The Iowa Cy-Hawk trophy trash-talking got to be too much for the two college teams to take when people were dissing the corn growers.
At a press conference on Tuesday announcing that the controversial corn-themed trophy will get a do-over, representatives from both the University of Iowa and Iowa State spoke up in defense of the Iowa Corn Growers, who had been taking the brunt of the heat from upset fans and the media. “Iowa Corn has shouldered most of the burden of the criticism … That story is not being told correctly,” said Iowa associate athletic director Rick Klatt, adding that Iowa corn represents “more than 6500 Iowans who help feed the world and share our commitment to hard work, dedication, determination and team work.” Steve Malchow of ISU noted that “Iowa Corn didn’t ask to change the trophy when they signed on.”
Iowa Corn CEO Craig Floss said the trophy will be re-designed with input from the fans. “When we signed on as a sponsor of the Cy-Hawk Series earlier this year, we did so because we know how passionate people are about this rivalry. We wanted to be part of that passion,” he said. “We heard loud and clear that people want a different trophy for the football game. A new Cy-Hawk football trophy will truly be the fans’ trophy.”
What will happen to the trophy featuring a farm family celebrating their harvest has yet to be decided, but Craig says it definitely “won’t be on the sidelines” at the upcoming Iowa-Iowa State football game on September 10. An interim trophy will be awarded at that game as the new one is being developed.
Watch the press conference video or listen to the audio here: Iowa Corn Trophy Presser
The AgChat Agvocacy 2.0 Conference may be over but I have more interviews to share. I’m on the agriblogging highway to another event so it will be several days before I can get them all posted. In the meantime I’ve got plenty of photos to share.
2011 AgChat Agvocacy 2.0 Conference Photo Album
Here’s the full group at the conclusion to the conference this afternoon. There are almost 200 photos in my photo album. Are you in there? We’re going to do it again next year so I hope to see you there.
AgChat Agvocacy 2.0 coverage is sponsored by The New Holland Boomer 555 Contest.Matt Teagarden is a rancher from Topeka, Kansas whose family has been in the business of cattle for at least four generations. During the Cattle Industry Summer Conference, he said he was closely watching the language around the mandatory COOL program. He explained there is a confidential trade ruling from the World Trade Organization indicating that Mexico and Canada are justified in their claim that our mandatory COOL program violates our trade agreements.
“So we’ve tried to be proactive in fixing the issue so its compliant. Canada and Mexico our are two biggest trading partners for beef,” he said.
Also on his radar and what he sees as the biggest challenge for the industry is the continuing decline of the cow herd. There are many factors causing this but one has been long-term drought in many states. “Even if the weather was right there are factors that are challenging us from growing our cow herd,” said Teagarden. “Our cow-calf producers are getting older so we need to identify the next generation of cow-calf producers.”
On the opposite side, Teagarden said if they can get the right conditions they have the opportunity to expand. “In the states I think we have the opportunity to grow beef demand and total beef consumption. As you look around the world and the global economy rebounds after the recession, the opportunities are tremendous.”
Listen to my interview with Matt Teagarden: Declining Cow Herd Challenge for Cattle Producers
Photos from the conference are posted to this photo album: 2011 Cattle Industry Summer Conference Photo Album.
At the AgChat Agvocacy 2.0 Conference I met Twitter follower and now friend in person. Here’s @DairyCarrie Mess and her husband.
You’ll notice that Carrie is wearing a New Holland shirt! That’s because the dealership she works at sponsored her participation in the conference. I talked with Carrie to learn what drew her to AgChat and using social media. I think you’ll enjoy hearing her story and it will encourage farmers to get started with social media if they haven’t already. As she puts it “If you are serious about being in agriculture you need to consider this as part of your job.”
You can listen to my interview with Carrie here: Interview with Carrie Mess
2011 AgChat Agvocacy 2.0 Conference Photo Album
AgChat Agvocacy 2.0 coverage is sponsored by The New Holland Boomer 555 Contest.Just because you couldn’t make it to the AgChat Agvocacy 2.0 Conference doesn’t mean you can’t communicate with the community. Take the Dairy Goddess who couldn’t be here. She passed along a video link to share around and I found it via the conference Facebook page. It’s a great video and I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.
Where Them Cows At from Volt on Vimeo.
Here’s what the producer has to say about why he made the video:
So after watching a video a friend made about his “chicks” on his chicken farm(linked below). My friend Marcelo Alves and I decided we could not only make a similar video about my dairy farm but do it even bigger and better. So we decided to try and make a full on music video, and this video is the result.
Ok here is the video i was referring to at the beginning of this video: youtube.com/watch?v=MFjE0qeUOq4
2011 AgChat Agvocacy 2.0 Conference Photo Album
Don Pemberton is a rancher from Hopkinsville, KY. His family business has been in operation for 40 years, and he is a long-time National Cattlemen’s Beef Association member who feels it’s important to have an association that “has your back” so to speak. He was recently elected as Vice Chair of the Policy Division, and the big joke during the Cattle Summer Industry Conference was that Pemberton is “Policy all the time.”
One main issue, he said, are the regulations coming out of the EPA. He said we’ve seen an overzealous administration that is really making it difficult to do business. “There is some talk in Washington that they will repeal some of these regulations. I hope they’re thinking about how they’re affecting the small business owner such as ranchers and farmers across this nation,” said Pemberton.
I asked him why he thought such harmful regulations were being passed. While he said he was not really in a position to answer that question, he did note that three generations ago most people knew someone who was involved in agriculture. Today, most people are two generations removed from the farm. The industry is now such a small percentage that they really have to work hard to make their voices heard, he explained. And they need to be heard, said Pemberton, because they need the opportunity to grow the food, feed and fiber the world needs.
In closing he stressed that it is important for more members of the cattle industry to join an organization that is dedicated to helping them succeed. He invited those interested to visit their new website, www.beefusa.org.
Listen to my interview with Don Pemberton:Pemberton on Policy
Photos from the conference are posted to this photo album: 2011 Cattle Industry Summer Conference Photo Album.
At the AgChat Agvocacy 2.0 Conference the U.S. Farmers and Ranchers Alliance presented some research with consumers that was conducted by Maslansky, Luntz + Partners. On our program was Jenn Dahm (pictured left). Jenn says that “the finding that all of our research hinges on is the fact that America loves farmers and ranchers. All the effort we’re putting in to showing our families and our values and what we do in those terms, it’s good, and it helps and you know that battle is already won and the place where we really need to focus our energy if we’re going to be effective is talking about our methods.” This is the area where consumers have questions.
She says that fighting back is not working. Throwing facts at them is not working. Inviting consumers to the table is working better. “It’s not a war, it’s about starting a conversation.”
You can listen to my interview with Jenn here: Interview with Jenn Dahm
2011 AgChat Agvocacy 2.0 Conference Photo Album
AgChat Agvocacy 2.0 coverage is sponsored by The New Holland Boomer 555 Contest.All roads lead to Colorado. Cattle producer Terry Fankhauser is a Kansas native but moved to Colorado about 11 years ago. He comes from a multi-generation ranch, but it was only big enough for the family that was there so Fankhauser said his dad had the foresite to tell him to go find something else. And that he did in Colorado – another ranch.
Like his counter part in Idaho, Charles Lyons, Colorado is a public lands state so that means they graze their cattle on a lot of public land. During the Cattle Industry Summer Conference, Fankhauser said he was glad to see that the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA) grouped up a lot of the private property, environment and federal lands committee discussions to really talk about endangered species issues, property ownership, leasing, and environmental challenges. In addition, the organization discussed in detail how these elements mix among land uses and production types.
“There’s a few good policies in there but it was more about the conversation on how we can bring our membership closer together and work across industry segments more effectively on those types of policies,” said Fankhauser.
So what does he believe to be one of the greatest challenges facing his business? Like so many others, he feels current regulations have over-reached.
“The biggest challenges we’re seeing are the current environmental regulations that are coming out of the administration that we believe are misguided,” said Fankhauser. “We think that agriculture is part of the solution, not part of the problem and I know we have the data, and the information and the talent to back that up.”
Listen to my interview with Terry Fankhauser:Roads Lead to Colorado
Photos from the conference are posted to this photo album: 2011 Cattle Industry Summer Conference Photo Album.
P.T. Barnum has been quoted as saying “There’s no such thing as bad publicity,” but those in the agriculture industry might disagree with that at times.
The vicious backlash over the Iowa Cy-Hawk series football trophy, sponsored by Iowa’s corn growers, might be one of those times – or it might not. The trophy shows an Iowa family together after a day on the farm, the farmer husband kneeling before his wife and children with a bushel of corn between them. It was designed by the Iowa Corn Growers to represent “the people and characteristics that are uniquely Iowan.”
It was immediately and almost universally condemned as the “worst trophy in sports.” Trophy chatter Twitter and Facebook just intensified over the weekend and once Governor Branstad commented Monday that he thought they “could do better” it was obvious that something had to be done. Iowa Corn representatives along with University of Iowa and Iowa State University officials will be holding a press conference Tuesday at 2 pm central in Johnston to talk about the situation and it is likely that some kind of modifications to the trophy, if not a complete redesign, will be announced.
Most of the criticism is based on the fact that the trophy has no football on it. Some of the comments have been humorous and some have been mean, but many of the sports writers seemed to be careful to point out they were not anti-farmer, like The Gazette in Cedar Rapids – “Yes, we are corn. Yes, we are farmers. And thank the heavens we are. Many of our families have lived it and we continue to live it every day in our state. We celebrate that every day. The Cy-Hawk Trophy should be about football, the game and the players.”
The question is whether this publicity will ultimately be positive or negative, because the whole purpose of the corn growers sponsorship of this high profile state rivalry is to remind Iowans about the importance of farming and corn. Had this been your basic sports trophy with maybe a football on top of a bushel of corn, the story would have gotten some state coverage and mentions in the college sports media. Instead, it literally went viral. I’m sure someone can calculate the number of mentions of this trophy in traditional and social media and it has to already be huge, and it will continue to have legs for some time as the college football season gets underway.
There have been positive comments about the trophy, like this one on the Iowa Corn Facebook page – “This will turn out to be a HUGE WIN for Iowa Corn and the CyHawk series.” It could very well happen.
