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AMES, Iowa — The next Ensminger international animal industry conference will take place Feb. 11-13 in Costa Rica. The event is being organized by Iowa State University and the University of Costa Rica.

“Opportunities and Challenges for Tropical Animal Agriculture” will bring in experts from around the world to present topics of interest for Latin American animal agriculture. About 200 students, faculty, producers and animal industry representatives will attend.

This Ensminger School is the next in a series that began more than 50 years ago. Marion Eugene Ensminger was dedicated to animal agriculture education. He served on the faculty at universities in Illinois, Massachusetts, Minnesota and Washington. In 1964, he launched a series of technical agriculture seminars held in more than 70 countries.

Iowa State faculty got involved with the Ensminger schools in 1990. An endowment left to the ISU Foundation following the death of Ensminger and his wife, Audrey, helps finance the continuation of his international animal agriculture conferences.

Iowa State recognized the couple by creating the Ensminger International Chair. Max Rothschild, Charles F. Curtiss Distinguished Professor of Agriculture in animal science and director of ISU’s Center for Integrated Animal Genomics, was appointed to the Ensminger International Chair in 2007 and leads the Ensminger schools.

The Costa Rica school program includes sessions on the sustainability of livestock production in tropical regions, the challenges of feeding animals in tropical climates and general issues related to improved animal production.

Rothschild has been a lecturer at Ensminger Schools in Taiwan, Thailand, Korea and Hungary. At the Costa Rica school, he will talk about modern genetic improvement in pigs and poultry.

Others on the program from Iowa State are Dorian Garrick, Jay Lush Endowed Chair in Animal Breeding and Genetics and professor of animal science, who will discuss genomic advances in dairy and beef cattle improvement; Rodney Baker, senior clinician in the College of Veterinary Medicine, whose topic is novel opportunities for disease prevention; and Dermot Hayes, Pioneer Chair in Agribusiness and professor of economics, who will talk about predicting feed costs for Latin America.