Ashley Antoskiewicz
Ashley Antoskiewicz has joined John Deere’s public relations team as the new manager of federal affairs located in the D.C. office. Antoskiewicz comes to John Deere from the office of Illinois Congressman Darin LaHood, R-Ill., where she served as legislative director since 2015, and deputy chief of staff since 2020.
Jan Ahlen now serves as the vice president of utility research and policy at the National Rural Utilities Cooperative Finance Corporation. He most recently served as the director of energy solutions at the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association and before that was with the National Farmers Union where he was a government relations representative.
Hunter Ihrman has joined the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association as an associate director of policy communications. He previously worked at Avantus Federal and the Department of Treasury.
Kent Roberson is the new senior manager of government relations for the Corn Refiners Association. Roberson previously worked for The Smith-Free Group and focused on transportation, infrastructure, cybersecurity, and environmental issues. Before joining The Smith-Free Group, Roberson worked for CSX Transportation as the legislative and administrative assistant.
Jack Cornell has been tapped to be the director of sustainable supply for the United Soybean Board. Cornell has a master’s in plant science from Missouri State University and also brings nine years of experience working for Monsanto. Cornell most recently worked for the National Corn Growers Association as a field team director for the Soil Health Partnership.
Casey Wasser has been promoted to chief operating officer for the Missouri Soybean Association, Missouri Soybean Merchandising Council and Foundation for Soy Innovation. In this newly created position, Wasser will continue to lead the association’s policy work in addition to serving as the COO.
Jack Cornell
Betsy Bowman now works for AgReliant Genetics as the communications program manager. Over the last nine years she worked for Elanco, most recently in communications and corporate affairs.
Chris Schaffer has been named the new chief executive officer and general manager of Ag Processing Inc., effective Aug. 1. Schaffer currently serves as AGP’s senior vice president of ag products. He succeeds Keith Spackler, who announced earlier this year he would retire. Schaffer has 27 years of experience in agribusiness, previously joining AGP in 1994. In 1997, he went to work for the U.S. Feed Grains Council as manager of international operations, before rejoining the team at AGP.
Peoples Company, a land brokerage, land management, land investment and appraisal services firm, announced that Dave Englund joined the company as the director of national accounts on July 6. Englund retired as President and CEO of Farmers National Company in April 2021 after 34 years in various roles within the company.
Dave Pyburn has accepted a new position with BioChek, a global veterinary diagnostics and animal health company, as the U.S. swine business unit director. Pyburn most recently worked for the National Pork Board as the chief veterinarian. Before joining NPC, Pyburn was the senior veterinary medical officer at the USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service.
CNH Industrial has appointed Scott Moran as chief business system officer and Kelly Tolbert as chief diversity and inclusion, sustainability and transformation officer. Moran joins CNH Industrial from Next Level Partners, where he was a principal. Tolbert joins CNH Industrial from Stellantis, where she most recently served as Vice President of Global Talent, Leadership & Learning and Global HRBP for HR.
Sen. Roy Blunt, R-Mo., has named Rachelle Schroeder as the new Republican staff director of the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration. She succeeds Fitzhugh Elder IV who has been named Republican staff director of the Senate Agriculture Committee. Schroeder has served as deputy Republican staff director of the Rules Committee since April 2018. She previously served as a clerk for the legislative branch appropriations subcommittee in the Senate.
Felicia Wu has been appointed by the World Health Organization to sit on its Foodborne Disease Epidemiology Reference Group (FERG). Wu is a professor at Michigan State University in the departments of Food Science and Human Nutrition and Agricultural, Food and Resource Economics. FERG is a group of food safety and public health researchers working to determine the human burden of disease caused by common food contaminants, as well as update data on foodborne diseases. Wu previously worked as a resource adviser for WHO FERG from 2007-2015, which was commissioned to estimate global foodborne diseases caused by arsenic.
The World Food Prize Foundation has hired Natalie Bidner as the new program manager of international dialogues. Bidner previously worked as a graduate teaching assistant at Iowa State University. In 2020, she graduated with a master’s in political science and international relations. She was awarded the Teaching Excellence Award in 2020 and the James A. Socknat Memorial Scholarship in 2019 for her work at the university. Bidner has also served as the world president for the International Association of Students in Agricultural and Related Sciences. Bidner replaces Amy Bettle, who left the organization in May to pursue other interests.
Felicia Wu
Chris Drake has joined FLM Harvest as the new vice president of management consulting. Drake spent the last 10 years with Elanco in various global marketing roles.
Ben Thomas has joined the board of directors of Leading Harvest. Thomas is the senior policy director for agriculture at the Environmental Defense Fund.
Jeffrey Porter has retired from USDA's Natural Resources Conservation Service in Greensboro, N.C., where he was the manure management team leader since 2014. Before that, he was an environmental engineer at USDA for seven years.
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