AGT Foods founder recipient of U of R honorary degree

Murad Al-Katib has distinguished himself as one of Canada’s most respected agricultural experts and has used his business success to help those in need at home and around the globe.

The entrepreneur, business leader, and humanitarian grew up in Davidson, Saskatchewan where he saw the vital role agriculture plays in feeding the world. The son of Turkish immigrants, he learned early on the importance of giving back to his community.

In the early 1990s, Murad recognized the potential lentils, an emerging Saskatchewan pulse crop, might have on the world. The company he founded, AGT Foods and Ingredients Inc., headquartered in Regina, has grown into one of the largest suppliers of pulses, staple foods and food ingredients in the world.

Murad, the down-toearth father of teenage twins Tariq and Serra, earned a Bachelor of Commerce degree with Honours from the University of Saskatchewan where he met his wife Michelle. He completed a master’s degree in Global Management at Thunderbird School of Global Management in Glendale, Arizona and founded Saskcan Pulse Trading, the predecessor of AGT, in 2001.

Under his leadership, AGT has partnered with the United Nations World Food Program and the International Committee of the Red Cross to help deliver more than 4 million family-ration cartons to Syrian refugees. As a patron sponsor of the Canadian Red Cross, AGT is helping the organization’s disaster response program as well as Imagine No Bullying, a program delivered by members of the Saskatchewan Roughriders that reaches 30,000 students in the province annually.

Earlier this year, Murad received the Ernst and Young World Entrepreneur of the Year Award. He was named an Oslo Business for Peace Foundation Honoree and received a 2016 United Nations Association of Canada Global Citizen Laureate Award. Canada’s leading agriculture publication, the Western Producer included him on their list of 44 Innovators Who Shaped Prairie Agriculture. He was named one of Canada’s Top 40 under 40 by the Globe and Mail and was included in PROFIT magazine’s list of Canada’s 30 Most Fabulous Entrepreneurs of the Past 30 Years. Murad has recently been announced as a recipient of the Saskatchewan Order of Merit, to be awarded November 2017.

He chairs the Kenneth Levene Graduate School of Business Advisory Board to the Dean.

SUPPLIED PHOTO Murad Al-Katib, founder of AGT Foods and Ingredients Inc., will receive an honorary degree at the University of Regina’s Fall Convocation ceremonies.