The National Grain and Feed Association (NGFA) has promoted three senior staff executives to vice president in recognition of their enhanced professional responsibilities and years of service with the organization.

Todd E. Kemp was promoted from director to vice president of marketing and treasurer, David A. Fairfield was promoted from director to vice president of feed services, and Charles M. Delacruz was promoted to vice president, in addition to his previous duties as general counsel and corporate secretary with the NGFA.  

Delacruz has served as the NGFA’s legal counsel and corporate secretary since joining the staff in 2002.  In these capacities, he administers the association’s highly valued and time-honored Arbitration System.  He also serves as principal staff liaison to the Trade Rules Committee,  Arbitration Appeals Committee, Legal Council and Rail Arbitration Rules Committee.  In addition, he provides overarching in-house legal expertise on NGFA public policy issues, programs and services. 

Prior to joining the NGFA, Delacruz had extensive background in business law and private legal practice serving Fortune 500 food industry clients on regulatory, import-export, safety and quality, and business and litigation issues.  A Virginia native, Delacruz is a magna cum laude graduate of James Madison University in Harrisonburg, Va., with degrees in history and political science.  He received his law degree from the University of Virginia School of Law in Charlottesville, Va., where among other things he was editor of the Virginia Journal of International Law.

Fairfield, who is based in Atlantic, Iowa, has been with the NGFA’s staff since 2001.  He manages the NGFA’s myriad activities pertaining to feed and feed ingredient manufacturing, including co-products from the biofuels industry, as well as livestock and poultry integrator operations.  Among other things, he leads NGFA’s interaction with the Food and Drug Administration and state feed regulatory officials on feed and feed ingredient safety and policy; directs the NGFA’s highly acclaimed Model Feed Quality Assurance Program and distance-learning courses; and addresses safety, health and environmental issues affecting the feed industry.  He is principal staff liaison to the NGFA’s Feed Legislative and Regulatory Affairs Committee, Feed Manufacturing and Technology Committee, and Biofuels and Co-Products Committee. 

Prior to joining the NGFA’s staff, Fairfield had 20 years’ experience as a manager of feed mills for Cargill Inc., Continental Grain Co., and Hubbard (now Ridley) Feeds Inc.  He received Feed Management Magazine’s Feed Mill of the Year Award in 2000 and was a four-time recipient of the former Continental Grain Co.’s Quality Top Achiever Award. A Kansas native, he is a magna cum laude graduate in feed science and management from Kansas State University, Manhattan, Kan., where he was recognized as a Kansas scholar.

Kemp, who has been with the NGFA since 1991, is responsible for the overall management and direction of the NGFA’s membership recruitment, development and retention programs.  He is the principal staff liaison to NGFA’s Risk Management Committee, Finance and Administration Committee, and Membership and Marketing Committee.  Most recently, he also has provided the NGFA’s staff support in responding to the MF Global Inc., bankruptcy and its implications for customer-segregated funds, as well as the development of the Association’s next Long Range Plan. 

He began his NGFA career as director of legislative affairs after working for the Agency for International Development, as a budget analyst at the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and as a legislative assistant for then-Sen. Nancy Landon Kassebaum-Baker, R-Kan.  A Kansas native, he is a graduate of Kansas State University with an undergraduate degree in agricultural economics and a masters in business administration.