I’m really glad that Makhteshim Agan is using the name MANA Crop Protection since it’s a lot easier for me to say. They held a media breakfast last week that I attended and it provided an opportunity to get to know them better. I interviewed Dave Downing, Senior Product/Marketing Manager – Herbicides and now know a lot more about the …
Cotton Picking Precision From John Deere
One of the exhibitors here at the Beltwide Cotton Conferences is John Deere for whom we manage their Precision Pays website. So it was a great opportunity to find out about what they’ve got new for cotton producers. I spoke with Jamie Flood, Product Marketing Manager, just as the trade show was kicking off. Of course John Deere has their …
New Holland’s Booming finOvation
Another finOvation award has been announced. This one for New Holland. Farm Industry News, a monthly magazine that provides high-income farmers with information about new products and technology for the farm, has presented a finOvation award to New Holland’s T2410 and T2420 Boomer™ tractors. The awards are presented to the best innovations of 2007 designed to help producers farm more …
The Feast and Good Eats are On
It’s official. Food Network will be offering new seasons of Good Eats, Iron Chef America, and more programs centered around fully appreciating food. Food Network and Alton Brown have agreed to a three-year deal, it was announced today by Brooke Johnson, President, Food Network. In 2008, he will produce new seasons of the popular Good Eats and Iron Chef America, …
Free-Range? Pah… It’s All the Same for United Egg Producers
What’s important is keeping the birds happy. Happy birds produce better eggs and more of them… right? Right or wrong, the United Egg Producers say, either way, free-range birds aren’t necessarily “happier.” Animal rights activists have long alleged that hens in modern cages live a horribly stressed life, but new research appears to debunk those claims. Researchers have discovered that …
A Gator Finovation
Those John Deere people are such Finovators! Farm Industry News announced today that the John Deere Gator XUV 850D is the winner of the ATV/Utility Vehicle category of the 2008 Finovation Awards. John Deere earned the award after the XUV 850D tested the highest in the Farm Industry News “Utility Vehicle Rodeo,” which is a two-day product testing where farmers …
ViaGen Offers Easier Tracking of Cloned Livestock
To be honest, I haven’t really given much thought whether my milk or meat comes from a farm animal that’s unique in every way… or whether it has come from a cloned specimen. That’s probably because there isn’t a significant amount of cloned livestock out there… yet. Now that ViaGen is offering a program that tracks cloned animals with ease, …
New Holland in Thailand
I’m sure most of you didn’t know this, but I haven’t quite made it back home from the Agritechnica event I covered in Germany in early November. In fact, I’ve only ventured further from home… all the way to Thailand. My first impression of farming in Thailand left me thinking that most of the farming operations were small and local, …
Urban Farm Helps Homeless, Named Social Innovator
Victory Programs‘ ReVision Urban Farm has been chosen as 2008 Boston Social Innovator. The program, which serves the homeless in surrounding areas, is set to receive financial support from Boston-area venture philanthropists. Victory Programs’ ReVision Urban Farm, a farm serving families facing homelessness in Dorchester, is among six area nonprofits selected as a 2008 Social Innovator by the Cambridge-based Social …
Organic Scandal
A handful of the nation’s largest grocery retailers have been accused of organic fraud. Wal-Mart, Costco, Target, Safeway, and Wild Oats have been accused of selling organic milk that might not be so “organic.” The legal filings in federal courts in Seattle, Denver, and in Minneapolis, against the retailers, come on the heels of class action lawsuits against Aurora Dairy …