After last week’s announcement about the Global Renewable Fuels Alliance and Tom Buis moving from NFU to Growth Energy I thought we now had plenty of organizations promoting not only renewable fuels but corn in particular since it is such an integral part of biofuels production today. However, we now have another new organization. This time it’s the Corn Farmers …
Westbrock and Anderson To Recieve NAMA Awards
NAMA has announced two of their big award winners. The awards will be presented at the 2009 Agri-Marketing Conference, “Hot Ideas, Sizzling Solutions,” April 16, 2009 in Atlanta, Georgia. ZimmComm will be there once again and celebrating 5 years btw. The National Agri-Marketing Association (NAMA) has named Leon Westbrock (pictured), CHS Inc., Executive Vice President and COO, Energy, as the …
American Society of Newspaper Editors Cancels Convention
I think it’s a sign of the times. Some might says it’s because of the economy. I don’t. The media has changed and it’s not going to change back to the way it was. Thanks to a heads up from Steve Drake, Drake & Company, I learned that the American Society of Newspaper Editors has canceled their 2009 Convention. Here …
Future Ag Journalists
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 …
IFAJ and AMS Planning Meeting
The IFAJ/AMS planning committee got together since so many of us ag media types were in town for Commodity Classic. Yesterday the group went to Billy Bob’s and the Stockyards before heading to the upcoming conference hotel, the Worthington Hotel in downtown Fort Worth. Cindy and I joined the group for a reception meeting last night. The local convention and …
The Classic Whaley
Cindy took this picture of Hugh Whaley, (l) Broadhead+Co and Barry Nelson, John Deere, during the Commodity Classic trade show. That gives you an updated look at Hugh since I used an old one in the story about his moving to Broadhead+Co. As things slowed down today I got to sit down and visit with Hugh about his new position. …
All American Cowgirl Chicks
Trish Lynn (r) and the All American Cowgirl Chicks were at Commodity Classic sponsored by RFD-TV. Trish says they were real proud to be here. The Cowgirl Chicks are a rodeo entertainment team that rodeo just about every weekend. They do about 85 performances a year, including outside the country. They’re trick riding professionals using castaway horses. They have to …
New Holland On-Location Training
You could go to school and learn about precision land management in the New Holland booth at this year’s Commodity Classic. Mike Harvey was teaching when I stopped by. He says the mobile teaching trailer provides a place for growers to see their monitors and even operate a simulator. The trailer can be configured in various ways and is also …
Monsanto Future Ag Journalist Fellowship Winners
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 …
RuMBA Formed To Guide Broadband Spending
Here’s an example of how the stimulus is stimulating. I’m betting there will be other groups formed to help spend that money. I’m not saying this is a bad thing necessarily. Someone sure needs to provide advice to the government officials who are going to be making spending decisions. The Rural Mobile Broadband Alliance (RuMBA) was launched to provide a …