Extended Bios

EXTENDED BIOS

Dan Hodgson

Dan founded LGI in 2012 to innovate in food, agriculture and health, and has built a network of investors, advisors, and market partners who share unmet market needs, their market access, their advice, and their capital to build businesses and returns. Born and raised on a farm in Northeastern North Dakota, near the Manitoba border, and after 20 years innovating in the retail food industry, he loves to be on site on a farm, processing plant, or barn, learning how to bring technology to meet the unmet needs. Beginning with LGAF and following with 3 additional funds and 4 single-purpose funds, Dan has both founded and invested in the LGI companies and currently serves on the boards of a number of the LGI portfolio companies.

Paul Card

Paul Card is a technology executive, founder and ecosystem leader with a strong track record of supporting startups and building innovation communities. He serves as CEO of Manitoba Innovates, where he helps founders access mentorship, funding, and strategic support to scale their companies. Paul is also a well-known community builder, recognized for fostering collaboration across Manitoba’s tech sector through initiatives like Tech Thursday.

Dan Mulder

Dan Mulder was with Federated Co-Operatives LTD. as a Fertilizer Director from 2015 to 2020, leading the formation and building their fertilizer business. He was the Vice-President of retail sales at Bretty Young, and the Marketing Director at Agricore United from 2003-2007. Before that he was the Manager of Marketing and Sales at Westco Fertilizer for 16 years, from 1980 to 2003. He also spearheaded the introduction of AgroManager Crop Enhancement Specialists (ACES) in a partnership program with distributors at 20 retail locations across the prairies.

Wayne Freese

Dr. Freese is the Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of Prairie Holdings Group, LLC. Wayne practiced veterinary medicine for more than forty years in Worthington, MN. He is co-founder of Oxford Laboratories (now owned by Merck), Newport Laboratories, Inc., (now owned by Merial), and founder of Cambridge Technologies. Dr. Freese attended Iowa State University, where he received a Bachelor of Science degree in Animal Science and a Doctor of Veterinary Medicine. He also received a Master’s degree in Swine Preventative Medicine from the University of Minnesota. Dr. Freese has served as a consulting veterinarian in Europe, Asia, Mexico, and Canada. He is a past President of the American Association of Swine Practitioners and the Interstate Veterinary Medical Association.

Dr William Wilson

Dr. William W. Wilson received his PhD in Agricultural Economics from the University of Manitoba in 1980. Since then he has been a Professor at North Dakota State University in Agribusiness and Applied Economics with periodic sabbaticals at Stanford University. Recently, he was named as a University Distinguished Professor at NDSU which an honorary position is, and a great achievement. And, in 2016 he was named the CHS Chair in Risk Management and Trading at NDSU which is an endowed position. In 2017 he was awarded the AAEA 2016 Distinguished Teaching Award (Chicago July 2017)

His focus is risk and strategy as applied to agriculture and agribusiness with a particular focus on agtechnology development and commercialization, procurement, transportation and logistics, international marketing and competition. He teaches classes in Commodity Trading, Risk and AgriBusiness Strategy and has taught his Risk Class at Purdue University; and is a visiting scholar at Melbourne University where he visits 2 times/year and advises PhD students in risk and agbiotechnology.

He was recognized as one of the top 10 Agricultural Economists in 1995 and more recently as one of the top 1% of agricultural economists by RePEc (Research Papers in Economics). Finally, he has students who are in senior positions in a number of the large agribusinesses including commodity companies, railroads and food and beverage companies.

Wilf Keller

(Honorary Doctor of Science)

One of Canada’s most renowned crop development scientists, Dr. Wilf Keller (PhD) has enjoyed a career spanning almost 50 years as a pioneering agriculture researcher and visionary leader.

Born in Melville, Sask., Keller earned his Bachelor of Science (1969) and his PhD (1972) majoring in crop science at the University of Saskatchewan (USask), before heading overseas to Germany for post-doctoral studies. A year later, he started with Agriculture Canada and quickly began contributing to the agriculture industry through trailblazing research endeavours.

Keller helped lead numerous major research initiatives, including the application of genomics in canola breeding that had a tremendous impact and contributed to making the crop a made-in-Canada success story. Keller’s work also contributed to the development of the first herbicide-tolerant canola variety in North America, one of his many research success stories.

A recognized global leader in agricultural biotechnology research, management and promotion, Keller has worked with the major research players in the industry, from Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada to the National Research Council, to Genome Prairie, and most recently serving until 2020 as president and CEO of Ag-West Bio Inc., a non-profit organization in Saskatoon that advocates for agriculture science. Keller currently serves as vice-president of outreach with the Agri-Food Innovation Council, after previously serving as the board chair.

Among his many accomplishments, Keller played a supporting role as a member of the group that successfully launched the Saskatchewan-based Protein Industries Canada Supercluster, projected to contribute billions to the Canadian economy. The supercluster was one of five proposals selected out of 55 applications to share in $950 million in federal funding, attracting both capital investment and industry-leading scientists to the city.

During his remarkable career, Keller has been honoured with multiple major awards, including induction into the Canadian Agriculture Hall of Fame in 2018, the Saskatchewan Agriculture Hall of Fame in 2017, and earning the Saskatchewan Order of Merit – the province’s highest honour – in 2015. Keller has also received three National Research Council Outstanding Achievement Awards, as well as Lifetime Achievement Awards from AgWest Biotech and from The Society for In Vitro Biology.

Bob Sinner

Robert (Bob) Sinner has spent his entire life in North Dakota, founding SB&B Foods, LLC. In 1989, the Company expanded by creating an international business to supply food quality soybeans and later other food grade commodities directly to food manufacturers globally. Bob serves as President of both SB&B Foods, LLC, the Company marketing entity and Identity Ag Processing, the state-of-the-art processing company with two locations. In 2007, SB&B Foods, Inc. was recognized and awarded the North Dakota Exporter of the Yea award. In 2009, SB&B Companies were also presented with the North Dakota Entrepreneur of the Year Award. Bob currently serves as President of SSGA (Specialty Soya & Grains Alliance), a national association of identity-preserved agriculture food ingredient suppliers and was recently appointed by U.S. Ag Secretary, Sonny Perdue to serve on the Federal Grain Inspection Advisory Committee. He has been, and remains, active in a variety of civic, state, regional and national organizations, including the North Dakota Trade Office Board of Directors and the National Agriculture Transportation Coalition Advisory Board. His three sons are involved in the company business.

Doug MacDougald

Dr. Doug MacDougald, Veterinarian and Founding Partner at South West Ontario Veterinary Services, is a true industry leader having paved new directions in managing swine diseases benefitting the welfare of pigs, the economic viability of swine producers and ultimately, the health of Canadians through safe food and a clean environment. Dr. MacDougald is an active member of several swine professional organizations including Swine Health Ontario, the Ontario Association of Swine Veterinarians, Western Canadian Association of Swine Veterinarians, and American Association of Swine Veterinarians. He is a leader in the swine industry when it comes to the control of economically important diseases by innovating and implementing good biosecurity practices and leading in the development of area regional control measures to reduce disease spread and enhance elimination.

Robert (Bob) Majkrzak

Robert (Bob) joined Red River Commodities in 1985 as the Production and Engineering Manager. He became Vice President in 1987 and the President and CEO in 1989. Bob retired from Red River Commodities after 35 years with the organization serving as the President and CEO for 30 years. He grew the company from one operation to several divisions including Processing, Wildlife, SunGold Foods, SunButter and Global Ingredients with multiple processing locations in the USA and customers throughout the world. His focus was creating a food supply chain that emphasized healthy and safe food products. He was always looking for new alternative uses for sunflower. Bob devoted much of his career to sunflower serving on the NSA Board of Directors and Chairman of the NSA Confection Promotion Committee. He was a leader on several key issues facing the sunflower industry such as: adoption of the Food Safety and Modernization act, Blair House Agreement, International Trade, Research and several Farm Bills.

Dan Ellsworth

Dan Ellsworth served as CEO of Animart after a career in senior sales and product management with Schering-Plough and Dextron Fearing.
Dan has deep expertise in dairy, feedlot, pasture, swine and poultry production health and management, and is currently serving as CEO of Fairona Animal Health and advisor to Anilogics.

Dan is an accomplished Senior Executive and Thought Leader with more than 25 years of success in the agriculture marketing, sales, distribution, and radio-frequency identification industries. He has extensive experience running complex projects driving organizational improvements to achieve growth objectives. His key areas of expertise include acquisitions/integration, strategic marketing, vision casting, people development, livestock vaccine markets, and organizational alignment.

Dan has held multiple executive leadership positions in market leading companies, public policy advocacy organizations and non-profits firms. Most recently serving as President/CEO of ANIMART LLC. He led a team through transition from a small state player to a broad regional firm with a presence from 2 states to a presence in over 20 from 2012 to 2019.

He is the founder of TCQ Solutions LLC a strategic consulting firm, helping small to medium size companies expand and capture market opportunities.

He has served on multiple Industry Boards including Durvet Animal Health, AgriLabs Animal Health, American Dairy Coalition, Dairy Cares of Wisconsin and the Wisconsin Dairy Business Association Legislative Committee.

He currently serves as President of Wisconsin Water Alliance and Chairman of the Board for Asian Partners International.

Dan grew up on cow/calf operation in the Northwest Colorado town of Meeker. He graduated from Colorado State University in 1995, with a BA in Political Science and has a Master’s in Business Administration from Bellevue University in Nebraska.

Murray MacLaughlin

Murray McLaughlin (B.Sc. McGill University, M.Sc. and Ph.D. Cornell University)
Dr Murray McLaughlin is President of McLaughlin Consultants and consults on the Bioeconomy, Agriculture and Forestry sectors with respect to the bioeconomy and circular economy in Canada. He is an advisor to Bioindustrial Innovation Canada on international and government relations. Also an Advisor to Forest Products Innovation (FPI) on bioproducts in forestry and is an advisor to British Columbia Research Inc. (BCRI) on oil spill technology, lignin and other new technology. He is an Innovation advisor to Bioenterprise on bioeconomy and cleantech related to food and Agri-tech. He is chair of the Biomass Quality Network Canada (BQNC) focused on certification and quality standards for biomass.

He (McLaughlin Consultants) was the founding Executive Director of BIC ( 2010-2016) and the Sustainable Chemistry Alliance ( 2009-2016) in Sarnia, Ontario, with a focus on a Sustainable Bioeconomy. He held various positions in the private, government and non-profit areas such as Director Business Development for the Canadian Light Source, President of OAFT, Deputy Minister of SAF, and President of AWB Inc. He was the founder of ABIC started in 1996. He managed a VC Fund, Foragen, for agriculture and spent 15 years with ELANCO, in R and D and marketing. His career has focused on agricultural bioindustrial sectors -development, product management , marketing and commercialization as well as economic development and cluster building. He has been a member of numerous Boards of Directors and Advisory Committees, including, BEN (BioEconomy Network); BioNB and FPI. He co-chaired the Industrial Bioproducts Value Chain Roundtable – a partnership with Industry and AAFC for the bioeconomy. He is a graduate of Nova Scotia Agricultural College, McGill (B. Sc. Agr.) and Cornell (MSC and PhD). He has an Honorary Doctorate Degree from Dalhousie Univ and received several awards – Alumni of the Year for NSAC: LSO Community Service Award; the GoldLeaf award from BioteCanada and the Queen Elizabeth Diamond Jubilee Medal. He received the LSO Lifetime Achievement Award 2016 and recognized in the top 100 global leaders in the Advanced Bioeconomy at Biofuels Digest in 2015 and 2016.

He was on committees at GenomeBC in Vancouver on forestry and research projects. He also is on advisory committee for the Biomass Quality network in Winnipeg ,Manitoba and the DFCC advisor for the Ag-Sci Cluster for special crops in Saskatchewan. He was on the International Advisory Committee of Global Bioeconomy Summit(GBS).