Social Media – Listen. Talk. Ask.

Jamie Johansen

To help wrap up Alltech’s Global 500 last week Billy Frey, Senior Vice President of the Alltech Ag Network, and David Butler, Alltech’s Web Marketing Manager, discussed the future of communication.

What does the future hold in terms of communication? Well, if you ask these guys the answer is social media. People don’t turn to magazines, newspapers or even television anymore for information. They go online.

What does this mean for the agriculture industry? We simply need to use this tool to tell our story. Share what your company is doing with a picture or video. Or share your farming story through a blog. Make your information accessible with the click of a button.

Billy and David said to first listen to the conversation. Then talk and join in with the dialogue. And finally ask questions and create engagement. Social media is free, it doesn’t cost any money to start a conversation.

Find out what Alltech is doing online by following them on Facebook and Twitter. If you missed this years Global 500 check out #global500 on Twitter to follow what those live tweeting had to say. Also check out Alltech’s blog and stay up-to-date with what the company is doing.

Listen to Billy and David’s complete presentation here: Billy Frey & David Butler - Global 500

Check out all the photos from this years Global 500 here: 2012 Global 500 Photo Album

Alltech, Audio, Media, Social Media, Social Networking

NAFB Foundation Auction Record

Cindy Zimmerman

The 2012 NAFB Foundation Auction was a record success this year, raising over $22,000 according to Foundation president Ken Anderson of Brownfield Ag News.

Ken extends special thanks to Orion Samuelson, WGN Radio, Chicago, IL, for his generosity in donating the first two copies of his new book, “You Can’t Dream Big Enough.” That generous donation was multiplied by the generosity of the bidders, especially Patrick Gottsch (RFD-TV) and Evan Slack who were high bidders for the first book.

Auction chairman Greg Akagi says the first book was sold twice at the auction to both Evan and Patrick who paid a combined $7500 for it. Murray Wise Associates bought the second book during the silent auction for $200. “The total overall was $7,700.00!! And that made the Auction Chair very happy,” said Greg.

The now traditional boys versus girls bidding war over a weekend at the Lake Ozark home of Al Johnson and Sara Wyant (Agri-Pulse) ended in TWO weekends – twice the dollars for the Foundation – and since the boys club included my husband, it means we will be part of both!

Ken reports that they had 75 silent auction items and 13 live auction items this year and he thanked everyone who contributed to this year’s successful event, including the Foundation Auction Committee – Sally Behringer (MustangRED Communications, Lawerence, KS), Haylie Shipp (Northern Ag Network, Billings, MT), DeAnna Thomas (WMBD/WIRL Radio, Peoria, IL), Ty Higgins (Ohio Ag Net, Columbus, OH), and Carah Hart (Osborn Barr Communications, Kansas City, MO).

“My mind is already thinking ahead for the 70th Annual NAFB Convention and what we can do to make the NAFB Foundation Auction another great success,” Ken says. We need to think about donating a fishing weekend on the Gulf of Mexico!

NAFB

Zimfo Bytes

Melissa Sandfort

    Zimfo Bytes

  • MyBeefCheckoff.com now has a mobile site offering all of the great information you’ve grown accustomed to on the full site.
  • USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack has appointed six members and alternates to serve on the National Honey Board.
  • SAVE THE DATE – 24th Annual MOSES Organic Farming Conference Coming to La Crosse, WI, Feb. 21–23, 2013.
  • The first results from a project to sample soil this fall to see how the dry growing season and low corn yields affected nitrogen levels are now available.
Uncategorized

Seasons Greetings Time

Chuck Zimmerman

It’s that time of the year. Christmas holiday time. The seasons greetings are coming in and I’ll try to share them as we receive them.

Here’s one from our good friend Jerry Harrington, Dupont Pioneer who says, “May the holidays bring you time with the people who bring you joy.”

Yes, it’s a great time to slow down and enjoy friends and family. We’ve got daughters visiting next week and then will be spending a weekend with more family. I just hope I can lose a few more pounds in advance of the cooking and eating that I’m sure we’ll find time to do.

Agribusiness

Syngenta & ASTA Help Feed Chicago Kids

Cindy Zimmerman

We talk a lot in agriculture about feeding a growing world population but Syngenta and the American Seed Trade Association (ASTA) brought that broad message home during this week’s CSS 2012 and Seed Expo in Chicago.

“We tend to think about hunger as being something that happens somewhere else, but it happens in our own backyard – it happens here in Chicago,” said David Morgan, Syngenta North America regional director. “We partnered here with ASTA at the event and we’re giving matching contributions to donations given for Chicago efforts on hunger relief.”

Syngenta was giving away backpacks at the Seed Expo, as well as some cool knit gloves with tech fingers (to operate touch screens) and collecting lots of donations. ASTA pledged to match donations up to $1500 and Syngenta matched up to $3000 – all going to support Nourish for Knowledge, a program of the Greater Chicago Food Depository.

*Post Update* Syngenta reports that they collected over $1600 during the Seed Expo, which was matched by $1600 from Syngenta and $1500 from ASTA – for a grand total donation of more than $4700 to help feed Chicago area children. What a great effort!

I had the chance to chat with David about why Syngenta is one of ASTA’s strategic partners and the products they have and are developing to help increase food security worldwide.

Interview with David Morgan


ASTA-CSS Photo Album

ASTA, Audio, Food, Syngenta

Economic Review and Outlook at ASTA Expo

Cindy Zimmerman

The American Seed Trade Association (ASTA) annual Corn & Sorghum and Soybean Seed Research Conference (CSS) and Seed Expo this week boasted a record 2,800 attendees and 150 exhibitors who were all excited about the future of the seed industry despite this year’s calamitous drought.

During the general session on Thursday, AgResource Company president Dan Basse looked at the year in review and gave his outlook for the future. As far as this year’s drought is concerned, Basse said the final analysis was better than expected. “We were just shocked at how the corn and soybean crops held together as well as they did,” he said. For example, we had record low pod counts as a result of the drought, however the pod weights were two standard deviations above the record. “US soybean yields ended up being 3.5 to 4 bushels an acre MORE than we expected and that’s largely due to the technology now being bred into seed,” said Basse.

Basse is concerned about what next year’s weather patterns may bring, especially in light of the fact that drought impacted Russia, Australia and portions of Latin America this year. He also commented on the lack of a five year farm bill and noted that the crop insurance policy that was part of the last farm bill really helped save farm income this year.

Interview with Dan Basse


ASTA-CSS Photo Album

ASTA, Audio, Farming

Ag Leader Holds Annual Dealer Meeting

Melissa Sandfort

Insights Weekly This week, Ag Leader dealers gathered for the annual meeting themed “Together we are Ag Leader”. And because dealers are the critical link between Ag Leader and the bulk of their market, Ag Leader will continually be putting more emphasis on trying to help their business be more successful.

In his opening remarks, Ag Leader founder Al Myers said:

“Ag Leader continues to grow steadily through the expansion of our product lines. Ag Leader’s sales this year are at a record level, giving us the ability to invest in product developments that will keep us on a strong growth path. We also continue to grow through the expansion of our geographic scope. In the last couple of years, we have established offices in Europe and South America, and have direct sales staff in Australia. This international expansion is necessary to allow Ag Leader to maintain its worldwide market share.

The acquisition of Soil Max and Gradient has made us the leading supplier of equipment and controls for tiling. The integration of the Intellislope functionality into the Ag Leader Integra is a further step to keep us in the lead in Precision Ag. And, we plan to expand the functionality of Intellslope to other water management functions, to become a true competitor to companies already established in the water management field. GeoSteer is going to be a great product for Ag Leader. Planter downforce control is another major expansion of our product line.

Together, we are the best in the business, and we need to use that to our advantage to continue to grow. This year, Ag Leader celebrated its 20th anniversary. Let’s make the next 20 years even better for all of us who – Together we are Ag Leader.”

Become a fan of Ag Leader on Facebook today, and get the latest precision ag videos on the YouTube channel. For more information about Ag Leader products and services, or to visit the blog site, go to www.agleader.com.

Ag Leader

BASF Support of Aerial Application Industry

Chuck Zimmerman

The BASF team was looking good this week at the National Agricultural Aviation Association Convention. Here they are just as the trade show started.

During the show I visited with a couple of the representatives on hand starting with our good friend Dr. Gary Fellows, Technical Marketing Manager. Gary presented the NAAA/BASF Scholarship awards and was available to talk about the products that BASF has that are well suited for aerial application. This includes their Headline fungicide of course. We also talked about what type of research BASF is doing for aerial application and BASF’s support of the NAAA Operation S.A.F.E. fly-ins.

You can listen to my interview with Gary here: Interview with Dr. Gary Fellows

Up next is Daryl Theis, Product Manager. We talked about BASF’s commitment to the aerial application industry that includes scholarships, product r&d and innovative products and relationships with companies like AgSync. More on that in an upcoming post.

You can listen to my interview with Daryl here: Interview with Daryl Theis

2012 NAAA Convention Photo Album

Agribusiness, Audio, BASF, NAAA

Enlist E3 Soybean Brand Announced at ASTA

Cindy Zimmerman

Developing new technologies to deal with herbicide resistant weeds is a major directive for agricultural crop protection companies, and a big announcement in that arena was made this week at the American Seed Trade Association (ASTA) CSS 2012 and Seed Expo by one of the event’s major strategic partners, Dow AgroSciences.

In collaboration with M.S. Technologies, Dow unveiled Enlist E3™ soybeans as the brand name for the industry’s first-ever, three-gene herbicide tolerant soybean to provide tolerance to 2,4-D product, glyphosate, and glufosinate. The technology was submitted for regulatory approval in August 2011 and is anticipated to be launched in 2015 pending U.S. and import country approvals.

“Enlist E3 soybeans will set the new standard for weed control and yield performance in soybeans,” said Lauren August, M.S. Technologies. “This first-ever three-gene stack event has been packaged in high-yielding elite germplasm from M.S. Technologies which, when combined, will allow growers to maximize per acre profits.”

I talked with Damon Palmer, Enlist weed control system commercial lead for Dow, at the ASTA Seed Expo. “It’s going to be really important that we maximize the tools that farmers have to control weeds and so those three herbicide tolerances will provide farmers flexibility and tools into the future to manage weeds,” he said. Enlist E3 soybeans will be brought to market in high-yielding varieties, widely available in multiple brands. “The business objective is to broadly license this throughout the industry,” said Damon, noting that they were able to meet with many companies interested in the technology at that ASTA 2012 Expo.

Damon says involvement in ASTA is important to Dow from both a business and policy perspective. “This is a high technology business and so it’s really important that we’re together and we can push forward policies that advance the seed industry,” he said.

Listen to my interview with Damon here: Interview with Damon Palmer
ASTA-CSS Photo Album

ASTA, Audio, Seed, Soybean, weed management