IBP's Leman Honored

The National Pork Board  presented Eugene Leman, Dakota Dunes, S.D., with its Distinguished Service Award at this March’s Pork Forum.  The award is given annually to recognize the lifelong commitment of an outstanding leader.

Leman most recently served as the senior group vice president of Tyson Fresh Meats, Inc.  He was responsible for overseeing the company’s pork and beef business, which includes such areas as livestock procurement, fresh meat production and fresh meat sales and marketing.

During his career, Leman made key contributions to the growth and diversification of IBP, Inc., which Tyson acquired in 2001.  After a 17-year career at Wilson, Leman joined then-Iowa Beef Processors in 1981 to launch the company’s pork division.  Under his leadership, IBP grew into the No. 1 U.S. pork processor. 

Nearly two decades later, he led another major IBP initiative to prepackage brand-name pork and beef products to place directly in grocers’ meatcases.

 “Gene is one of the few people in the meat industry who has a thorough understanding of the entire pork industry,” said Gary Machan, Tyson Foods.  “His leadership in building and remodeling plants, marketing pork products domestically and internationally and most recently the entry into case-ready fresh pork has brought the entire industry to never-before-seen-levels of competitiveness on a world- wide basis.”