Zimfo Bytes

Melissa Sandfort

    Zimfo Bytes

  • Merck Animal Health announces the U.S. approval of ZUPREVO (tildipirosin) – a new macrolide antibiotic for the management of bovine respiratory disease.
  • Miller Electric Mfg. Co. has announced the launch of its Miller Online Store, offering an engaging, customer-friendly shopping experience for the DIY segment.
  • Charleston|Orwig was recently voted Top Workplace in Wisconsin for the third year. This year the agency ranked 11th of 56 in the small business category.
  • Collegiate FFA is now accepting applications for its National Collegiate Agricultural Ambassador program.
    Zimfo Bytes

    Alltech’s FoodPrint Discussion Dinner

    Jamie Johansen

    The Carbon FoodPrint was the topic of debate for one of the Discussion Dinners at the 2012 Alltech International Symposium. Moderator, Damien O’Reilly, Irish National Television and Radio Broadcaster, lead the dialogue on perception vs. reality. Delegates enjoyed a tasty chicken dinner while chatting about how much of the carbon footprint hype is branding and how much is changing operations.

    “It is a very timely discussion because everybody in the world knows more or less what we we mean when we say your carbon footprint. It is a relatively new phenomenon I suppose, but people are becoming more conscious about it and their impact on it.”

    “I hope we can provoke a debate here about the food industry and food companies and what they are doing. Some have signed up for the foodprint idea which is to say we have reduced our carbon footprint by 5 or 7%. But some questions asked are how can we monitor them?”

    Listen to moderator, Damien O’Reilly’s interview here: Interview with Damien O'Reilly

    2012 Alltech International Symposium Photo Album

    Agribusiness, Alltech, Audio

    2012 Alltech Smart Debate

    Chuck Zimmerman

    This year the Alltech debate session is titled Smart Debate. Topics include: feeding 9 billion people; is Africa now Brazil? What’s next for biofuels and more. Our panelists include Tom Arnold, CEO, Concern, Ireland; Sean Richard, Senior Lecturer in Business Economics, Cranfield University, UK; Dr. Marcus Vinicius Pratini de Moraes, Former Minister of Agriculture and Food Supply of Brazil and Tom Dorr, CEO, U.S. Grains Council. Our moderator again this year is Aidan Conolly, Alltech.

    Listen to my interview with Aidan in which he summarizes some take away points from the debate here: Interview with Aidan Conolly

    To give you a flavor for the debate here’s each panelists answer to the question: What does the future hold for us?

    Listen to Tom Arnold’s answer here: Tom Arnold Answer

    Listen to Sean Rickard’s answer here: Sean Rickard Answer

    Listen to Dr. Marcus Vinicius Pratini de Moraes’s answer here: Dr. Marcus Vinicius Pratini de Moraes Answer

    Listen to Tom Dorr’s answer here: Tom Dorr Answer

    2012 Alltech International Symposium Photo Album

    Agribusiness, Alltech, Audio

    A UK Perspective on Improvement in the Food Chain

    Jamie Johansen

    The 2012 Alltech International Symposium was host to Keith Millar, Head of Animal Feed and Animal By-Products Unit at Food Standards Agency, UK. He shared his insights into control and improvement in the food/feed chain during the New Regulatory Landscape breakout session.

    Mr. Millar was private secretary for two separate leaders of the House of Commons. He was a United Kingdom delegations leader in numerous international negotiations. He also worked at the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food and the UK Food Standards Agency since its formation. He is currently secretary to the Independent Advisory Committee on Animal Feedingstuffs. And is also a member of the International Dairy Federation’s Task Force on Animal Feeding.

    “The fundamental take home message I wanted to give was as a government regulator I can’t do my job without having a good working relationship with the industry. I get most of my facts and topical up-to-date information from the industry and thats why I was delighted to come across the Atlantic and speak at this global conference in Lexington, KY.”

    Listen to the complete interview with Keith here: Interview with Keith Millar

    2012 Alltech International Symposium Photo Album

    Agribusiness, Alltech, Food

    USDA Invests in Mississippi River Basin Water Quality

    Melissa Sandfort

    Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced that USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) and its partners will invest nearly $32 million this year in financial and technical assistance for five water quality and wetlands improvement projects in seven Mississippi River Basin states. When fully implemented, the projects will prevent sediment and nutrients from entering waterways, decrease flooding and improve bird and fish habitat. NRCS estimates that this investment will restore 11,400 acres to wetland habitat.

    Landowners interested in applying for funding should contact their local NRCS office. Signup dates may vary based on the individual project.

    NRCS provides funding for these new projects through its Wetlands Reserve Enhancement Program, part of the agency’s Wetlands Reserve Program. Since 2010, NRCS has formalized WREP agreements under MRBI with 47 landowners in the Mississippi River Basin, investing $17.8 million in long-term conservation easements and wetland restoration projects.

    Note: Chuck will be covering the Conservation Technology Information Center (CTIC) 2012 Conservation in Action Tour thanks to support from CTIC and AGROTAIN.

    Conservation, Farming, USDA

    Alltech Young Scientist Global Scholarship Winners

    Chuck Zimmerman

    Alltech announced the winners of their Young Scientist competition during today’s afternoon session. In addition to regional winners there are two global winners (graduate and undergraduate). Altogether there were 8,000 entries in the competition! Presenting the awards were Dr. Mark Lyons and Dr. Inge Russell.

    The Global Undergraduate winner is Gisele Greghi, Universidade Sao Paulo, Brazil. Listen to Jamie’s interview with Gisele here: Interview with Gisele Greghi

    The Global Graduate winner is Qian Wang, University of California-Davis, USA.

    The Alltech Young Scientist Award brings together the world’s brightest scientific thinkers from colleges and universities across the globe. To compete for the top prizes, undergraduate and graduate students are asked to register and submit a scientific paper on an agricultural topic such as veterinary science, animal feed technology, agricultural developments or agriculture management.

    Listen to Jamie’s interview with Qian here: Interview with Qian Wang

    2012 Alltech International Symposium Photo Album

    Agribusiness, Alltech, Education

    The Farmer of the Future

    Jamie Johansen

    During the Marketing Forum at the 2012 Alltech International Symposium, Dr. Dwight Armstrong, Chief Executive Officer for the National FFA Organization, answered the question, “Who is the farmer of the future?” The FFA works with 500,000 potential youth farmers to help fill the need for young agriculturalists.

    The National FFA Organization is dedicated to making a positive difference in the lives of students by developing their potential for premier leadership, personal growth and career success through agricultural education.

    Dr. Armstrong highlighted the FFA’s efforts to make career success a priority for its future members, current members and alumni.

    “The farmer of the future is an individual who can step forward and supply technology, business and science into farming because farming is far more complicated and complex then it has been in the past, but certainly we hope the 500,000 FFA members that are involved in agriculture education and FFA will be the farmer of the future.”

    Dr. Armstrong is a former FFA member from Kentucky and served as the 2005 chairman of the National FFA Foundation Sponsors’ Board. He earned his bachelor’s degree from Murray State University and his master’s degree and Ph.D from Purdue University.

    Listen to the complete interview with Dwight Armstrong here: Interview with Dwight Armstrong

    2012 Alltech International Symposium Photo Album

    Agribusiness, Alltech, Education, FFA

    Alltech Launches Crop Science Business

    Chuck Zimmerman

    Alltech launched their Crop Science business during the 2012 International Symposium. During a lunch time press conference we heard from (r-l) Geoff Frank, CEO of Alltech Crop Science; Robbie Walker, Regional Director of Europe and the Middle East for Alltech Crop Science and Jon Carloftis, award-winning garden designer, garden writer, television guest, author, and lecturer.

    Alltech has actually been in the plant science business for a number of years but has just pulled the business into the Alltech brand. The company is making all natural products that can be used on a wide variety of plants from grains to gardens. The products are especially helpful to plants that experience stressful conditions. They promote more stable growth and greater yields. I asked about the grain market for midwest U.S. growers and they told me that they are conducting trials right now in Iowa. With higher corn prices growers now have a new alternative application to get the most out of their crop.

    Listen to the full press conference here: Alltech Crop Science Press Conference

    Listen to Geoff’s opening remarks here: Geoff Frank Opening Remarks

    Listen to Robbie’s opening remarks here: Robbie Walker Opening Remarks

    Listen to Jon’s opening remarks here: Jon Carloftis Opening Remarks

    2012 Alltech International Symposium Photo Album

    Agribusiness, Alltech, Crop Protection

    Food Styling at Alltech

    Chuck Zimmerman

    I’m borrowing from the Alltech blog here. I thought it was interesting to hear a food stylist talk about her craft.

    Erica Ryan, a food stylist from Dublin, Ireland has spent the last 20 years styling food for TV and film and photography for food packaging and cookery books. Erica is over in Lexington this week helping to put the finishes touches on the display food at ‘The World’s Market’ at Alltech’s Symposium. Erika’s skills require her to maintain the color, texture, composition and quality of the display food that best represents the product.

    2012 Alltech International Symposium Photo Album

    Agribusiness, Alltech, Food, Video

    Alltech Tweetup

    Chuck Zimmerman

    During the 2012 Alltech International Symposium we held a tweetup. Here’s our happy group. Thanks to Jamie for taking our photo.

    Tweetups provide a great opportunity to meet people in person whom you follow or interact with on Twitter. We got together for a few minutes prior to the Kentucky Night dinner celebration at Kentucky Horse Park last night. Most of these folks were on their smartphones tweeting before, during and after the tweetup.

    2012 Alltech International Symposium Photo Album

    Agribusiness, Alltech