Republican Jeb Bush, former governor of Florida and presidential hopeful, kicked off his time on the Presidential Soapbox promoting his support of agriculture and renewable energy. Florida has a huge agriculture community. In fact, the state ranks second in value of vegetable production, just behind California, is the first in production value for oranges, grapefruit, watermelons, and more and is …
Democrats Webb, O’Malley Tout Support for Ag, Energy
Democratic hopeful presidential candidates Jim Webb and Martin O’Malley touted their support for ag and energy yesterday during their speeches from the Des Moines Register’s Presidential Soapbox at the Iowa State Fair. They have some fundamental issues in common, including the need for better education and to bring the American dream back to Americans through a stronger economy and better wages. …
Viewpoints from @USFRA Food Dialogues
On Tuesday night, the Mill City Museum in downtown Minneapolis was filled with conversation about agriculture at the fifth annual Food Dialogue, hosted by the US Farmers and Rachers Alliance(USFRA). The event featured seven very diverse panelists, highlighting the diverse ranges of expertise that exist within food production. Bill Gordon, fourth generation soybean farmer; Jen Haugen, a registered dietician formerly …
Huckabee Gets His #Pork On at Iowa State Fair
Iowa Ag Secretary Bill Northey is encouraging everyone, including presidential candidates, to #GetYourAgOn at the Iowa State Fair. Well Presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee, former governor of Arkansas and 2008 winner of the Iowa Republican Caucuses, is definitely getting his #GetYourAgOn with his love of pork. He kicked off his Des Moines Register Presidential Soapbox speech saying, “Porkchop on a stick. …
Big Crowd for @USFRA Food Dialogues in Minnesota
It was a packed house last night at the USFRA Food Dialogues in Minneapolis entitled “Farm to Consumer: Bridging the Gap between Consumer Concerns and Food Production and Sourcing Decisions.” Chuck was supposed to be there but had his flight cancelled and at the last minute our amazing summer intern Lizzy Shultz drove from Madison to fill in. The event, …
Ayrestone Productivity Making Data Transer Efficient
There’s a revolution coming in agriculture, and it has to do with technology and how data is managed. “There’s just a lot more devices today that talk on a network and more coming all the time,” Bill Moffitt with Ayrstone Productivity told Chuck during the recent InfoAg Conference. His company offers producers long-range wi-fi networks that can cover up to …
Planted Acreage Update From USDA
USDA is forecasting the third largest corn crop and the second largest soybean crop on record in a new planted acreage update released today. U.S. growers are forecast to produce 13.7 billion bushels of corn this year, according to the report from USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS). That is actually a four percent decrease from last year’s production, but …
West Central New to #AgMedia Expo
New to the Ag Media Summit (AMS) Info Expo this year was West Central Distribution of Willmar, Minnesota. “We’re a wholesale distributor of farm inputs,” said Jesse Cler, Focus Product Marketing Manager for the company. “So we stock the shelves for retailer and create a business partnership with them and help to grow their business.” Cler says they came to …
“Ahead of the Curve” Theme for @GROWMARK Annual
As one of the nation’s largest, oldest, most profitable and most respected farmer cooperatives, GROWMARK has always been ahead of the curve, so it is an appropriate theme for this year’s annual meeting, coming up August 27-28 at the Hilton Chicago. “We do think that GROWMARK and the FS System are ahead of the curve,” says GROWMARK Corporate Relations Manager …
Cheminova Products Add to FMC Portfolio
FMC Corporation just completed its acquisition of Cheminova earlier this year and at the Ag Media Summit we talked with FMC business solutions manager David Wheeler about what new crop protection solutions that adds to the FMC portfolio for growers. “The Cheminova acquisition has really rounded out our portfolio,” said Wheeler. “For instance, we were lacking in fungicides in our …