RFA Ethanol Podcast

Get Social With AgLoop

Chuck Zimmerman

ZimmCast 267There’s a new social network for agriculture and they want you to get in the loop, the AgLoop.

Zachary Brown may still be in college but he’s already got a full time job going thanks to his Dad, James Brown. Together they started Hay Talk a couple of years ago and it has done so well that they’ve branched out with Ranching Forums, TractorFocus, Row Crop Talk and have plans for several more including the one they just announced which is AgLoop. Sounds like enough to keep two guys busy! By the way, to stay busy in his spare time Zachary also manages AgDesign, website development for farmers.

AgLoop is part of the AgBoards family of online farm forums. Zachary says they believe the sense of “community” created by these forums make them a great place for agribusinesses to connect with their customers. I couldn’t agree more. It’s all part of the online conversations that new and social media have made possible. You can follow them on Twitter.

Besides the forums and new social site, these guys are also podcasting with their first one tied into Hay Talk. It’s the HayTalk.com Hay and Forage Podcast (iTunes link). ZimmCast 267

Here’s some more information about AgLoop:

AgLoop has been compared to the Facebook of Agriculture and provides you with an opportunity to create an in depth profile of yourself or your business.

AgLoop provides you a place not to just chat anonymously, but build personal and professional connections that can be invaluable to you in the future.

AgLoop is a different beast compared to our other sites at AgBoards, but one that we believe could revolutionize the way the agriculture industry and community uses the web.

At AgLoop, you can:

* Create and maintain your very own blog
* Upload photos and videos
* Create polls
* Chat in our chat room and forums
* Submit your website to our FREE web directory
* Update your Facebook and Twitter from AgLoop!
* Create or join a group/association for your favorite company, cause, or just for fun
* Find and post events that are going on in your area (and promote your favorite event for free)
* Browse using our iPhone app (Coming very, very soon)
* Generate sales and leads for your business
* Make valuable connections – professional and personal
* And more!

The program ends this week with Social Trend by HAF from Music Alley.

Thanks to our ZimmCast sponsors, Novus International, and Leica Geosytems for their support.

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

Agribusiness, Audio, Internet, Social Networking, ZimmCast

Zimfo Bytes

Melissa Sandfort

    Zimfo Bytes

  • Syngenta and Bayer CropScience have entered into a long-term business agreement relating to a key plant biotechnology trait. Under the agreement, Syngenta has granted Bayer CropScience a worldwide, non-exclusive license for use of VIPCOT insect control technology in cotton.
  • Kansas Bioscience Authority (KBA) invites you to their July 26 community stakeholder event in Overland Park, Kan. Following the luncheon, KBA also will hold a special briefing regarding a new KBA partnership that will be announced that day with the USDA.
  • Farm Journal Media announces the addition of Lesly Weber to the Project Development Team as Director of Government Relations.
  • In light of rapid expansion of glyphosate-resistant weeds, an initiative, called Respect the Rotation, is being facilitated by Bayer CropScience and is intended to spur grower adoption of the key elements of Integrated Weed Management.
    Zimfo Bytes

    International Conference on Precision Ag Underway in Denver

    John Davis

    The 10th International Conference on Precision Agriculture (ICPA) has kicked off at the Hyatt Regency Tech Center in Denver and runs through Wednesday, July 21, 2010.

    Throughout the day, hundreds of research scientists, producers, technology company representatives, equipment manufacturers, input dealers, agronomic consultants, software developers, educators, government personnel and policymakers have been pouring into the Mile High City from 40 different countries to look back on the past 20 years of precision ag innovations and to work together on the future of maximizing the potential of the world’s farmlands.

    At the opening reception tonight, I caught up with Dr. Raj Khosla, the chairperson of the 10th ICPA and a professor at Colorado State University. He told me with 300-500 participants from such a wide variety of places around the world, he expects a large part of the conversation will be on the hot topic of food security.

    “Precision agriculture has been mentioned as one of the solutions in meeting food security. Populations are increasing. People’s eating habits are changing.” And to meet those increasing demands, Khosla says they have to figure out how to translate some of the precision ag techniques used in the U.S. and apply them to lesser-developed countries. He says meeting the food demands of these growing countries could literally transform those societies.

    “When you’re tummy is hungry is hard to listen to anything else other than feeding itself. There’s an opportunity for precision ag to contribute to lesser developed countries, smaller field sizes by coupling the technology and the [large labor markets].” He says it is just as important to use the same amount of labor to grow the larger quantities of food so precision agriculture doesn’t end up putting those workers out of jobs.

    Khosla says precision agriculture is putting the right inputs in the right place, at the right time, and in the right manner. It’s a great conversation, and you can download or listen to Khosla’s interview at ICPA here: Dr. Raj Khosla

    And check out the ICPA Photo Album

    Coverage of the 10th International Conference on Precision Agriculture brought to you on Agwired by leica When it has to be RIGHT!

    Audio, Leica Geosystems, Precision Agriculture

    Having Great Time In Nanjing

    Chuck Zimmerman

    Zachary Larson, Borlaug Summer Intern, is on location at Nanjing Agricultural University and providing us with updates this summer of his trip. Here’s his latest. You can also find a photo album he’s got started here: Borlaug Summer Intern Photo Album. The internship is being sponsored by the Iowa State University Plant Sciences Institute.

    I would have to say that the last week has been one of the best I have had here in China, and it has made me fall in love with Nanjing, doing lab work, and the inevitable heartbreak that will come when I will have to leave Nanjing in just a week.

    Beyond an ordinary week, I have had the chance to meet my best friend , see the craziness of the Nanjing train station, and get a better handle on my lab work as I finally get past some of the initial errors.

    As far as my recent lab work, I have been doing rather well. While I am still very inexperienced, I have finally gotten a handle on solely running PCR, gel, and DNA extraction experiments without too much contamination or lab error. To be honest, I know that my lab work has offered no useful data to Wang Jia, the student I have been working with. But, I realize the most important thing that I can take away from my experiences and apply to other labs is that scientific research is pretty much worthless without knowing how to do the basics of the experiment and repeat the experiment without a large margin of error or difference.Read More

    Education, International, University

    Touring Conservation In Action

    Chuck Zimmerman

    I am going to find out how agriculture protects water quality and improves
    soil health at this year’s Conservation Technology Information Center, Conservation In Action Tour. The tour will take place in the Virginia/Maryland area and looks like it is at capacity. Yesterday was the last day to get registered but you can probably still get in if you call today.

    I just spoke with CTIC Executive Director, Karen Scanlon, who says this has become the organization’s marquee event. We’re going to “visit farms and farmers in east central Virginia who run profitable operations and provide communities with valuable ecosystem services.” That sounds like fun to me. I’ll be getting to know CTIC and its members and thought a great way to start was a conversation with Karen about their mission and what we’ll be doing on the tour.

    Karen Scanlon Interview
    The Conservation Technology Information Center (CTIC) is a national, public-private partnership that envisions agriculture using environmentally beneficial and economically viable natural resource systems.

    CTIC, a nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization, is comprised of members of ag industry, ag publications, ag associations, conservation organizations and producers and is supported by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Natural Resources Conservation Service and other public entities.

    It is our mission to champion, promote and provide information about comprehensive conservation and sustainable agricultural systems that are beneficial for soil, water, air and wildlife resources and are productive and profitable for agriculture.

    My coverage of the tour is being sponsored by CTIC and AGROTAIN. Thank you!

    Ag Groups, Conservation, CTIC, Sustainability

    Ag Leader Technology Mission Precision 3

    Chuck Zimmerman

    We’re getting closer to the Ag Media Summit and the invites are coming in fast and furious. My favorite so far has to be from Ag Leader Technology (sponsor of Precision Pays).

    Mission Precision II Recruits,

    Ag Media Summit is fast approaching and Ag Leader is asking you to complete yet another mission. Visit the following link for your top secret video message and rendezvous information.

    This mission is critical to readers – we need you!

    http://www.agleader.com/flash/mission.html

    Ag Leader Technology
    Mission Precision Headquarters

    I was a Mission Precision II Recruit btw.

    Ag Leader, Ag Media Summit, Agribusiness

    Zimfo Bytes

    Melissa Sandfort

      Zimfo Bytes

    • Ag Leader Technology, Inc., released SmartPath – a new “drive and guide” guidance pattern. This pattern is available with any of Ag Leader’s manual guidance, assisted steering or automated steering products.
    • Big Iron’s unreserved online auction on June 23rd hosted bidders from 31 different states and 4 different countries. In the three days prior to the auction closing, the website had 440,868 views. Auctions are held on the second and fourth Wednesday of every month.
    • The National Cattlemen’s Beef Association has launched its first ever blog, Beltway Beef.
    • The AGCO Cash program, is available again in its “Field Rewards” campaign. By purchasing a minimum of $250 in qualifying parts, growers will receive AGCO Cash redeemable at participating AGCO Parts dealers between July 12 and Aug. 27, 2010.
    Zimfo Bytes

    NAFB Member Lyle Romine Passes Away

    Cindy Zimmerman

    Some sad news to pass along from the National Association of Farm Broadcasting.

    lyle romineLong-time Farm Broadcaster Lyle Romine of Fargo died this morning of cancer. He was 59 years old.

    Lyle was Farm Director of the Fargo based American Ag Network, a regional network serving forty radio stations in North Dakota South Dakota and Montana.

    Lyle was born and raised in Devils Lake, North Dakota. He is survived by his wife Terrie of Fargo, and a son and daughter-in-law, of Bozeman, Montana. A private memorial will be held at a later date.

    Lyle was a member of NAFB for 29 years and he will be fondly remembered by hundreds of NAFB friends around the country.

    NAFB

    SMS Text Messaging Growing According To Commodity Update Survey

    Chuck Zimmerman

    Commodity UpdateThe folks at Commodity Update have found that SMS text messaging has really gained ground among farmers and agribusiness. To prove it they had Millennium Research conduct a survey of farmers and found some very interesting information. I think this information should help agrimarketers feel comfortable about investing more in mobile, personal and direct forms of communication with members and customers!

    “Mobile is the fastest-growing segment of the marketing mix, and now agricultural companies are leveraging this direct channel to build relationships with top customers,” says Joel Jaeger, president and founder of CommodityUPDATE, the leading provider of agricultural information to mobile phones.

    Jaeger and his two brothers created the concept that became CommodityUPDATE in 2006 to gain access to market information in the field. The brothers, who run farming operations in Colorado and Belize, soon realized a need for the offering beyond their own operations. They began cultivating a new mobile communications channel that would engage farmers like no other. Today, producers receive CommodityUPDATE primarily through sponsored subscriptions. Companies leverage the channel to send supplemental messages, such as agronomic alerts, to growers.

    Growers place unparalleled value on those CommodityUPDATE messages, according to survey data recently compiled by Millennium Research, Inc. in Minneapolis:
    • 91 percent of farmers indicated the information they receive is important or very important; roughly the same suggested they would recommend the service to another farmer
    • 80 percent correctly recalled the company that sponsors the CommodityUPDATE subscription, on an unaided basis
    • 65 percent felt “more connected” to the sponsoring company     Read More

    Uncategorized

    E-85 Fuelfinder App From Renewable Fuels Association

    Chuck Zimmerman

    The Renewable Fuels Association just announced a new iPhone app – E-85 Fuelfinder (opens iTunes) to help flex-fuel drivers access the latest, most accurately geo-coded E85 stations throughout the United States. Can you say, E85 fuel? There’s an app for that! Hurry to get yours since it won’t be free for long.

    This application will also work on the iTouch and iPad. The RFA will sponsor a free download for the first 500 users.

    The E85 FuelFinder allows iPhone and iPad users all over the country to map out E85 (85% ethanol, 15% gasoline) stations most accessible to them, no matter their current location or destination. With the database embedded in the iPhone itself, this application is useful, even if the user is in a no-service zone. In addition, users have the ability to add a station as a “favorite” for quick and easy accessibility, view or update the price per gallon of E85 fuel at specific locations, access driving directions through Google maps, and directly contact a specific station via telephone. The cost of the application is $1.99, which you can download here, and is also available on the App Store. Read More

    Ag Groups, Ethanol, RFA, Technology