Livestock owners face numerous challenges, including natural disasters like flooding and wildfire and the threat of foreign animal diseases like African Swine Fever and foot-and-mouth disease, which have impacted other countries. The Kansas Department of Agriculture works to help Kansas livestock owners, from large feedyards to families with show animals, in preparing for the impact any of these disasters could have on their lives. KDA will host a workshop in Iola on May 16 to assist Kansans throughout the livestock industry with emergency preparedness.

The workshop will be held on Thursday, May 16, from 9:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. in the basement of the Allen County Courthouse, 1 N. Washington Ave. in Iola. 

The Emergency Livestock Management Workshop will help livestock owners understand which foreign animal diseases are a possible threat to their animals and how an outbreak could impact them as well as the industry as a whole. Attendees will learn what precautions they can take to protect their herds, and how to respond if they do suffer losses due to natural disaster or disease. The workshop is geared toward all livestock owners, regardless of species or size of their herd.  

Please register for this free event as lunch will be provided and space is limited to the first 50 people.

Workshops will be held in 2019 in the following locations:
April 30 – Great Bend
May 1 – Montezuma
May 6 – Olathe
May 7 – Mankato
May 8 – Goodland
May 13 – El Dorado
May 16 – Iola
May 20 – Manhattan

All of the workshops are free, and registration is now open for all of the locations at www.agriculture.ks.gov/EmergencyManagement. For more information about the Emergency Livestock Management workshops, contact Kelly Oliver, KDA’s assistant emergency management coordinator, at 785-564-6608 or Kelly.Oliver@ks.gov.