The 2024 MCIA Annual Meeting, which was held Wednesday, January 24, 2024, included an election to fill three Category A Director seats on the MCIA Board of Directors. Category A directors serve 3-year terms of office. MCIA members re-elected incumbent board member Kelsey Henke (District 3). In addition, members elected two persons who are new to the MCIA Board: Anthony Cortilet (Related Industry) and Gabel Hoseth (District 2). Gabel Hoseth will serve the remaining two years of a vacant position. In addition to the election of the aforementioned directors, members also ratified the nomination of incumbent Nancy Ehlke as the board’s Category B Director (who is nominated by the Director of the Minnesota Agricultural Experiment Station to serve a one-year term of office).
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Background information about the newly elected and ratified directors follows.
Nancy Ehlke (Nominee from the University of Minnesota) Nancy Ehlke is a professor and plant breeder in the Department of Agronomy and Plant Genetics at the University of Minnesota. She has been a member of the department faculty since 1986 and is nationally recognized as a plant breeder working on forage legumes, turf grasses, and native plant species. She is also a fellow in both the American Society of Agronomy and the Crop Science Society of America. In addition to her administrative and teaching responsibilities, Nancy leads research and outreach activities in northern Minnesota with the grass and legume seed producers. She received her PhD from Pennsylvania State University. She has been an MCIA board member since 2006.
Gabel Hoseth (District 2) Gabel Hoseth is a young farmer in the Waubun area who owns and operates a seed business, Spring Creek Seed LLC. He works alongside his grandfather John Pazdernik of Pazdernik Farms Inc. This is a fifth-generation family farm. As a graduate of North Dakota State University with a bachelor’s degree in agricultural systems management, he is passionate about the future of farming. Along with raising seed and serving customers, Gabel enjoys sharing his passion for farming with his wife and two young daughters on their small farmstead near Flom. He foresees serving on the MCIA Board or Directors as a great way to learn and give back to the seed industry in Minnesota.
Kelsey Henke (District 3) Kelsey Henke is currently the Sales and Office Manager at Anderson Seeds of St. Peter. Her main role is to oversee all aspects of wholesale and retail seeds sales. She handles the accounting, customer service, and many other aspects of the office work. Before being employed by her family’s seed business, Kelsey worked for United Farmers’ Cooperative, MCIA, and BioDiagnostics. Kelsey graduated with high honors from South Central College, Mankato, in 2012, earning an associate degree in applied science in agribusiness service and management. Currently, she is a county and state 4-H volunteer, the secretary of the Nicollet/Sibley County Corn & Soybean Growers Association, and she has served one term on the MCIA Board of Directors. Kelsey and her husband, Jeremy, reside in Gaylord, where in her free time she enjoys quilting, embroidering, and spending time with her family and friends.
Anthony Cortilet (Related Industry) Anthony Cortilet is the manager of the Seed, Weed, Hemp, and Biotechnology Section of the Minnesota Department of Agriculture’s Plant Protection Division. Tony has oversight of all four programs but focuses on Noxious Weed and Industrial Hemp. Recently, he has been very busy helping establish the Office of Cannabis Management.