New Kid in the Wyffels Hybrids Family

Cindy Zimmerman

wyffels corn strategies illinoisThe Wyffels Corn Strategies event in Dixon, Illinois last week was a first for regional manager Dave Rolli.

“I’ve been on the job for just about seven months, started back in December,” Dave told me. “It’s just been a great company to work for and they really do treat their employees like family.”

Dave was in charge of organizing the Corn Strategies event this year, his first year on the job, and he was very pleased with the outcome. “I’ve been very proud of my team for all the work they put in,” he said. He was also grateful to the Pratt farm family who hosted the event. “They have been outstanding hosts for us to work with. It’s a real family event for them, they’ve been happy to have us here, and I’ve been tickled to work with them.”

Dave also talked about how the corn looks in his part of the country, which includes the northern third of Illinois and Wisconsin.

Listen to or download my interview with Dave here: Dave Rolli with Wyffels Hybrids

Wyffels Corn Strategies 2011 Illinois Photo Album

That wraps up my coverage of the Illinois Wyffels Corn Strategies 2011 event and Chuck is getting ready to head off today for the event in Iowa tomorrow.

Audio, Corn

Farm Foundation Reports on What’s Driving Food Prices

Cindy Zimmerman

farmfoundationlogo3The agricultural policy organization Farm Foundation, NFP released a new report today on What’s Driving Food Prices for 2011.

Foundation president Neil Conklin says the report is a follow up to similar studies they commissioned when prices were up in 2008 and 2009. “The purpose of the report this time is to provide both policy makers in the public sector and decision makers and stakeholders in the private sector with information to make difficult choices about food, agriculture and energy policies,” said Conklin. “This time we’ve tried to put some additional emphasis on the medium and long term implications of what’s going on.”

Listen to or download an interview with Neil about the report here: Neil Conklin Interview

Farm Foundation commissioned three Purdue agricultural economists to do the report – Phil Abbott, Chris Hurt and Wally Tyner. According to Tyner, they identified two major commodity demand shocks in 2011 – the use of corn for ethanol and Chinese soybean imports. “In 2005, we were using about 16 million acres to supply all of the ethanol in the United States and Chinese soybean imports,” he said. “In 2010, it took 46.5 million acres, an increase of 189%, just to satisfy those two demands.”

Listen to or download an interview with Wally about the report here: Wally Tyner Interview

“There was a dramatic increase in Chinese imports of soybeans between 2006 and now,” said Abbott. “China imports 86% of their use of soybeans and imported roughly 55 million tons in the last year.” He noted that 40 percent of the increase in Chinese soybean imports in recent years was for building stocks, which he estimates to be about 23% of their use right now, compared to five percent here in the United States.

Listen to or download my interview with Phil here: Phil Abbott Interview

Hurt says another major factor driving prices is market inelasticity, both on the demand and the supply side. “An area on the supply side that we’ve seen is land,” said Hurt. “Today there’s just not any crop land available to shift over to the high demand crops of corn and soybeans.”

Listen to or download my interview with Christ here: Chris Hurt Interview

The report also noted that with grain stocks much tighter, weather is a bigger concern now than it was when prices were up in 2008.

Read the full report here.

Audio, Corn, Ethanol, Farm Foundation, Food, Soybean

Tom Brand New NAFB Exec

Chuck Zimmerman

Meet the new Executive Director for the National Association of Farm Broadcasting, Tom Brand. Tom’s new position was just announced by NAFB.

You can hear NAFB President Tom Steever make the announcement: Tom Steever Announcement
“I think a lot of folks may know me because of being a farm broadcaster,” says Tom, who’s currently the farm director at KFEQ. He has a decorated history as a member of the NAFB. He’s a Horizon Award winner, a nominee for Farm Broadcaster of the Year and he presided over the Association in 2003. He’s still getting used to the idea of this latest change in his career. “You know, whenever I came to my first [NAFB] convention in 1990, if someone had said, “I’ve seen the crystal ball and you’re going to be the executive director of NAFB,” I sure wouldn’t have believed them,” he said, after being informed that he was selected to be in that position.

Congratulations Tom!

I remember hiring Tom at Brownfield Ag News and watching him learn to do market reports from Derry Brownfield! I think he learned well. The photo is from an NAFB Washington Watch I attended a couple of years ago.

NAFB

Soil Sampling With An iPad

Chuck Zimmerman

ZimmCast 312Precision Earth. Has a nice ring to it doesn’t it. Would you guess it’s an iPad app for soil sampling? Didn’t think so. At the 2011 InfoAg Conference I learned about it when I saw their booth in the trade show.

Pictured are Chris Tucker (left), Precision Earth and Aaron Hutchinson, Cogent3D, Inc. holding an iPad showing Precision Earth in action. I visited with Chris to learn more about how this application got started. Chris has been a diehard Microsoft guy who got his first iPhone last year. He’s been in the precision ag industry for a long time. The iPhone “opened his eyes” that it could be used as a data collection device. He sees lots of farmers carrying them around. So he got started working with Aaron’s company to develop what is now Precision Earth. He sees it evolving beyond just soil sampling to a full fledged crop scouting device. The app uses shapefiles which can be managed by iTunes or a local computer app they can provide. The feedback that Chris received at the InfoAg Conference was far more positive than he even hoped for. That’s a good sign. There are plans to utilize other mobile platforms in the future.

Precision Earth should be available in the iTunes Store soon. It will also work on an iPhone!

Learn more about it in this week’s program: Precision Earth on an iPad

Thanks to our ZimmCast sponsor, GROWMARK, locally owned, globally strong, for their support.

The ZimmCast ends this week with some music from Music Alley. It’s called “Eliptical White Tablet” by Elika. I hope you enjoy it and thank you for listening.

The ZimmCast is the official weekly podcast of AgWired. Subscribe so you can listen when and where you want. Just go to our Subscribe page.

Agribusiness, Apps, Audio, ZimmCast

Wyffels Corn Hybrids More than Numbers

Cindy Zimmerman

wyffels corn strategies illinoisThe slogan for Wyffels Corn Hybrids is “More than a Number” which is the company’s philosophy when it comes to both their customers and their hybrids, but they do keep adding more numbers to their lineup of corn hybrids.

“We released 12 new products this last year,” said Wyffels Product Development Manager Bob Jackson at the 2011 Wyffels Corn Strategies event in Dixon, Illinois last week. “So, there’s kind of a new hybrid for everyone of our customers, whether they’re in southern Minnesota or southern Illinois.”

wyffels corn strategies illinoisCorn is all Wyffels does and Bob says when they look at new hybrids they are looking for what will make the farmers more money. “So that means more bushels, better standing products and better plant health. It’s always about making the customer more revenue.”

Dozens of Wyffels corn hybrids were on display at the Illinois Corn Strategies event last week and will be this week as well at the Iowa event in Malcom. If you would like to attend the Iowa event on Wednesday, find out more information on-line or contact your local Wyffels Seed Representative.

Listen to or download my interview with Bob here: Bob Jackson with Wyffels Hybrids

Wyffels Corn Strategies 2011 Illinois Photo Album

Audio, Corn, Seed

Some Thoughts on Google+

Chuck Zimmerman

How many of you are using Google+? How many of you care? Just what we need, another social network right? I kind of feel that way myself. We’re doing pretty good with Twitter, Facebook, etc. I know many of you are just getting used to using them. So do we really need another one? I’ve had a number of people asking what I think and do I recommend it. Here are some initial thoughts.

To start with, it’s like all things new. Not everyone is there so who are you going to talk to? That will change and is already changing as they allow more and more people in. I think the early adopter have jumped on Google+ and they are writing a lot about it. Reactions are mixed. Some love it and some already hate it. I’ve only been in it for about a week and with relatively little time to get the full experience. At first take it seems a little like Twitter on steroids.

Since social networking is all about having conversations I liken this to looking at a new house and wondering if I want to live there. I kind of like the house I live in now but is this one better? Does it have more room and better appliances? Do I want to have two houses (Facebook and Google+)? Some people are very comfortable with a primary residence and a vacation house at the lake or the beach. I’m not so sure I want that. But since my business is all about using social media I will use them both.

Getting started with Google+ is relatively simple, especially if you are already an active Google user. I am. I use Google for all kinds of things. My first thought was that Google+ might be a good fit and integrate with all my other Google apps (Gmail, iGoogle, Analytics, etc.). Since we’re still in the beta stage of Google+ I’m sure there will be a lot more development work as Google gets the feedback so many users are providing. For example, I’d like to be able to have a Twitter post update Google+. I like that and so do many of my followers on Facebook. However, I’ve seen comments from people wanting to keep Google+ “pure” from apps that allow this to happen.

I think it’s too early for me to provide a point by point comparison between Google+ and Facebook. I don’t see Google+ competing with Twitter that much yet btw. There are too many 3rd party apps for Twitter that make it such a useful tool and Google+ doesn’t have them yet. Emphasis on yet.

Google+ makes it real easy to add friends and group them which is called Circles. Yeah, there’s some new language to learn. I’ve already got around 50 friends and families connected to me but only a few are very active yet. Most of them are already active in Facebook and seem to be staying there most of the time.

So, should you join? Why not? Whey not create an account and at least take a peek? You can even create a nice little vanity url for yourself on Google+. Here’s mine: http://gplus.to/ChuckZimmerman.

Have you joined? What do you think? Feel free to add comments.

Social Networking

A Blast From My Past

Melissa Sandfort

I’m starting to age myself by writing this column. See, I show you pictures of Grandpa’s old things, but then I go and post pictures of MY old toys and you can tell just how old I really am!

These are the rollerskates I used as a kid and get this – you left your shoes on and they adjusted as your feet grew. Do any of you remember these? If you hit a pebble, you were taking a nosedive to the ground. And forget a stopper on the front…you had to skid sideways to put a halt to your fun. I later graduated up to a pair of white slip-on rollerskates with a pink stopper, for which my grandmother knitted a pink “puff” that tied to the shoelaces. That was big-time.

These old metal skates have long been retired and the skating rink burned down, but they do bring back memories. Disco balls, slow-skates, skating trains, birthday parties…

Until we walk again …

Uncategorized

Zimfo Bytes

Melissa Sandfort

    Zimfo Bytes

  • Michael Dillon and Michael “Smitty” Smith, will lead Osborn & Barr’s creative efforts, serving as executive creative directors. Adnan Sabic also joins the team with returning creative talents Zach Arnold and David Boesch.
  • A reliable supply of high quality ammonium thiosulphate will soon be available to ag producers throughout the Upper Midwest as a result of an agreement between Kugler Company and Hydrite Chemical Company.
  • National Corn Growers Association President Bart Schott presented the President’s Award to Senator Kent Conrad (D-N.D.).
  • Scientific Certification Systems is now an accredited certification body for the Bonsucro standard for sustainable sugarcane.
    Zimfo Bytes

    2011 NAMA Boot Camp

    Chuck Zimmerman

    Are you new to agrimarketing? Want to do some industry networking? How about NAMA Boot Camp? The National Agri-Marketing Association has a full program lined up.

    Whether you’ve just entered the rough working world or one who’s been through the NAMA Boot Camp drill before, sign up for this program today to learn more about the agri-marketing industry. This year the Boot Camp will take it to a new level expanding on marketing and agriculture basics.

    Join the National Agri-Marketing Association for the 8th annual NAMA Boot Camp, August 16-18, 2011 in Kansas City.

    All attendees will receive a notebook packed with agricultural terminology, facts, case studies and speaker presentations. This notebook has become one of the most popular aspects of the boot camp experience.

    Register here.

    NAMA

    ARC 2012 Spring Meeting Will Be In Charleston, SC

    Chuck Zimmerman

    If you’re looking at things to put on your 2012 calendar then mark down March 21-21 for the Agricultural Relations Council spring meeting. It will be held at the Hilton Garden Inn in Charleston, SC.

    The annual meeting, held in February the past several years, was moved to March by the ARC board of directors at its meeting in Fort Myers in February. “The board felt moving the meeting a month forward to late March would get us beyond most of the major mid-winter ag trade shows,” said Mace Thornton, ARC board president. “We are excited about Charleston and the move to March.”

    Watch for more information from ARC on the program for the meeting. If you’re interested in serving on the program committee, please contact the ARC office at (952) 758-5811 and ask for Den or Barb.

    ARC