The 2008 World Food Prize winners met the press on Thursday, which was also World Food Day. Former Senators Bob Dole and George McGovern took questions from the media on a variety of topics ranging from funding for the school lunch program, to biofuels, to the world financial situation. The two are splitting the $250,000 World Food Prize for their …
Soy Sponsored World Food Prize Luncheon
Several soybean groups – including the United Soybean Board, Iowa Soybean Association, Soy Foods Council, WISHH, and World Soy Foundation – jointly sponsored the luncheon today at the World Food Prize symposium. There was a record crowd of more than 750 in attendance, including over 100 students participating in the WFP Youth Institute. Appropriately, the event today is held on …
Grilling With Propane at Sunbelt Ag Expo
There’s no question that if you grill food you’re going to attract a crowd. That’s what Joel Garrett, Garrett Grills, is doing for his second year at the Georgia Propane Gas Association building at the Sunbelt Ag Expo. I don’t think he, or the other members of the cooking crew, could cook fast enough to feed everyone but they were …
Schafer Addresses Farm Foundation Conference
U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Ed Schafer has just finished addressing the folks attending the latest Farm Foundation’s Transition to a Bioeconomy Conference going on in St. Louis, Mo. Schafer reminded the crowd how hard the current administration has worked to promote the biofuels field in this country, and thus, how hard it had worked to help the farmers who are …
Georgia Propane Gas Association President
The President of the Georgia Propane Gas Association is Lynda Humm. She was behind the registration table for their Sunbelt Ag Expo drawings every time I came by their building. You won’t find a friendlier person in the propane industry. I thought it was interesting that her company primarily supplies propane to fork lift operators. However, she knows the value …
Participating in World Food Prize Events
One of the participants in the 2008 World Food Prize symposium who caught my eye yesterday was Dr. Gale Buchanan, USDA Under Secretary for Research Education and Economics. I saw him sitting in on every session I attended, so I caught up with him for an interview about the event and what he thought. This year’s World Food Prize winners …
Conversations at World Food Prize
Panel discussions at the World Food Prize Norman Borlaug Symposium in Des Moines are called “conversations” and one on Wednesday focused on the “Promises and Challenges of Next-Generation Science and Technology.” Among the presenters was Brazil’s former minister of agriculture Roberto Rodrigues, co-chair of the International Biofuels Commission who made a very compelling case that both food and fuel production …
World Food Dialogue for Solutions
Even though the word “crisis” is being used liberally here at the World Food Prize Norman Borlaug Symposium, there is a great deal of focus on solutions to feeding a growing global population. The “Global Agricultural Crisis of the 21st Century” was the topic of the keynote speaker for the symposium kickoff, Sir Gordon Conway, who is chief scientific adviser …
Charging Ahead in a Transitioning Bioeconomy
How we develop rural jobs as the country moves to a bioeconomy was the latest subject tackled today at the Farm Foundation’s Transition to a Bioeconomy: Environmental and Rural Impacts Conference in St. Louis. One of the key speakers during this session was USDA’s Under Secretary for Rural Development Thomas Dorr, who talked about how we need to move forward …
New T4000 Orchard Tractors From New Holland
Peach and blueberry growers just got a new tractor option from New Holland. I met with Andy Reinert, Mid-Range Tractor Marketing Manager, and learned all about it. He says the Sunbelt Ag Expo is the first place they’ve displayed the new tractor in the U. S. It’s got more power (comes in 62 to 82HP) and he says growers will …