Officers of the British Veterinary Poultry Association
Here is the current executive committee
President
Michael Clark
Michael Clark graduated from University of Cambridge in 1992. He worked in mixed practice in the Cotswolds for 4 years before moving to Minster Veterinary Practice. By 2000 he had migrated from mixed practice to 100% poultry and gamebird work.
At that time he also became a partner in the business and was instrumental in setting up Minster’s Hereford poultry office. With the establishment of the Minster Sutton Bonington office in 2006 Mike became an honorary associate professor of poultry medicine at the adjacent Nottingham Vet School.
Having relocated to Nottingham Mike completed an MBA at Nottingham Business School. From 2014 to 2017 Mike served on the Animal Health and Welfare Board of England. He is currently a member of the Poultry Veterinary Study Group of the EU, the Poultry Disease Group and Chairman of the East Midlands Poultry Discussion Group.
Since the sale of Minster Vets to VetPartners Mike has changed course and is now a clinical associate professor in poultry medicine and agribusiness at Nottingham Vet School and an avian adviser at Boehringer Ingelheim.
Senior Vice President
Richard Jackson
Richard Jackson was born in Ireland and spent his spare time working on his father’s commercial turkey farm. He developed a keen interest in poultry and begun to take an interest in breeding and showing rare breeds of chickens. Ultimately this culminated in the purchase of an incubator and educating himself about the problems of incubation and chick rearing.
Subsequently he developed a desire to become a poultry vet. Richard spent five years at Glasgow University and graduated on the 28th of June. The following week he headed to Exeter to work as part of St David’s Poultry Team.
Richard currently spends a large part of his time caring for broiler birds within the poultry industry and has developed key expertise in reviewing bio-security, hygiene, management and vaccination on clients’ farms. He has become an important member of The Chicken Vet team, developing new ideas, writing veterinary articles and playing a major role in the CPD training courses.
Richard became Clinical Director of St David’s Poultry Team in 2014.
Junior Vice President
Dr Charlotte Commins
Charlotte graduated from RVC in 2014, with a keen interest in poultry. Upon qualifying she immediately joined the Slate Hall Group. She undertook, (and thoroughly enjoyed) their internship programme, and has now become their youngest ever Senior Associate.
She is especially interested in broilers, broiler breeders and commercial layers, and has been involved in several research projects during her time working within the practice. Charlotte is keen to promote knowledge of poultry across the veterinary sector, and has spent the last two years working as the BVPA representative on BVA council, ensuring that the poultry vet voice is heard.
She is now taking on the role of Treasurer within the committee, and is looking forward to a more active role in ensuring financial aid is available for both future poultry research, and members seeking help to continue their professional development; as well as choosing the wine for BVPA dinners!
Treasurer
Alex Royden
Alex graduated from the University of Liverpool in 2014 and then completed a PhD on the role and impact of biosecurity in the control of Campylobacter in commercial broiler production in 2018. Alex also has an MSc in Veterinary Infection and Disease Control and an MRes in Advanced Biological Sciences (Microbiology). Following her PhD, Alex was Lead Vet for the North West for Poultry Health Services where she worked with all types of poultry production, but primarily commercial broilers and gamebirds.
Alex is currently an Assistant Veterinary Advisor in the UK Office for Sanitary and Phytosanitary Trade Assurance within DEFRA. The UK Office manages UK market access requests for live animals and animal products, ensuring that GB import requirements are met to protect public and animal health.
Alex was elected to the BVPA committee as a general committee member in 2021 and spent two years representing BVPA at BVA Council before taking on the role of Treasurer in 2023.
Secretary
Emma Youngs
Emma fell in love with the poultry industry whilst studying veterinary medicine at the University of Cambridge, after doing a work experience placement with Slate Hall Veterinary Practice and following graduation in 2013, Emma began work there, focusing on broiler and broiler breeder health and disease.
Late in 2015 Emma moved to become Technical and Marketing Manger for Poultry with Hipra UK & Ireland, which gave her an opportunity to see different types of production challenges across the country and overseas, and to design and implement projects to optimise vaccination on farm. She particularly enjoyed getting more involved in the layer industry and also joined the organising committees for both the East Midlands and Wales & West Poultry Discussion Groups.
After 2 years with Hipra, Emma felt the call of clinical practice once more and is now enjoying herself immensely as an Associate Veterinarian at Crowshall Veterinary Services, where she works with all manner of poultry!
Emma is also studying part-time for a PhD exploring the epidemiology of histomonosis (blackhead) in the UK poultry industry. This is a topic she is passionate about, and is proud to have received funding from the turkey R&D sub-committee of the BPC to enable her research.
Programme Secretary
Kannan Ganapathy
Dr Ganapathy is a lecturer in infectious diseases (poultry) at the University of Liverpool. He is engaged with research, teaching, poultry consultations and CPDs, mostly on molecular immunopathogenesis, diagnosis, control and prevention of poultry infectious respiratory diseases. His research focuses on avian respiratory pathogens and vaccines, especially on infectious bronchitis virus (IBV) and avian metapneumovirus (aMPV).
He has studied the interactions between live viral vaccines of IBV, aMPV and Newcastle disease virus (NDV), the influence infectious bursa disease virus vaccines on the bursa of Fabricius and its impact on live IBV vaccine-take. The other research activity is to improve diagnosis of respiratory pathogens by conventional and molecular methods, including the use of PCR and sequencing (eg. aMPV subtyping or IBV genotyping). Dr Ganapathy's group have validated a PCR system for detection of multiple respiratory pathogens from RNA/DNA extracted from FTA cards.
He also has years of experience in research, diagnosis, control and prevention of avian mycoplasmas, in particular Mycoplasma gallisepticum (Mg) and Mycoplasma synoviae (Ms).
Public Relations Officer
John Tasker
John studied agriculture at Reading University, followed by a year at the IRAD Compton, and went on the study veterinary medicine at the Royal Vet College, graduating in 1976. He then spent 6 years in farm animal practice followed by a stint in New Zealand with a small Scottish animal health company where he was responsible for all matters technical, including sheep farming.
On his return to UK in 1995 he continued working in industry and is currently development director with ECO Animal Health Ltd. He completed the Compton Poultry Health course in 2001 and has since spent much time developing pharmaceutical products for the poultry and gamebird industries.
John has many years experience in the international pharmaceutical industry, particularly in areas of antibiotic development and regulation. When not working John enjoys old cars and slow boats.
John is now Public Relations officer with the Association.
Elected Committee Member
Ben Huntington
Ben spent several years as an in-house vet for UK poultry meat integrators. In 2019 he founded Pengwern Animal Health, a consultancy for research and development in animal health and production, with an approach influenced by applied epidemiology and economics. Ben provides consultancy services to poultry companies in Europe and Africa and manages the Global Burden of Animal Diseases (GBADs) program and the associated WOAH Collaborating Centre for the Use of Economics in Animal Health (Europe) at the University of Liverpool.
Ben is a member of the BVPA Research Sub-committee and was previously chair of the BPC anti-microbial stewardship committee and BPC representative to the Poultry Health and Welfare Group. Ben has undergraduate qualifications in Veterinary Medicine, Infectious diseases, and Immunobiology (University of London); a Level 5 Award in Leadership and Management (Institute for Leadership and Management); is a certified Project Management Professional (Project Management Institute); and holds qualifications in HACCP and internal auditing for food safety.
Elected Committee Member
Emma King
Emma graduated in 2016 from the Royal Veterinary College, having gone to university intending to become a poultry vet. She spent 5 years with the Poultry Health Services team in North Yorkshire, before taking a year out of clinical work to gain practical experience on a farm as an Area Manager for a broiler/turkey integrator.
She returned to PHS Sheriff Hutton in 2022, as the veterinary lead for the North East. Her main interest remains in turkey work, with a focus on gut health. Emma has a post-graduate diploma in Population Health, Statistics, and Epidemiology, an interest in coccidiosis research, and sits on the APHA Avian Expert Group. She was elected to the BVPA committee as a general member in 2023.
Elected Committee Member
Henrietta Kodilinye Sims
Henrietta graduated from RVC and initially went into mixed veterinary practice, seeing mostly companion animals. However, as food production was her main interest she began a Diploma in Veterinary Epidemiology and Public Health and then moved into the poultry industry, working for Slate Hall Veterinary Practice. She then moved into an academic post at the University of Surrey, School of Veterinary Medicine, where she designed and delivered the poultry curriculum. Here, she designed and created the first range of chicken clinical skills models used in UK vet schools, aimed at improving day one skills for graduates entering either commercial or companion industries.
After maternity leave, she returned to education part-time and launched her veterinary practice, Surrey Poultry Vet - the first UK practice to serve only pet poultry. Alongside her practice, she is currently a visiting lecturer at Surrey Vet School, an external lecturer at the University of Liverpool on the RCVS Poultry Certificate, consults for St David’s Poultry Team, is the associate editor (poultry) at the Vet Record journal and collaborates with industry and government on owner and veterinary education. Her particular interest is in responsible antimicrobial prescribing, on which she has collaborated with RCVS Knowledge, and the VMD and presented at national conferences.
Elected Committee Member and WVPA rep
Dr Alex Schock
Alex is a veterinary pathologist with over 20 years of experience. She started her career investigating diseases of mammalian species, particularly production animals. Since 2013, she has specialised in avian species. After leading the Diagnostic & Consultant Avian Pathology Group at APHA Lasswade for 5 years, she is now the Lead Consultant Pathologist for APHA. She has a keen interest in poultry and game birds. Her areas of expertise are infectious diseases, endemic disease surveillance, and detection of new and (re)emerging threats.
Elected Committee Member and BVA rep
Adrian Knoetze
Adrian qualified in 2009 and started as a company veterinarian in a large broiler integrator in South Africa. Whilst doing this he completed a MSc in tropical diseases. In 2014 he was awarded the WVPA young poultry veterinarian award. He joined Slate Hall Veterinary Practice in 2016 and is currently one of the clinical directors of the business. Within the BVPA he currently holds the BVA rep role and represents the interests of the BVPA and members in divisional and council meetings.
