There are booths on the floor of three different buildings at the Iowa Power Farming Show. They’re also in the hallways. I stopped at this one to learn about the Monsanto sponsored America’s Farmers Grow Communities Project. Lots of farmers were stopping by to sign up their favorite local charity. To tell us all about it I interviewed Gayla Daugherty, Monsanto Communications Manager.
She says it’s a new project for farmers to sign up a local non-profit of their choice to win via a random drawing. There are 179 counties involved in Iowa/Missouri/Arkansas and you can see them listed on the official rules page.
Plant $2,500 in your community and watch it grow.
As a farmer, you care for our land and grow our economy. You make everyone’s lives better – locally, nationally and globally. To thank you, Monsanto wants to make a contribution in your name to your local community with the America’s Farmers Grow Communities™ Project.
One nonprofit community organization in each eligible county will receive a $2,500 award. It’s up to farmers like you to help decide where it goes.
Together we can grow rural America…one community at a time. Apply now.
The U.S. Department of Justice is seeking information from Monsanto about the company’s soybean traits business.
According to a press release from Monsanto, the Justice Department “has issued a civil investigative demand (CID) requesting information on its soybean traits business, primarily seeking a confirmation that, as Monsanto has previously indicated, farmers and seed companies will continue to have access to the first-generation Roundup Ready soybean trait following patent expiry in 2014.”
“Monsanto continues to cooperate with the U.S. Department of Justice inquiries, just as we have over the last several months,” said Scott Partridge, Monsanto’s Chief Deputy General Counsel. “We respect the thorough regulatory process. We believe our business practices are fair, pro-competitive and in compliance with the law.”
Monsanto has voluntarily cooperated with regulators to address their questions about its business and the broader agriculture industry. This request represents a continuation of that process. During this time, the company has provided extensive access to millions of pages of documents to ensure that regulators’ questions are addressed. Monsanto noted that it will continue to provide information that is requested of its business.
The first of two American Farm Bureau Federation “tweetups” was held at 3 pm in the #afbf10 annual meeting trade show. More that a dozen regular Twitter posters in the ag industry showed up at the Monsanto booth at 3 pm to meet each other in person and exchange tweeting tips.
For those of you on the Twitter fringe, tweetups are gatherings where people who tweet about a certain topic or industry meet up. Most of those who showed up for the tweetup are also very involved with #agchat , an agricultural industry Twitter conversation. The hash tag thing is a way to connect posts made on the same topic or from the same event.
Click on the photo for a bigger version and see some of the folks who are tweeting ag’s horn, including farm media, organization representatives like several in AFBF, company public relations like Monsanto, and real farmers and ranchers.
Monsanto and the American Farm Bureau Federation will host two “tweetups” for Twitter users in the Monsanto booth during the AFBF annual meeting which starts Sunday in Seattle.
The Tweetups will be held at the Exhibitor Showcase in the Monsanto Booth #210. First one is Sunday at 3 pm, then they will do it again on Monday at 8 am. Come learn about the usefulness of Twitter and network with some of the agricultural leaders advocating for the industry online. Non-Twitter users are also encouraged to come and find out what it’s all about!
BASF Plant Science and Monsanto today announced they will be working together to develop new corn hybrids with better nutrition for animal feed.
The new hybrids will contain BASF’s NutriDense® traits that are designed to enhance animal feed performance. NutriDense corn has higher levels of essential amino acids and energy, greater phosphorous availability and is more digestible.
BASF’s NutriDense traits will be combined with Monsanto’s Roundup Ready® Genuity™ VT Triple PRO™ and Genuity™ SmartStax™ corn. The new high quality hybrids are expected to deliver the best feed value and yields equivalent to elite conventional corn. Once launched, seed companies will market the new hybrids through licensing agreements.
Read more here.
BASF has announced a supply agreement with Monsanto for a new cotton fungicide seed treatment.
The new product contains F500®, the same active ingredient found in Headline® fungicide, BASF’s top-selling Plant Health fungicide, and will be part of Monsanto’s AcceleronTM Seed Treatment combination.
This new seed treatment will provide cotton growers with the opportunity to give seedlings a stronger start and a higher yield potential by controlling diseases, such as those caused by Rhizoctonia solani.
BASF is expanding its portfolio of seed treatment offerings with the launch of F500-containing products like Stamina® fungicide seed treatment, which is marketed for corn, sweet corn, wheat, barley, legumes, and rye. Several additional new seed treatments will be launched this year, and in 2010.
AgWired coverage of IFAJ 2009 is sponsored by: and
A little over a year ago Monsanto made a commitment to people around the world to sustainable agriculture. The company is working on products that will produce more than double current yields while reducing the resources needed to grow the crops by nearly one-third. They are so committed that they launched a website to discuss this topic: www.producemoreconservemore.com.
I was curious to learn more about Monsanto’s initiatives in the sustainability department so I caught up with Kevin Eblen, Vice President Public Policy & Sustainable Yield for Monsanto.
“What we’re trying to to get the world and the public to see and know is that we have the capability to produce more food and conserve resources at the same time,” explained Eblen. “So we went on record saying in the core crops that we focus on as a company which is corn, soybeans and cotton, that we can double the yields of these crops by 2030 with the starting year of 2000. And at the same time, through the use of technology we have and others’ have, that we could conserve resources by one-third to produce each unit of corn, beans and cotton.”
Eblen mentioned that the UN has determined that the world will need to produce as much food in the next 50 years that has been produced in the last 10,000 years. That is why Monsanto is working with farmers around the world to help them grow crops that are both sustainable and profitable.
Monsanto Company announced a few weeks ago the appointment of David L. Chicoine, Ph.D., to the company’s Board of Directors. Dr. Chicoine is currently president of South Dakota State University (SDSU) in Brookings, South Dakota. Dr. Chicoine is also a nationally recognized economist, specializing in public finance, taxation and rural economies.
Prior to joining SDSU in 2007, Dr. Chicoine held various positions of increasing responsibility with the University of Illinois, most recently as Vice President for Technology and Economic Development. His higher education administrative experience at the University of Illinois also includes service as Head of the Department of Agricultural Economics and Dean of the College of Agriculture, Consumer and Environmental Sciences at the Urbana-Champaign campus.
This appointment has caused quite a stir at South Dakota State University. While many think that this partnership with Monsanto could bring advanced research opportunities to students and faculty, many are concerned about the politics of President Chicoine serving on the Monsanto Board of Directors. While he makes $300,000 as SDSU’s president, Monsanto will give him $400,000 compensation for his time on the board. I have listened intently to both sides of the story, and I can see why there are differing views. If you haven’t read up on this scenario, I have included some of the “hot button” articles in the news for you to read. Let me know your thoughts in this situation. Should a president of a university sit on a company’s board of directors? Are people overreacting, or is the community outburst warranted? What needs to change at land-grant universities, or what could be improved upon in the future? Looking for your thoughts and opinions today.
Monsanto keeps moving forward into the online conversation with regular Planting Updates. Do you think these are that much different than the news you get from the “regular media.” Tyne Morgan is the Monsanto “reporter” out in the field. In this episode you not only get a planting update you also hear what farmers think the general public thinks of them. The production quality is good and the content is interesting.
Obviously Monsanto is not relying on their main website to be the only destination for their customers. They’re reaching out beyond the confines of a web destination to engage them and interact with them. If you doubt that’s happening then you should start following them on Twitter. Is it easy for Monsanto to quantify the exact ROI on this? I doubt it. Does that mean they shouldn’t do it? No.
For Norman Borlaug’s 95th birthday today, Monsanto has created a $10 million grant to establish the Beachell-Borlaug International Scholars Program, which will “help identify and support young scientists interested in improving research and production in rice and wheat, two of the world’s most important staple crops, through plant breeding techniques.”
Monsanto is funding the program, which will be administered by Texas AgriLife Research, an agency of the Texas A&M University System, for the next five years. The program honors the accomplishments of Dr. Henry Beachell and Dr. Norman Borlaug, who pioneered plant breeding and research in rice and wheat, respectively.
Applications will be reviewed by an independent panel of global judges chaired by Program Director Dr. Ed Runge, who is also a professor and Billie B. Turner Chair in Production Agronomy (Emeritus) within the Soil and Crop Sciences Department, Texas A&M University at College Station.
Students interested in applying to the program can find more details at www.monsanto.com/mbbischolars. Applications will be accepted until May 31.
Announcement of the first year’s winners is planned to correspond with the World Food Prize held in Des Moines, Iowa, on October 15, 2009.
Besides the new Genuity brand, Monsanto was also promoting other brands at Commodity Classic. One such brand is Acceleron, a seed treatment system. I’m sure there are still people who aren’t quite sure just what Acceleron is. To help explain it, I spoke with Tom Schaefer.
He says they launched the product line last fall. They had in-field plots out and saw great performance and yield increases. He says growers should know that the beans will be a different color and they’ll see good plantability and early season performance. There is a pretty tight supply this season on Round Up Ready Yield on bean varieties so he suggests calling your dealer now.
New Acceleron™ Seed Treatment System helps maximize the performance potential of your seed and traits right from the start. Designed to complement new seed and trait products, Acceleron can improve stands and plant health to help maximize the performance potential of your crop.
Available in 2009 as a feature of Genuity™ Roundup Ready 2 Yield™ soybeans. Followed by the introduction of corn in 2010 and expansion into other crops and vegetables in 2011 benefiting hybrids, varieties and traits across a broad geography.
You can listen to my interview with Tom here:
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At last week’s Commodity Classic I learned a new word – Genuity. My teacher was Dion McBay, Monsanto trait marketing lead.
Genuity is a new brand that provides Monsanto with a new platform to deliver new technologies to the marketplace. The name came from the work of a brand development team that talked to farmers across the country. The name meant things like genuine and the “gen” part seemed to suggest genes or genesis so Genuity it is. Dion says that the Monsanto brand covers a lot of things and with Genuity they can focus on a brand that “promises to deliver technology products that help farmers do what they do best, even better.” A media and public relations campaign is scheduled to start immediately to begin introducing the brand to farmers.
You can listen to my iPhone interview with Dion here:
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In this week’s program you get to meet Brooke Hoelscher and Megan Ott. They’re the Monsanto Future Ag Journalist Fellowship students who were set up to cover the Commodity Classic on blogs created by Monsanto – Brooke’s Commodity Insider and Megan’s Classic Chronicle.
We had a nice chat in the media room at Commodity Classic. Brooke is a junior ag communications and journalis major at Texas A&M University and Megan is a Sophomore at the University of Illinois and also majoring in ag communications. They were taking photos, recording audio interviews and shooting video clips during their stay which are posted on their blog. I think that, like me, they’ve still got stories to post too. They’re really grateful for the opportunity they have to attend Classic and see and learn what’s going on in the industry. I’m sure this will help them in their careers.
Both of them are quite familiar with Facebook. I thought it was funny when Megan said she was a little scared when her Mom got on Facebook. Both agree that the internet is where communication is today. They had never heard of Twitter before coming to Classic but found out right away how many people in ag communications were tweeting away.
This week’s program ends with music from the Podsafe Music Network. It’s a song called, “Answers From Me” by Classic Tragic Hero. I hope you enjoy it and thank you for listening.
You can download and listen to the ZimmCast here: ZimmCast 210 (19 min MP3)
Or listen to this week’s ZimmCast right now:
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This afternoon I finally got to meet the Monsanto Future Ag Journalist Fellowship winners. Brooke Hoelscher (r) and Megan Ott (l) were escorted to my work station in the media room at Commodity Classic. Apparently they weren’t allowed access to the media room even though they had media badges. These students will someday possibly be professional ag journalists and part of the rationale for the Monsanto program is to provide them with a “real world” opportunity to write about their experience at Classic and interact with professionals. Unfortunately, they are not considered to be “media” and therefore, since they’re staying in a different hotel they have to go back to their hotel to post on their websites and they don’t get to have that professional journalist experience. However, they’re taking pictures, doing interviews and all the same things us professionals are doing.
I had the fortune of participating in the very first Monsanto Future Ag Journalist Fellowship project. One of them is now a very respected member of the professional ag journalist ranks. I guess I’m wondering how these media room policies are promoting good media relations and the development of professional ag journalists who will be the leaders in the industry tomorrow. I’ll be featuring my interview with Brooke and Megan in my ZimmCast podcast on Monday. They’re awesome young talents and just talking with them helps inspire this old ag journalist as I hope it will you.
Monsanto has launched a blog with multiple contributors and they start right out being pretty open about “things.” I think this is great and look forward to how it develops. I’ve been following Kathleen (Ms Monsanto) on Twitter for a while now so it looks like this is one ag company that is not only understanding social media but not afraid to take part in it. Here’s some excerpts from their first post:
This blog will address issues related to Monsanto, our business, and technology in agriculture.
The title Monsanto According to Monsanto is a spoof of The World According to Monsanto, a horribly biased documentary which portrays Monsanto in a very negative light. Aside from the shoddy journalism, we at Monsanto found it incredibly arrogant that the filmmaker would present her own twisted view of Monsanto as the company’s view of the world.
If anyone should speak to Monsanto’s vision of the world, it’s those of us who come to work here every day and collectively make this company what it is. This is the main reason for this blog.
Monsanto has a fair number of critics. Technology in agriculture is an emotional topic and there are organizations or individuals who generally oppose modern agriculture or biotechnology. This blog will be used on a rather frequent basis to respond to criticism leveled against Monsanto and the use of technology in agriculture. On occasion we’ll use the blog to levy some criticism ourselves. We expect that some of these postings will generate controversy. Creating controversy isn’t the intention of this blog, but it’s inevitable.
ZimmComm has had the pleasure and honor to work on various projects with Monsanto btw. It’s great having them more involved in the online conversation!
Monsanto is sponsoring a Commodity Classic blogger once again this year. Thanks to Tyne Morgan, former Classic blogger herself, for the heads up. This year Brooke Hoelscher will be providing her perspective on the Classic happenings in Grapevine, TX. Here’s a little bit about Brooke.
I am a junior Agriculture Communications and Journalism major at Texas A&M University. I study the principals of professional writing, editing, public relations, and advertising in the agriculture industry. I plan to graduate in December 2009 and pursue a career in marketing and public relations.
The readers of No-Till Farmer magazine voted on the products that performed best in their no-till operations in 2008 – and the “No-Till Product of the Year” winner is – Headline fungicide from BASF.
No-till products in 11 specific categories were also selected as the best of their field for 2008. Each of the products and their manufacturers were honored during an awards ceremony last week at the 17th annual National No-Tillage Conference in Indianapolis. Other winners were:
No-Till Equipment: Early Riser Planters, Case IH
Planter/Drill Attachments: Martin Row Cleaners, Martin Industries
Strip-Till Equipment: Blu-Jet StripTill System, Thurston Manufacturing
Spray Equipment: AGCO Spra-Coupe 7000 Series, AGCO
Residue Management: The Spreader, The Spreader Inc.
Fertility: Agrotain, Agrotain International
Insect Protection: YieldGard VT Triple, Monsanto
Fungicides: Headline, BASF
Seed Treatment: Cruiser, Syngenta Seed Care
Precision Tools: RTK AutoSteer, AutoFarm
Weed Control: Roundup PowerMax, Monsanto
BASF and Monsanto Company have joined forces to accelerate the development of next-generation of dicamba-based weed control chemistry products. The partnership will be working to develop crops that are resistant to both Roundup® agricultural herbicides and dicamba to deliver significant on-farm benefits to growers.
According to Monsanto Global Chemistry lead Sean Gardner, “Combining a second type of herbicide resistance with Roundup Ready® technology would offer growers multiple tools for weed control through the use of Roundup®, dicamba, or combinations of both herbicides.”
Dicamba is a benzoic acid herbicide and BASF is currently the largest provider of dicamba and dicamba-based solutions.
Monsanto is making a bold move with a unique partnership with the Weather Channel. Nothing like taking two of the things most important to farmers and making it easily available to them in an online and social networking environment!
The Weather Channel Interactive, in partnership with agricultural products leader Monsanto Company (NYSE: MON), announced a new section on weather.com® dedicated to weather and farming at www.weather.com/farming. Within the Agriculture News & Forecast, the main feature is the Farmers Forecast, which includes up-to-date weather information that matters most to the agricultural community, such as severe weather alerts affecting crops and detailed data about precipitation, wind and soil moisture.
The new Farmers Forecast adds farming-related alerts in addition to the severe weather alerts already available through the weather.com site. These will alert consumers to warnings with freeze, frost, high wind or hail indicators for each forecasted day. With precipitation being critical for the farming community, not only does the page include the percent of precipitation, but it also includes an actual projection of the amount of rain that is expected.
Weather.com/farming will offer several components to help farmers make decisions before and throughout the season. From the same page, users can easily change locations to keep up with multiple farms or compare sites. Among the information included on the new section:
· Soil moisture information
· Detailed wind data
· Sunrise and sunset times
· UV index
The section is also a one-stop resource for the latest agriculture news. Users can stay up to date with articles related to the industry while checking out the next day’s forecast. Users can easily bookmark any page within the new section, such as the Farmers Forecast, to return to this practical resource and connect it to social networking sites such as Facebook, Digg and others.
Along with the new section within the weather.com site, Monsanto will also run an online campaign throughout 2009 featuring many of its brands such as Deltapine, DEKALB, Asgrow, Yieldgard, Roundup Ready and Roundup PowerMax.
Post Update: If you’re an iPhone owner make sure that when you use your browser that you select the “Classic Weather Channel” link instead of the mobile version. This isn’t available in the mobile version yet.
Do you have a future in cotton? Want to have one? Then write an essay and enter this Deltapine scholarship program.
The future of the U.S. cotton industry continues to rely on new talents and fresh perspectives. To keep bright young minds involved in cotton, Monsanto is creating the Deltapine Class of 09 scholarship program. The program will award nine $1,000 college scholarships to high school students in the class of ’09 who are interested in a career in cotton.
The scholarships will be awarded to nine students whose essays best express “My Future in CottonSM.” Eligibility requirements include:
· High school seniors who will graduate in 2009 with plans to enroll in a full-time undergraduate accredited 2- or 4-year college or university with the intent to engage in a course of study related to agriculture or agribusiness.
· A minimum GPA of 2.8 on a 4.0 scale; involvement in agriculture or with agricultural organizations; and living in a cotton-producing state.
· Those applicants whose families are directly involved in cotton production will be given special consideration.
· Persons related to employees of Monsanto, its agencies or competitive companies are not eligible to participate.
To apply, go to http://www.MyFutureInCotton.com for complete eligibility and criteria requirements. Winners will be announced on Jan. 6, 2009 at the Beltwide Cotton Conferences in an Antonio, TX, and listed on the Web site Jan. 7, 2009. All winners will be notified via email prior to this date.
The National Biodiesel Conference is taking place in Grapevine, TX. Chuck is on the scene and adding to the ZimmComm photo collection.
New NAFB Executive Director
If you don't know Mark Vail then meet him in this week's program.
Mark will officially start as the Executive Director for the National Association of Farm Broadcasting on March 1. We chatted via Skype and talked about what he sees as the priorities and challenges of the organization.
There are booths on the floor of three different buildings at the Iowa Power Farming Show. They’re also in the hallways. I stopped at this one to learn about the Monsanto sponsored America’s Farmers Grow Communities Project. Lots of farmers were stopping by to sign up their favorite local charity. To tell us all about it I interviewed Gayla Daugherty, Monsanto Communications Manager.
According to a 
Monsanto and the American Farm Bureau Federation will host two “tweetups” for Twitter users in the Monsanto booth during the AFBF annual meeting which starts Sunday in Seattle. 
BASF has announced a supply agreement with Monsanto for a new cotton fungicide seed treatment. 
“What we’re trying to to get the world and the public to see and know is that we have the capability to produce more food and conserve resources at the same time,” explained Eblen. “So we went on record saying in the core crops that we focus on as a company which is corn, soybeans and cotton, that we can double the yields of these crops by 2030 with the starting year of 2000. And at the same time, through the use of technology we have and others’ have, that we could conserve resources by one-third to produce each unit of corn, beans and cotton.”
For Norman Borlaug’s 95th birthday today, Monsanto has created a $10 million grant to establish the Beachell-Borlaug International Scholars Program, which will “help identify and support young scientists interested in improving research and production in rice and wheat, two of the world’s most important staple crops, through plant breeding techniques.”
Besides the new 
At last week’s Commodity Classic I learned a new word – 
In this week’s program you get to meet Brooke Hoelscher and Megan Ott. They’re the Monsanto Future Ag Journalist Fellowship students who were set up to cover the Commodity Classic on blogs created by Monsanto – 
This afternoon I finally got to meet the 
and 
Monsanto is sponsoring a 
The readers of 
Do you have a future in cotton? Want to have one? Then write an essay and enter this 
If you don't know Mark Vail then meet him in this week's program.
