Kira Everhart-Valentin serves the United Sorghum Checkoff Program (USCP), where she is responsible for developing and leading the sorghum industry’s sustainability initiatives. This includes the assessment of opportunities for investment and collaboration to increase the value of sorghum for farmers and industry stakeholders while also assuring continuous improvement in practices and performance on farms and across the industry as a whole. Her primary focus has been effectively quantifying and communicating sorghum’s key resource-conserving characteristics and elevating the unique challenges, opportunities and benefits of High Plains farming systems.

Everhart-Valentin has worked in the sorghum industry for a number of years, beginning in Western Kansas where she served farmers and agribusinesses in communications and community development. Prior to joining USCP, she served as the program coordinator with the USAID Feed the Future Innovation Lab on Collaborative Research on Sorghum and Millet at Kansas State University where she managed a global research program on sorghum and millet across various areas of sorghum innovation and technology, including genetic improvement, agronomic practices and end-use processing.