I am on my way to National Agriculture Day activities which will be taking place tomorrow. Here’s another event you might want to check out being held again this year. It’s National Teach Ag Day which is being celebrated on March 15 and it includes a live stream event. The agriculture program at Buena Park High School in Buena Park, …
Foundation for Agriculture Book of the Year
Presenting accurate information to children about where their food comes from is the goal of the 2012 American Farm Bureau Foundation for Agriculture “Book of the Year” – “How Did That Get In My Lunchbox? The Story of Food.” Author Chris Butterworth received the Foundation’s fifth annual “Book of the Year” award during the recent AFBF annual meeting. The book …
National FFA Meets With Secretary of Agriculture
I have a concern about this announcement from the FFA. With more than 100,000 new farmers needed over the next few years, Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack issued the young leaders of the National FFA Organization a challenge in 2011. “I would like you to with your fellow students and the adult leadership of the organization to develop a series …
Make Learning Mobile With Float
In this week’s program we’re going to use the M word, as in Mobile, as in Float Mobile Learning. I just had a conversation with Chad Udell, Managing Director, about mobile learning technology and what that means for today’s agribusiness customers. Float Mobile’s parent company is the Iona Group. Chad says the company has a deep history working with agribusiness …
A FAPRI Farm Market Outlook
Patrick Westhoff is the Director of the Food and Agricultural Policy Research Institute (FAPRI) at the University of Missouri–Columbia and a professor in the MU department of agricultural and applied economics. He was also our St. Louis Agribusiness Club speaker yesterday. I spoke with him beforehand since I had to leave early. He says his job was to talk about …
GROWMARK Essay Contest Underway
Appropriately for the International Year of Cooperatives, the theme for the 2012 GROWMARK essay contest is “Cooperatives in a Global Environment.” This is the 19th year for the program, sponsored by the GROWMARK System and FS member cooperatives, in conjunction with state FFA leaders, to help young people develop their writing skills, learn about current issues impacting agriculture, and understand …
WTF? Where’s the Food. Without the Farmer?
Hey farmer and food lovers. Here’s a head’s up about a coordinated effort by college students to help do some agvocacy and reach out to other students to help them better understand food production and where it comes from. Student volunteers from colleges and universities nationwide have joined the agricultural advocacy group, I Love Farmers…They Feed My Soul to promote …
GROWMARK Names Scholarship Winners
GROWMARK is helping 35 college students from throughout the Midwest to continue their educations in agriculture and business. “GROWMARK invests more than $45,500 annually on scholarships. We’re investing today for a return tomorrow,” says Steve German, GROWMARK member employment manager, pictured here at the scholarship luncheon during the recent GROWMARK annual meeting. “There’s a need for agriculture businesses to support …
Illinois Commodity Groups Support Evans Endowed Chair at U of IL
After just seeing Jim Evans last week at the 2011 IFAJ Congress it was nice to see this large gift to the James F. Evans Endowed Chair in Agricultural Communications at the University of Illinois. Five Illinois agriculture groups jointly announced today a more than $28,000 award to a University of Illinois joint initiative between the College of Agricultural, Consumer …
Rupert Loves Home Grown Fuel
His name is Rupert Boneham but everyone knows him as Rupert, winner of Survivor. Rupert is one of the folks I’ve had the pleasure to meet here at the 2011 Sturgis Motorcycle Rally. In the photo he’s being interviewed on the street before the Legends Ride. I ran into him again out here where I’m staying at the Buffalo Chip …