When Patrick Holland was 15 years old his grandfather took him to the Canadian Angus Showdown in Dumdas, Prince Edward Island starting him on a journey, which has led to him being named this year’s Robert C. McHaffie Ambassador for the Canadian Angus Foundation.

The now 21-year-old Junior Angus Foundation board member from Montague, PEI says his time on the board has allowed him to meet a lot of breeders from across the country.

Holland tells Rural Roots Canada it was a rigorous process to be named to this position.

“We start out with an application back in April, we submitted a resume and from there, there were five outstanding young Angus breeders who were selected to be finalists for this program,” says Holland.  “The next part of this process was to write an essay about a topic that was given to us by the foundation and from there we came to Calgary this weekend participated in a quiz, an interview process and we also delivered a speech at the President’s Reception and then we have just observed and kinda seen how we can mingle with the crowd throughout the rest of the weekend.”

Holland says the Canadian Angus Association has one of the best junior programs in the country and it was evident at this year’s national conference.

“We’ ve got probably 20 – 25 Angus breeders under the age of 21 here this weekend and it’s just truly outstanding I think you’ll see more of that now that the beef market is starting to return to what it has in the past.”

Holland says the most common issue he is hearing from young breeders is how hard it is to get into industry.

As he travels around the country in the coming year he is sure to have many more discussions with breeders from all parts, which is all part of the journey his grandfather started him on.