Bios

Kristine Marceca
President
Townsend Management, LLC
kmarceca@townsendmgmt.com

Ms. Marceca founded Townsend Management, LLC in 2004 after over 10 years working in the area of agricultural trade for the American Peanut Council and the American Forest and Paper Association. Ms. Marceca is the current Executive Director of the U.S. Apple Export Council and the International Trade Director for the California Kiwifruit Commission. Ms. Marceca is a member of the U.S. Agricultural Export Development Council (USAEDC) Executive Committee and the past Chair of the Rules and Meetings committees. Ms. Marceca has experience working on trade policy issues and organized the U.S. forest products industry delegation to Seattle for the 1999 WTO Ministerial. She also has worked extensively on the resolution of various phytosanitary issues for the apple and forest products industries. Ms. Marceca has worked for an international public relations firm and a strategic research firm. She worked on Capitol Hill for over five years for various members of Congress from New York State. She studied anthropology and political science and received the Dana Fellowship allowing her to conduct anthropological research in the Caribbean.

Elizabeth Callanan
Senior Consultant
Townsend Management, LLC
ecallanan@townsendmgmt.com

Ms. Callanan retired in 2006 after nearly 34 years in the Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS), U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). Since her retirement, Ms. Callanan has provided technical support and guidance to US agricultural industry groups interested in refining their global strategic planning processes. Virtually the whole of her career was dedicated to the implementation of the Agency’s more than $250 million in foreign market development programs which are conducted in cooperation with nonprofit agricultural trade associations. During her tenure with USDA, Ms. Callanan was responsible for the oversight of the export promotion programs of the forest products, soybeans, peanuts, sunflower, cotton and planting seeds industries. She also served as the Assistant Deputy Administrator over FAS’ marketing programs, and supervised the unit that developed and implemented program regulators for the export marketing programs. Ms. Callanan additionally designed and first implemented the Unified Export Strategy (UES).

Kent Sisson
Senior Consultant
Townsend Management, LLC
ksisson@townsendmgmt.com

Kent Sisson has 27 years experience with FAS. For 17 years, he oversaw the administration of foreign marketing and promotion programs. He served in leadership positions formulating program policies & procedures; liaising with the Cooperator community; coordinating Cooperator training in strategic planning; managing the MAP and TASC programs for the specialty crops industries; and serving as the USDA representative on the Fruit & Vegetable Agricultural Technical Advisory Committee. He also implemented USDA’s strategy for expanding agricultural exports derived from biotechnology and animal clones. Mr. Sisson served as the lead USDA representative in both Indonesia and Malaysia. He managed technical and SPS trade negotiations, export promotion activities, food assistance programs, and capacity building projects. He has extensive trade and marketing contacts throughout the Asian Pacific Rim and excellent working relationships with USDA and other officials with USTR, State, EPA, and FDA. He retired from FAS in 2008 as Minister Counselor in the Senior Foreign Service.

Jane Shey
Senior Consultant
Townsend Management, LLC
janeshey@aol.com

Jane Shey has developed and implemented legislation policy for 23 years. Her client base includes trade associations, Fortune 500 companies, and producer organizations. Much of her work involves strategic planning, goal setting, coalition-building and communication efforts. She represented the Coalition for Foreign Market Development for 11 years promoting the program and obtaining funding. She has organized and conducted training programs for international visitors for the U.S. Agency for International Development and the Cochran Program. Before starting her consulting business, Jane worked in the U.S. House of Representatives as a legislative assistant and served as Staff Director of the Subcommittee on Foreign Agriculture and Hunger. Her work in trade policy has focused on the countries in the European Union and adjacent to the EU. She also represented the National Association of Animal Breeders on the Agriculture Technical Advisory Committee (ATAC) for Animals and Animal Products. She currently resides outside of Brussels, Belgium.

Sean Callanan
Director, International Programs
Townsend Management, LLC
scallanan@townsendmgmt.com

Sean Callanan, Director, International Programs, oversees Townsend Management’s administration of MAP, EMP, TASC, TIRF and other programs on behalf of the company’s clients. Mr. Callanan manages generic promotions in Canada, Central America, Mexico, Taiwan and the EU and has hosted several trade missions and reverse trade missions bringing exporters and importers together for face-to-face meetings in order to discuss and explore opportunities for trade. In addition, Mr. Callanan directly oversees many of the different promotional activities conducted on behalf of Townsend’s clients in foreign countries including the production of point-of-sale materials, sampling activities, in-store demonstrations and technical/safe-handling seminars. Mr. Callanan joined the Townsend team in 2005 and has extensive experience with commodity and agricultural trade organizations, global strategic planning and retail management. He earned his B.A. in Philosophy with an Economics minor from the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in 2002.