Gig'em Chicken
Strategic Plan
 Strategic Plan for Texas A&M University
Poultry Science Department (2000-2010)



PREAMBLE
VISION
MISSION
VISIONARY GOALS
PRIORITIES, NEEDED RESOURCES, AND PARTNERSHIP OPPORTUNITIES
PRIORITY AREAS
ADDITIONAL RESOURCE NEEDS

PREAMBLE:

     Although the Department of Poultry Science at Texas A&M University was not officially formed until 1923, there was an identifiable poultry program as early as 1910. It has occupied a series of research stations but has evolved into a completely centralized faculty and facility located on the College Station campus. This centralization has facilitated collaboration between faculty and provided a single point resource for clientele. Poultry is the leading source of meat in the American diet. The Texas poultry industry generates over $1.9 billion and comprises 5.5% of the national production. Texas ranks 6th in broiler production, 7th in egg production, and 10th in turkey production among all states in the US.

     Although the poultry industry is not our only clientele group, it is one of the largest and has some unique characteristics that should be considered. This industry is a pioneer in the concept of vertical integration in which a single corporate entity owns all aspects of the production, processing, and marketing for a product. For poultry, the same company owns the live birds, feed mill, transport trucks, processing plant, and distribution fleet. This unique integration improves production efficiency and product uniformity. Because of vertical integration, the poultry industry has shifted from many, small, independent operations toward fewer, more highly concentrated production companies. This is the model for the broiler and turkey meat industries and to a lesser extent the egg industry. Because these large companies control a relatively large proportion of the industry's birds, it allows faster and broader impact of our research, extension and teaching programs to the industry. On the other hand, these larger companies have more intense needs that span all facets of the industry. Evolving along with this vertical integration has been an allied industry that services the nutritional, pharmaceutical, equipment and other technical needs of the large companies. Together, this industry represents a broad, yet concentrated set of research, teaching, and extension needs.

     Our Department currently has twenty faculty . Six of these positions are joint appointments in the Department of Veterinary Pathobiology. These 14.8 FTE's split into 5.4 for teaching, 5.9 for research, and 3.5 for extension. The Department has seventeen permanent staff members and its facilities consist of various laboratory and office suites in the Kleberg Center; the Poultry Health Building in the Veterinary Research Complex; and the Poultry Science Teaching, Research, and Extension Center on FM 2818. In addition to the personnel located in the POSC Department, we have several affiliated scientists at USDA, Texas Veterinary Medical Dianostic Laboratory, and numerous other related private and public organizations such as the Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission. Our Department has collaborative research agreements with several institutions such as the National Autonomous University of Mexico, University of Arkansas, University of California-Davis, University of San Francisco, University of Maryland, University of Nebraska, West Virginia University, and Virginia Tech University, and the USDA-ARS laboratories at College Station (TX), Beltsville (MD) and Athens (GA).

        Although it is divided into six specific focus areas, our Departmental vision embraces the cross-cutting themes outlined in the Agriculture Program 21 plan. This Department will seek excellence in all its functions, diversity in its personnel and programs, objectivity in its findings and activities, efficiency through its partnerships, and a global perspective in its programs and faculty. These are themes that permeate all the priority areas and Departmental programs. We are also dedicated to the broader goals of the Texas A&M University Vision 2020 plan in which priorities are to foster excellence in our faculty, students, facilities, and programs.

     Throughout the coming decade, we seek to create a seamless Department in which there are no visible boundaries or distinctions between teaching, research, and extension. The vertical integration of much of our industry and the centralized organization of our Department require and facilitate close interaction between the three land grant missions. Integration of teaching, research, and extension improves teaching and research relevance while better enabling extension programs to relate results to clientele. Because of this philosophy, this strategic plan is not segmented by teaching, research, and extension; but is presented as a single, integrated program. Likewise, this strategic plan is organized according to the issues being addressed and not by scientific discipline. This reflects our effort to address these priority needs through interdisciplinary teams within our Department and in collaboration with other departments and institutions.

Back to top


VISION:

The Texas A&M Poultry Science Department aspires to provide:

"Premier Poultry and People for Texas and the World"

Back to top


MISSION:

Our mission is to be a leading source for the discovery and dissemination of information, technology, and experience to students, the poultry industry, and society.

Back to top


VISIONARY GOALS:

We strive to accomplish this through programs that:

1. Facilitate the positive interaction between the poultry industry, society, and the environment
2. Ensure a safe supply of poultry products for consumers
3. Maximize societal and industrial benefits from molecular sciences
4. Provide accurate, objective information about poultry care and well-being for the development of appropriate decisions and policies
5. Enhance the value and quality of poultry products through better processes and ingredients
6. Continue excellence in all of our educational programs

Back to top


PRIORITIES:

     Many of the following priority areas are interrelated. For example, molecular genetics and bioinformatics are used for the study of pathogenic bacteria in a poultry waste stream that may possibly impact the environment. These relationships facilitate interaction within our Department but also represent opportunities for collaboration outside of our Department. It should also be noted that within each priority area, there is an entire range of scientific depth, from the most applied information and technology to the most cutting-edge molecular biotechnology. This represents part of the challenge in our Department, meeting the needs of a field that requires both everyday operations and pioneering new scientific knowledge. This document is our plan for addressing these needs for the coming decade. Although we will strive to expand our faculty with new positions, the reality may be that the needed expertise may come from redirection of existing faculty and partnering with expertise already present in other departments at Texas A&M.

Back to top


PRIORITY AREAS:
Environmental Impact
Food Safety
Molecular Genetics and Bioinformatics
Health and Welfare
Process and Ingredient Technologies
Educational Programs


1. Environmental Impact
     Poultry production impacts the environment in many ways such as dust, odors, flies, and manure/litter accumulation. These factors affect the quality of air, soil, and water. While most methods have focused on disposal methods, newer concepts such as precision nutrition are directed at prevention. More precise nutrient management and utilization will focus on the bird to reduce the production of problematic waste components. A more attractive approach to environmental impact will be to develop alternate uses for the waste products produced by the poultry industry. This will make a potentially negative issue into a positive, value-added product.

Back to Priority Areas

2. Food Safety
     Food safety will continue to be an issue as we strive to understand the many factors affecting it. While the most immediate solution is to focus on interventions at the processing plant and consumer levels, a more effective plan needs to include a focus on the role of the live production factors that contribute to the initial contamination. Another area is to develop a more complete understanding of the risks involved from specific hazards so that procedures, policies and legislation can be based on science.

Back to Priority Areas


3. Molecular Genetics and Bioinformatics
     As the sciences of genomics and proteomics continue to provide increasing knowledge and technology about biological processes, we are presented with opportunities to improve poultry production and products. Areas of potential improvement include production of biologically active compounds from poultry systems, preservation of endangered species, and acceleration of genetic improvement for commercial poultry (disease resistance, reproductive efficiency, growth, stress susceptibility, etc.). Using transgenics for the molecular manipulation of animal systems is one of the fastest developing fields in biology. Due to the unique anatomy of the avian egg and embryonic development, avian species present unique opportunities and challenges in the field of transgenics.

Back to Priority Areas


4. Health and Welfare
     Human/animal diseases and poultry welfare are important to poultry companies and the general public. Controlling animal diseases is critical to commercial production, but also impacts food safety and the international trade. Furthermore, animal health impacts human health in areas of Texas where poultry and humans live in close proximity such as the colonias of south Texas. In these and other areas, poultry could be indicators of the impact of livestock on human health. Transport of poultry and other birds across the Texas-Mexico border continues to be a public and poultry health concern for the Texas poultry industry.
     Animal welfare is also a growing concern of both the public and the poultry industry. Whether the issue is perceived or real, we need to provide objective information about the treatment and conditions of the animals upon which we depend. A biochemical/anatomical approach to understanding bird welfare to help establish a healthy bird phenotype for use in situational assessment and policy development would ideally replace the evaluation of stress based on human perceptions of discomfort as the primary indicators of welfare.

Back to Priority Areas


5. Process and Ingredient Technologies
     The processing sector is the largest employer in the poultry industry. It also imparts the greatest modifications to the product and is the product's last point of contact with the company before it reaches the retail market. The processing plant is the focus of the industry's effort for increased efficiency to reduce labor costs and for meeting the ever-changing demands of consumers for variety, nutrition, safety, and value. In an effort to increase efficiency, the poultry industry has moved toward automation. More recently it has embraced robotics as a possible way to reduce labor costs. With its vast engineering programs, TAMU is well-positioned to participate in this robotic development by the poultry industry.
     Nutriceuticals and functional foods are related areas in which foods and ingredients elicit beneficial effects on human health. These areas have tremendous potential for growth in our Department considering that the egg is a unique biological packaging system for a wide variety of nutrients and bioactive compounds. There are also obvious links in this priority area with the areas of food safety, animal health, molecular genetics, and environmental impact.

Back to Priority Areas


6. Educational Programs
     Providing a supply of well-trained professionals for the poultry industry, graduate/professional schools, and related public service organizations is a main function of our Department. Maintaining these future professionals will require a base level of teaching excellence in poultry science. Just because these base areas may not entirely fit in a priority area does not mean they are any less essential to the future success of poultry science. Furthermore, these educational programs are not limited to classroom teaching. Youth education is important in creating informed consumers and potential future poultry science majors. Likewise, consumers need information about their food and environment and the lack of it is a major factor in the negative perception of agriculture and related new technologies such as genetically modified organisms.

a. Departmental Web Site - In today's technological society, the Departmental Web Site is a primary means of exposure and contact with prospective students as well as the various clientele groups. It is a portal through which we recruit students and through which external parties can access our expertise/programs and those of the entire University System. Our Department Web Site has always been a leader in innovation and productivity. We need to constantly reevaluate its design and function to assure that it is achieving our goals.

b. Distance Education Coordinator - Our Department will be a leader in the delivery of continuing education training and professional Masters degrees by distance education. While the faculty will be ultimately responsible for developing and teaching the courses, their efforts are greatly facilitated (and their time saved) by a staff member dedicated to the programming involved in the development and maintenance of the computer-based/assisted courses. Time and computer knowledge are usually the most limiting factors in the implementation of distance education courses. Our Distance Education Program Coordinator helps reduce that barrier.

c. Student Programs Coordinator - As our Departmental enrollment has expanded, our advising and coordinating capacity has not. Crucial to an effective teaching program and to a positive student educational experience in college is readily available academic advice and guidance. Additionally, our many student activities help to provide the "other education" so sought after by the TAMU Vision 2020 plan. Our student activities are currently all independent and the lack of adequate coordination has reduced their impact. A coordinator of academic and other student activities would greatly enhance our Department. This staff member would still encourage students to seek faculty contact for experience and career guidance. This coordinator would also not be solely responsible for recruiting. Our Department strongly feels that recruiting is a department-wide effort and everyone has a contribution to make.

d. Teaching Program Evaluation and Development - To insure that our students are receiving the best, latest, and most useful education, we feel that our teaching effectiveness needs to be routinely evaluated for quality and timeliness. This is also important because the quality of our educational programs will impact its appeal to potential students in recruiting efforts. Toward this end, our curriculum will be annually evaluated and adjusted appropriately. Furthermore, we will encourage qualified students to pursue a basic science curriculum within our Department in preparation for graduate study. This will not replace the existing curriculum that provides a solid and marketable training in poultry science. Instead, it will target those students who would already be going into graduate or professional school and provide them a curriculum to better meet their future needs.

e. Life Sciences Graduate Students - As the basic life sciences become a greater part of poultry science, our graduate programs will have an increasing need for students trained in basic sciences and techniques. We will develop a recruiting program for non-poultry students from basic life science backgrounds to pursue graduate degrees in poultry science. Such students are often looking for a field in which they can apply their basic skills and knowledge in a marketable way.

f. Graduate Student Stipends - With addition of the proposed faculty positions in this plan and the associated expansion of our programs will come the need for additional graduate student positions. While many of these will need to be funded from contracts and grants, there will also be a need for a core supply of graduate funding to maintain a base level of teaching, research, and extension operations.

g. Youth Programming - Our Department recognizes that educating youth in poultry, and life in general, is a critical to the entire field of poultry science. Specifically, the livestock shows, judging teams, and related school programs such as FFA and 4H will continue to be priorities in our mission and in our recruiting effort.

Back to Priority Areas
Back to top

by Liz Hirschler
Copyright © 1996 --
Poultry Science Department, Texas A&M University