributor/Marketer/Retailer of the Year.
The purpose of these awards is to recognize and honor those who have made significant contributions to the production of good food and agricultural stewardship, and Joyce Farm’s dedication to offering the consumer not only healthy products that are good for the land, the animals, and us -- but also products that are tender and delicious – was one of the major reasons for their selection for this award.
In naming Ron Joyce and Joyce Farms the winners, the selection committee cited their 50+ years of contribution to regenerative agriculture, revitalization of the rural economy, production of high attribute proteins, and commitment to providing consumers with a healthy choice in grassfed beef and poultry.
Receiving this award is a significant achievement, and I’m delighted Ron and the team here were chosen. Working with them, I see their hard work and dedication to quality every day, and it’s nice to see it recognized by our peers. It’s also a compliment to Joyce Farms customers, because when you choose Joyce Farms products, you’re choosing the industry-recognized best there is.