While wandering around this year’s Mid-South Farm & Gin Show Anna Leigh Peek found me. Anna worked with Cindy and me on-location at the 2014 National Farm Machinery Show to gain experience as an agriblogger. It’s always great to see her. She graduated from Auburn and is now working for Monsanto as a consumer engagement specialist working with our good …
Mississippi State University Utilizes Drones
Robert Moorehead, Director of Geosystems Research Institute and Northern Gulf Institutes at Mississippi State University, was at the 2015 Mid-South Farm & Gin Show to showcase the research being done on harnessing UAV technology on farm.. Moorehead had a chance to chat with Chuck Zimmerman about their use of UAVs and drones. Geosystems Research focuses on agriculture; they utilize UAV …
USA Rice Federation at 2015 Mid-South Farm & Gin Show
The USA Rice Federation is the commodity association that represents all industry aspects (growers, millers, merchants) of the rice industry; they have members in all 6 major rice producing states. While at the 2015 Mid-South Farm & Gin Show, Randy Jemison, Director of Louisiana Field Operations for USA Rice Federation, spoke with Chuck Zimmerman about their role in supporting rice …
EPA and USDA Heads to Keynote NFU Convention
Members of the National Farmers Union will hear from both Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack and EPA administrator Gina McCarthy on Monday at their convention in Wichita. NFU’s Chandler Goule says registration is open to anyone for the organization’s 113th annual meeting. “We’d love to have more people come, listen to our grassroots debate,” said Goule. In an interview at Commodity …
Schmacon Inventor Ready for Retail
The inventor of Schmacon, Howard Bender, accepted a challenge to do better than the turkey bacon he and a friend were eating one day. So he invented “Beef’s Answer to Bacon – Schmacon.” If you attended this year’s American Farm Bureau Federation convention you might remember being able to sample it. You can read his full story here (pdf). Smokey, …
Corn Yield Contest Winner Keeps Pushing
It got a little repetitive at the Commodity Classic corn banquet announcing the national winners of the Corn Yield Contest when Randy Dowdy of Valdosta, Georgia won six of the 18 categories. But Dowdy did make history last year with nearly 504 bushels per acre in his irrigated plot using DEKALB DKC 62-08, and he thinks he can do even …
Annual Commodity Outlook w/ Richard Brock
While at the 2015 Mid-South Farm & Gin Show, Richard Brock, of Brock Associates, gave his annual Commodity Outlook update to conference attendees. Brock’s session was packed with attendees hoping to gain insight into commodity markets. When asked about key takeaways for producers, Brock encouraged growers to shift acres to cotton if they’re in a cotton producing area as he …
USFRA Holds Research & Food Industry Workshop
I had the opportunity to catch up with U.S. Farmers and Ranchers Alliance (USFRA) chairwoman Nancy Kavazanjian during the Commodity Classic to find out about their Research & Food Industry Workshop which was held just prior to Classic. “We’ve been doing research because to talk the talk we need to know what the consumers want to know, the messages that …
Bayer Issues Forum Shows Evolution of Innovation
Agribusinesses are reaching more and more into the innovation realm to help farmers stay at the top of production and meet the needs of a growing world population. Some have even characterized the process as an “evolution of innovation.” “The ag companies, and in particular, Bayer, have been very good at innovation in the past, and we’re very good at …
Smart Sensors & Cheap Connectivity Future of Ag
A combination of more, cheaper smart sensors and more connectivity could make the future of agriculture and food production pretty bright in this country. During the recent Bayer CropScience 10th annual Ag Issues Forum in Phoenix, Michael Rogers, who is an author, journalist and futurist, spoke to those gathered at the event about some of these global trends driving food …