It looks like this whole credit crunch issue is affecting agriculture according to some testimony on Capitol Hill today by the Association of Equipment Manufacturers. You can watch a video of it here.
The Chair of AEM’s Small Enterprise Committee, Richard A. Brown, testified on Tuesday, October 28, 2008 before the House Committee on Small Business at 10 a.m. EST. Brown is the President and COO of Krause Corporation, based in Hutchinson, Kansas. The hearing is on “Creating Opportunities for Small Businesses in an Economic Recovery.”
In his prepared statement, Brown expressed his concerns to the committee for small businesses in the U.S. obtaining credit during the present economic crisis. As an example, Brown cited one business person from rural South Carolina who “had an operating line of credit with (a bank) that was secured by a stock portfolio, but with the unraveling of the market their line was frozen … Now (he) is spending most of his time trying to resolve the issue when he should be working to secure orders in this down market.”
Brown pointed out that the crisis is also now hitting agriculture. “The economic foundation for countless small businesses on thousands of Main Streets throughout the country is agriculture,” he said. “The tightening of the credit markets is coinciding with a rapid rise in the cost of agricultural inputs, such as fertilizer, seed, chemicals and fuel.”
Here’s another excerpt from his testimony:
“We are now seeing farmers delay the purchase of these inputs from their “normal” pre-season purchasing patterns as they are having trouble accessing credit and are hesitant to pay such steep prices. The ripple effects of tightening credit markets at a time of increasing capital requirements for agriculture will lead to economic hardships for rural America. I can also say that I personally perceive a sense of anger among rural Americans about this situation. Generally speaking, they did not buy homes they could not afford or run up huge credit card debt, but now are forced to deal with the consequences of other people’s excesses and as a consequence are losing faith in the system.”
How many times have you been at a meeting and had to fill out some survey at the end giving your evaluation of how the meeting went and each individual presentation?
That would be everyone. And then the people who did the meeting have to get all those pieces of paper back and add up all the responses and take up a bunch of time trying to figure out what worked and what didn’t.
Well, the Association of Equipment Manufacturers used a high tech method to get feedback immediately at last week’s AgExecutive forum with a cordless response system. Kind of like what they use on “America’s Funniest Home Videos” to pick the $10,000 winner at the end, you know?
Besides using it to get feedback on the meeting, they also had some fun with it asking questions on different topics and getting immediate responses by percentage. Pretty cool.
See photos from the AEM AgExecutive Forum here.
Three commodity organization representatives attempted to answer the question on everyone’s mind right now regarding commodity trends - where are we headed?
Steve Censky of the American Soybean Association, Fred Stemme with the National Corn Growers Association and Alan Tracy of US Wheat Associates all made presentations and took questions from the audience at the Association of Equipment Manufacturers AgExecutive Forum last week in St. Louis.
Steve noted the importance of biotechnology in the soybean industry and the increase in global demand for soybeans. “Global demand since 1990 for soybeans has been rising at 2x that of corn and almost 4x that of wheat or rice,” Steve said. “That is because people around the world have been improving their diets, which means more oil in the diet and more meat, which is good for the soybean industry.”
Fred started off his presentation with a flawless report on closing futures prices - sounded as good or better than any farm broadcaster I know - making bad news sound good! His presentation focused on the increase in corn yields since 1944, which can allow them to meet the feed, food and fuel needs of the world. “Who would have imagined 60 years ago that today we could produce on the same number of acres, 85 million acres, nearly four fold the size of crop,” Fred noted. “We went from about 3 billion bushels to 13 billion bushels last year.”
There was a bit of good-natured competition between the three. Alan pointed out that wheat may be losing acres to corn and beans, but he likes to remind his two colleagues that “mine is the only product that is mentioned in the Lord’s Prayer.” He noted the increase in wheat production in the Black Sea area, such as Ukraine, and he showed a graph comparing the similarities in weather between that region and the Midwest, suggesting that we “teach the Russians to grow corn and soybeans.”
Lots of good stuff in their presentations, which you can listen to here:
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I also interviewed Fred and Alan - listen to them here:
Fred Stemme
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Alan Tracy
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View and download photos from the AEM AgExecutive Forum here.
A panel of six representatives from major farm equipment manufacturers took seats on a panel at the Association of Equipment Manufacturers AgExecutive Forum in St. Louis Thursday to discuss “The Next Generation of Ag Show” - AG CONNECT expo, scheduled for January 12-15, 2010 in Orlando.
The executives, from left to right, were Doug DeVries, Deere and Company; Doug Griffin, AGCO; John Koetz, Case IH; Rusty Fowler, Krone NA; Gary MacDonald, MacDon Industries; and Dick Brown, Krause Corp. They are all very excited and supportive of the new show which promises to be a “worldwide and world-class experience; bringing the world of agriculture together in one gathering place for the benefit of exhibitors, producers, government, media, and all key industry leaders.”
We heard some of Doug DeVries comments about AG CONNECT in an earlier post, but I also had the opportunity to visit one on one with three of the other execs on the panel who have all been involved in developing the event as part of the show committee.
John Koetz of Case IH says, “What’s different here is that it’s designed around what the producers have been asking for. They are looking for more than just seeing the machines, they are looking for what are going to be the solutions, they want to interact with each other and industry experts, both here in the United States and internationally.”
Listen to John’s interview here:
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Gary MacDonald of MacDon, which is a family-owned manufacturer of harvest machinery based in Winnipeg, thinks AG CONNECT will be the biggest thing to hit the industry in many years because of its global nature. “Going back 20-25 years, our market was 80 percent Canadian and 20 percent US, today the breakdown is 35 percent Canada, 35 percent US and heading toward 30 percent outside North America. So the export market has grown tremendously.”
Listen to Gary’s interview here:
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Dick Brown of Krause says the show is a vision that started about 15 years ago. “We realized that equipment is just one part of a farming system and we needed to bring all of the elements of the farming system together to have a world class event.” He says the show is patterned to some extent on Germany’s AgriTechnica, but even more diverse in terms of what it offers for producers.
Listen to Dick’s interview here:
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You can also download the interviews for broadcast use with these links:
John Koetz
Gary MacDonald
Dick Brown
View and download photos from the AEM AgExecutive Forum here.
Republican presidential candidate Senator John McCain is causing quite a bit of concern among members of the agriculture and ethanol industries with his comments about farm programs and ethanol incentives. Last week in Missouri, McCain said, “My administration will reduce the price of food by eliminating the subsidies for ethanol and agricultural goods. These subsidies inflate the price of food, not only for Americans but for people in poverty across the world, and I propose to abolish them.”
During a question and answer period yesterday at the Association of Equipment Manufacturers AgExecutive Forum, I had the opportunity to ask Secretary of Agriculture Ed Schafer what he would say to Senator McCain about farm policy if he had the opportunity.
“What I would say to Senator McCain is this: ‘You’re flat out wrong about your agriculture policy,’” Schafer said bluntly, while noting that he needs to be careful what he says in the political arena. “I would say that both candidates leave a lot on the table to be desired for agricultural policy. I’d love to have the opportunity to get in there and say ‘this is the importance of agriculture in this economy’ and I don’t think either one of them are seeing it.”
Schafer hopes that Senator McCain gets some advisers who can help him see that “agriculture is the foundation of the economy and the strength of this country.”
Listen to Schafer’s comments here:
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You can also download his comments with this link: Ed Schafer on McCain ag policy (mp3)
Download photos of Schafer and others from the AEM AgExecutive Forum here.
Dr. Jay Lehr has the title of Science Director for an organization called The Heartland Institute, which is a national nonprofit research and education organization with the goal to “discover, develop, and promote free-market solutions to social and economic problems.”
He is also an entertaining and passionate speaker who believes in spreading the good news about agriculture to places that are far removed from the farm - like the streets of San Francisco. He spoke about the importance of being an advocate for agriculture to agribusiness corporate leaders meeting in St. Louis at the AEM AgExecutive forum Thursday.
“People don’t understand agriculture and they believe the myths that they hear. They don’t even understand what fertilizer is, they think that we are despoiling the land when in fact we’re the best environmental stewards,” Dr. Lehr said.
He encourages people in agriculture to be pro-active in talking about modern farming and he is particularly interested in promoting precision ag. “The average person thinks that farming today is the same as it was in his grandfather’s day and it’s changed dramatically - using global positioning systems, geographic information systems and variable rate technology, automatic steering - which allows us to reduce our inputs by being more accurate.”
Listen to an interview with Dr. Lehr here:
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You can also download the 9:30 interview with this link: Dr. Jay Lehr interview (mp3)
Check out the Flickr Photo Album from the AEM AgExecutive Forum here.
A preview of the new generation of ag show - AG CONNECT 2010 - was offered to ag executives meeting Thursday in St. Louis.
Sara Truesdale Mooney has the job of show manager for this ambitious new ag show being organized by the Association of Equipment Manufacturers and she says they have taken a very deliberate approach in developing AG CONNECT.
“We conducted a lot of research with producers,” Sara told me. “And from that research we developed a number of event features that would be unique to AG CONNECT.”
Some of those features include networking, the ability to interact with product specialists and engineers about equipment and new products, more information about precision farming and new technology. Sara says they are really developing a one-stop shop ag show. “We’re going to be putting on a world class agribusiness event that is not just exhibits, not just an equipment show - it’s new products, innovations, technologies, services, inputs - everything you need for your business.”
All of the information about AG CONNECT is available on-line at agconnect.com.
Listen to an interview with Sara here:
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You can also download the 8:00 interview with this link: Sara Truesdale interview on AG CONNECT 2010 (mp3)
Check out the Flickr Photo Album from the AEM AgExecutive Forum here.
U.S. Agriculture Secretary Ed Schafer discussed some of the big issues facing agriculture today and in the future during an address to agribusiness company executives meeting in St. Louis Thursday for the Association of Equipment Manufacturers AgExecutive Forum.
Two primary issues he addressed were trade and renewable energy, as well as the importance of the financial rescue plan passed by Congress last week, which he said was absolutely necessary although he expects it will take some time for it to work. “It’s sort of like reining in a team of runaway horses,” Schafer said. “You gotta really haul back on those reins hard for a long period of time before they start calming down.”
Schafer says the agriculture sector is in strong financial shape, with high commodity prices helping farmers to pay down debt and the competitive dollar boosting ag exports to record levels. “Despite increases we have seen in the cost of fuel and fertilizer and other inputs, we expect net farm income to post an all time high again this year at a little over $100 billion,” Schafer said.
Listen to Schafer’s address here:
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You can also download the 24:00 speech with this link: Ed Schafer speech to AEM AgExecutive Forum (mp3)
And you can also see the recorded video from the live webcast this morning here.
Check out the Flickr Photo Album from the AEM AgExecutive Forum here.
Joining in progress - I joined the panel a few minutes late, but here are the people you are hearing and seeing - left to right.
Doug DeVries, Deere and Company; Doug Griffin, AGCO; John Koetz, Case IH; Rusty Fowler, Krone NA; Gary MacDonald, MacDon Industries; Dick Brown, Krause Corp.
The topic of this discussion is the AGCONNECT 2010 trade show. Here’s the recording of the presentation:
Okay - here we are set up at the AEM AgExecutive Forum in St. Louis for a live webcast on Ustream - AgWired Live TV.
This is the first time I have used this tool - free live webcasting. I have a great internet connection here in the Renaissance Grand hotel and a really great set up in front of the podium. I must give credit to the hotel AV technician who has been the best I have ever dealt with. Too often we have two or three AV techs who are either incompetent or just don’t care. This guy - and I will get his name and post a photo later - has been amazing.
I do have photos started from last night’s reception, but I am not real pleased with them. I am using Chuck’s D200 because we have three events next week and John Davis will be using the camera I normally use. So, I am still getting used to the “big boy” camera.
The plan now is to webcast Ed Schafer live at 8:00 central - I will then upload the recording of his address during the break and live webcast the panel on The Next Generation of Ag Show starting at 9:15. That’s the plan - stay tuned.
Here is the recorded video of the Secretary’s address:
The host for the Association of Equipment Manufacturers AgExecutive Forum in St. Louis this week is Doug DeVries, Senior Vice President of Ag Equipment Marketing for Deere & Company - shown here doing a little pre-event prep work on Wednesday night. Doug heads up AEM’s Ag Executive Council which represents the farm machinery segment of the equipment manufacturers organization. He passed up being in Sarasota this week for the big Deere event that Chuck is covering to be at this event because of it’s importance to the industry.
“We’re going to have a broad range of discussions about a number of issues around what’s happening in the industry today,” Doug told me. That includes economic issues, renewable energy, commodity prices and more.
Doug says he is really looking forward to introducing plans for the new AG CONNECT 2010 expo. “We’re really excited about AG CONNECT as the first AEM-sponsored, agricultural equipment show that is brought to our customers by the industry and for the industry,” he said. “We believe it will be a different type of experience for people.” He is most excited about the global focus of the expo and the educational opportunities they plan to offer.
Listen to an interview with Doug here - and tune in for AgWired Live TV from the AgExecutive Forum Thursday starting at 8:00 am central with Secretary of Agriculture Ed Schafer followed by a discussion about AG CONNECT with Doug and several of his industry colleagues who are helping to plan and support the new show.
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You can also download the 4:00 interview with this link: Doug DeVries Interview (mp3)
Tomorrow this room will be filled with executives from agricultural equipment companies and associated industries, here in St. Louis for the Association of Equipment Manufacturers AgExecutive Forum. And AgWired is set up to webcast some of the proceedings live starting at 8 am central time with an address by Agriculture Secretary Ed Schafer.
AEM Vice President of Ag Services Charlie O’Brien says the purpose of the forum is to bring leaders in the industry together and provide them with the latest information about factors that are impacting the business.
AEM hold the forum every year but one of the main differences about this year is the focus on plans for AG CONNECT 2010, a new ag trade show that has been developed by many leaders in the farm equipment industry who are members of AEM. “It’s a concept that has been talked about for awhile and now it’s actually coming to be,” Charlie told me. Some of those who have helped in the development of AG CONNECT are among the largest ag equipment manufacturers in the world.
Listen to an interview with Charlie here - and tune in for AgWired Live TV from the AgExecutive Forum starting at 8:00 am central.
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You can also download the 3:00 interview with this link: Charlie O’Brien Interview (mp3)
U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Ed Schafer will be keynoting the AgExecutive Forum this Thursday in St. Louis, sponsored by the Association of Equipment Manufacturers. Douglas DeVries of Deere & Company is the forum host.
Schafer will be addressing concerns related to the future of agriculture in our global economy and how agribusiness and renewable energies may impact agribusiness. Other highlights of the forum include Going Global in the Ag Industry: Trade Barriers, Obstacles and Partnerships, presented by economist and futurist Dr. Jay Lehr, science director with The Heartland Institute; an AEM Public Policy Update from Nick Yaksich, Vice President, Global Public Policy of AEM; Renewable Energy: What are the Real Costs and Benefits? by Terry Francl of the American Farm Bureau Federation, and much more.
A major feature of the event will be a look ahead to “The Next Generation of Ag Show” - AG CONNECT 2010. AEM members from Krause Corporation, Deere & Company, Krone NA, AGCO, Case IH and MacDon Industries will all be discussing what is ahead for this major new show scheduled for January 12-15, 2010, at the Orange County Convention Center in Orlando, Florida.
A panel discussion on commodity trends will feature Fred Stemme, vice president of marketing, National Corn Growers Association, Steve Censky, chief executive officer, American Soybean Association, and Alan Tracy, president, U.S. Wheat Associates.
AgWired will be covering the forum from start to finish this week, so stay tuned for live updates - including streaming video of the Secretary’s address at 8:15 am central time on Thursday, assuming the internet allows. Both audio interviews and photos will be available for media to download here on the site.
Marketing to the country lifestyle people is the topic once again of this week's program.
