Jhones Sarturi, an associate professor of beef cattle nutrition and metabolism within Texas Tech University's Department of Animal & Food Sciences, has been named one of 30 faculty and staff from Hispanic-Serving Institutions around the nation as the 2023 class of E. Kika De La Garza Fellows. 

The recognition is part of USDA's commitment to advance equity in professional development opportunities as well as build a more diverse pipeline into public service and the agricultural sector.

Starting this week the newly named fellows will spend a week meeting with leaders from different USDA agencies in the Washington, D.C. area, where they will learn about national and regional issues, policy making and research. 

“This program exemplifies USDA's commitment to ensuring equitable access to the department's programs, services, and resources.” said Lisa Ramírez, director of USDA's Office of Partnerships and Public Engagement. 

“This is such a great opportunity to interact with USDA program directors, grant administrators, and network with great fellow-colleagues from multiple U.S. universities,” Sarturi added. “The main goal for our visit is to discover venues to properly engage and empower students to pursue careers in agriculture and within the USDA. I am certain the network created during the event will leverage future federal grant submissions within the USDA education and science missions.”

Since the E. Kika De La Garza Fellows Program was established in 1998, the USDA has hosted more than 300 faculty and staff, a key effort in strengthening relationships with Hispanic-Serving Institutions. HSIs are accredited and degree-granting institutions of higher education with a full-time Hispanic student enrollment of 25 percent or more. Today, there are more than 500 HSIs nationally, serving more than 2 million students. 

Sarturi's research focuses on beef cattle nutrition, ruminal metabolism, and digestive physiology. In addition to his research duties, Sarturi teaches undergraduate (feeds and feeding; and stocker cattle and feedlot management) and graduate classes (advanced feedlot cattle management; minerals and vitamins in animal nutrition, research methods in ruminant nutrition; and seminar in agriculture), while also serving as the manager for the Ruminant Nutrition Laboratory and the Ruminant Nutrition Center.

Dr. Sarturi joined Texas Tech in 2013 after his position as post-doctoral research associate at Texas A&M AgriLife Research in Bushland, Texas. He received his degree in Veterinary Medicine from UNIDERP (Campo Grande, Brazil), and a master's degree in Agronomy from the University of Sao Paulo (Piracicaba, Brazil). His Ph.D. in animal science is from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

CONTACT: Clint Krehbiel, Dean, Davis College of Agricultural Sciences & Natural Resources, Texas Tech University at (806) 742-2808 or Clint.Krehbiel@ttu.edu

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