The Beef Improvement Federation (BIF) presented Tommy Clark, Culpeper, Virginia, a BIF Continuing Service Award June 11 during the group’s annual research symposium in Knoxville, Tennessee.
Continuing Service Award winners have made major contributions to the BIF organization. This includes serving on the board of directors, speaking at BIF conventions, working on BIF guidelines and other behind-the-scenes activities. As BIF is a volunteer organization, it is this contribution of time and passion for the beef cattle industry that moves BIF forward.
Clark attended his first BIF Symposium in the 1990s and has since immersed himself in the organization. He was elected to the BIF board in 2013 and served as president in 2019-2020.
Clark completed his formal education at Germanna Community College before starting a show and sale cattle fitting service. These experiences, combined with 30 years of managing two other purebred cattle operations, paved the way for his involvement and service within BIF.
With a sincere passion for the improvement of cattle, Clark is known to be a beef enthusiast to the bone. He owns a herd of about 200 cow-calf pairs that are primarily purebred Angus and Charolais, but also consists of some commercial cows. While on the BIF board he worked on numerous projects, including standardizing recommendations of policies on genetic defects and how they are handled by breed associations, redefining procedures on collecting feed efficiency data, and developing recommended guidelines on foot and leg scoring processes. Clark has continually dedicated himself to advancing the beef industry and has made several contributions to the BIF organization.
Approximately 500 beef producers, academia and industry representatives attended the organization’s 56th Annual Research Symposium and Convention in Knoxville. BIF’s mission is to help improve the industry by promoting greater acceptance of beef cattle performance evaluation.
For more information about this year’s symposium, including additional award winners and coverage of meeting and tours, visit BIFSymposium.com.