United Soybean Board Supporting Animal Agriculture

Chuck Zimmerman

Rick StearnRick Stearn is chairman of the production committee for the United Soybean Board. He was attending the NAFB Washington Watch Issues Forum.

The United Soybean Board was a major sponsor and had people on hand like Rick to address issues like animal agriculture and the impact of animal rights groups. The reason for this Rick says is because domestic animal production agriculture is the number one customer for domestically produced soybean meal (over 96%). He agrees that if animal rights groups who want to end animal agriculture are successful it will change the whole industry since many elements are very interdependent.

Some other issues important to USB from a production standpoint include soybean rust, soybean quality and soybean yield.

You can listen to my interview with Rick here: ww-09-usb.mp3

NAFB Washington Watch 2009 Photo Album

Ag Groups, Animal Health, Audio, Soybean, USB

Help Peanut Producers and Stamp Out Hunger

Chuck Zimmerman

Stamp Out HungerYou can help stamp out hunger while helping America’s peanut producers.

The Georgia Peanut Commission urges consumers to support the peanut industry by donating jars of peanut butter for the U.S. Postal Service Stamp out Hunger day on Saturday, May 9. This event is the nation’s largest annual single-day food drive.

On Saturday, letter carriers in more than 10,000 communities will collect food items and deliver them to local food banks to help some of the millions of Americans, including an estimated 13 million children, who face hunger every day. To find out whether your letter carrier is participating, search the USPS website at www.usps.com for the contact information for your local post office.

Peanut butter is an excellent source of plant protein. With about 8 grams per 2 Tbsp. of peanut butter, a small serving can make a significant contribution to daily protein intake. Peanut butter has an excellent balance of fats. High in mono- and polyunsaturated fats, consumption of peanut butter can contribute to improving cholesterol levels and reducing the risk of disease.

Ag Groups

Monsanto Planting Updates

Chuck Zimmerman

Monsanto keeps moving forward into the online conversation with regular Planting Updates. Do you think these are that much different than the news you get from the “regular media.” Tyne Morgan is the Monsanto “reporter” out in the field. In this episode you not only get a planting update you also hear what farmers think the general public thinks of them. The production quality is good and the content is interesting.

Other places you’ll find Monsanto include:

Monsanto Twitter
Monsanto’s Sustainabile Agriculture Initiative
Monsanto Today
Monsanto’s Blog

Obviously Monsanto is not relying on their main website to be the only destination for their customers. They’re reaching out beyond the confines of a web destination to engage them and interact with them. If you doubt that’s happening then you should start following them on Twitter. Is it easy for Monsanto to quantify the exact ROI on this? I doubt it. Does that mean they shouldn’t do it? No.

Agribusiness, Social Networking

Do You Still Think Your Website Is A Destination?

Chuck Zimmerman

Several times in the last couple years I’ve tried to point agrimarketers to the concept of “community” in online communications/marketing. By that I mean the fact that employing today’s new and social media tools allows us to connect and interact with our customers and members in ways we never could before. Using AgWired as an example, I don’t just reach readers who think, “I’ll visit AgWired.com to see what’s new.” I reach them in Facebook, Twitter, FriendFeed, Flickr, YouTube, LinkedIn, email and in all the ways those people re-post or pass along or tell their connections. So for you marketers who just look at website visitors, you’re missing a lot of the story.

I still find so many in corporate communications who can’t wrap their mind around this concept. Granted there are a lot of control freaks out there who fear loss of the control they’ve enjoyed for so many years. It’s a mentality that says “I’ll build what I want them to see and give them the choices I want them to make.” But those days are coming to an end.

Today’s consumer (any kind, farmers included) not only want and demand freedom of choice but they’re just creating their own destinations and touch points. They’re leaving the old destination websites behind. I was prompted to write this after reading Steve Rubel’s post on Micropersuasion, “The End of the Destination Web Era.”

After years of erosion it now it appears the destination web era is drawing to a close. This a trend that digital thinkers like Om Malik have long noted. In fact, the numbers prove it.

In March the average American visited a mere 111 domains and 2,500 web pages, according to Nielsen Online. What’s worse, our attention across these pages is highly fragmented. The average time spent per page is a mere 56 seconds. Portals and search engines dominate, capturing approximately 12 of the 75 hours spent online in March. However, people-powered sites like Wikipedia, Facebook and YouTube are not far behind, snagging nearly 4.5 hours of our monthly attention.

He points to an article by ARAnet in conjunction with Opinion Research Corporation that talks about what you can do to break through the clutter. The answer doesn’t include fancy pop up ads.

Long-shunned pop-up ads remained the least favorable option for every audience segment, regardless of age, race, income, sex, region or size of household: 87% of respondents said they were not very likely or not at all likely to read and respond to them.

Their conclusion is that brand mentions in articles is one of the best ways to reach consumers. I would call that “meaningful content” that is posted into social networking locations and on highly search engine optimized websites (blogs). That’s why public relations folks are trying to figure out ways to present information to bloggers now. We’re not your ordinary msm journalists!

Do you get it? Are you willing to venture out into the online conversation or are you going to stay inside your “safe” online house and hope someone comes to visit?

Social Networking

Pork On A Fork

Chuck Zimmerman

Pork On A ForkAs of right now, the terms “Swine flu” and “#swineflu” are trending at positions 2 and 6 on Twitter. The term “H1N1” is trending in the 10th spot. I think that shows that as much as we’d like to think that everyone, media included, would call this what it is, it’s not happening. This thing blew up way too fast and is now branded in the public psyche. It has meant serious problems for hog producers. However, we shouldn’t give up and in fact, we’ve got an opportunity to do something about it by taking advantage of our new media tools to “get our message out.” How you might ask? Well, get busy and tweet, post on your blog or website and join in this online conversation and make a difference. Here’s an example of how Trent Loos, Faces of Agriculture, is doing it. He’s launching the “Pork On A Fork” campaign to immediately increase demand for pork and I support it and hope you will to. Pass it along.

Here is my plan. I believe we truly need to connect the dots not only for our overzealous lawmakers but for media and consumers globally. You know it has been said that the best way to anybody’s heart is through their stomach. I am launching a campaign and encouraging all people who eat food to enter the Faces Of Agriculture-sponsored event called “Pork on a Fork.”

I’d like you to send photos of family members, friends, customers, anyone, anywhere eating pork. On May 26, the photos will be judged and the winner announced. The winner will receive an all expense paid trip for two to the World Pork Expo in Des Moines, Iowa, June 3-5. I will personally see to it that the winners are given the Royal VIP treatment and access to anything and everything pork-related during the event. All entries will be available for viewing during the entire World Pork Expo plus on all social networking sites. In fact, the winner could be recorded and become a YouTube Pork connoisseur for all the world to see.

Click here (pdf) to find out how you can participate

You can listen to Trent talk about it here: pork-on-a-fork.mp3

The photo above is Trent’s girls Libbi and Lindsi eating a bone-in ham.

Pork

Zimfo Bytes

Melissa Sandfort

    Zimfo Bytes

  • John Deere Ag Management Solutions and Raven Industries, Inc. announced an agreement to supply customers with a broad suite of application control solutions in the precision agricultural market.
  • Monsanto has signed a new three year trademark licensing agreement with Chapin International. Chapin will provide new sprayer technology for use with agricultural herbicide products including Roundup PROMAX and QuikPRO.
  • Pfizer Animal Genetics has successfully completed the move of its DNA-testing facilities, Customer Service and administration from Harahan, La., to new, custom-built facilities in Kalamazoo, Mich., the headquarters of Pfizer Animal Health’s Veterinary Medical Research and Development.
    Zimfo Bytes

    #AgChat Session

    Chuck Zimmerman

    #AgChatWe just concluded another great #AgChat session via Twitter. Here’s the questions posed.

    Q1: What are differences between the 2 main types of ag production – local & nat./int?. Advantages & disadvantages?
    Q2: Family farmers vs. ind. ag, how can you distinguish between 2 approaches (family vs. big) & validate need for both?
    Q3: How can we share positive msg about all ag practices, incl organic, even as some claim one is better than another?
    Q4: NYC held a food conf. Disagreements aside, they’re interestd in farming. How do we engage & find common ground?
    Q5: What other groups can we collaborate with outside of agriculture strengthen our voice & overcome adversaries messages?

    We had a very lively discussion. You can read back through it via Twitter Search. The picture is from Twitterfall which I really like to follow a fast paced discussion like this.

    I want to thank Michele Payn-Knoper for once again being the “chat herder” for #AgChat. You can follow her on Twitter at @mpaynknoper.

    A couple of things stood out to me during the discussion. We don’t have common definitions for terms like sustainable, organic, industrial farm, family farm, etc. It’s really hard to communicate with people who define these terms in completely different ways.

    We had a few non-farmer types join us which was very refreshing. One in particular was very open to discussion and explaining a different point of view. Another was there just to spam us and threaten. I think it shows that we are having an impact. As was pointed out, all of our websites (blogs included) and social media efforts are reaching a lot more people than just farmers. So we are getting our message out and not depending on the mainstream media to do it for us. I think we’re making an impact.

    If you participated or have read back through the discussion what do you think? Also feel free to check out #AgChat on Facebook.

    Uncategorized

    Find IFAJ On Twitter

    Chuck Zimmerman

    IFAJ On TwitterHave you made your reservation for the IFAJ Congress/Ag Media Summit yet? We’ve got ours in.

    To help you keep up with what’s going on at this year’s IFAJ Congress a new Twitter account has been set up: @IFAJ.

    The beautiful background is the U.S. delegation to last year’s IFAJ Congress.

    For you Twitter experts, please remember to use the #IFAJ hashtag in your posts on Twitter. That will make it easy for all of us to follow along with all that’s being said about IFAJ in the Twitterverse.

    IFAJ

    Farm Foundation Animal Welfare Forum Wrapping Up

    Chuck Zimmerman

    Farm Foundation ForumI take it from Mace Thornton’s (@AFBFMace) latest photo that we’re now into the question and answer portion of today’s Farm Foundation Forum on animal welfare. Here’s some of his tweets since my last post including concluding thoughts. I love his “funny moment” post:

    Bob Krause of MW Poultry Svcs of Indiana. 10 largest egg farm comp. In country @ FF forum on farm animal care. Up now.

    Ind. Eggman Krause @ FF forum on farm animls: confnmnt allows control disease, parasites, preds, other challenges 4 poultry, egg producers.

    Krause @ FF forum on farm anml care: is wlfare of hens better in confinement or cagefree. Egg ind. study says cage enviro better overall.

    Funny moment @ FF forum.

    HSUS Shapiro: Guess I would be one of the extremists.
    Moderator Charlie Stenholm: I think you would qualify.

    My Btm line on FFforum. If proftbl humane market is there, farmers will rspnd. ? is do animal rights groups want any market? Probably not.

    Calif. Farm Bureau VP Kenny Watkins challenges HSUS Shapiro to help devlp mkts for kind of production they are forcing. Markets not there.

    Post Update: Here’s a link to the recorded audio (mp3) of the Farm Foundation Forum. You can also listen here: 363-20090505_pv_farm_foundation_forum.mp3

    Ag Groups, Farm Foundation

    Now Hearing From American Humane Association

    Chuck Zimmerman

    Farm Foundation ForumThis time we’ve got Tim Amlaw, Director of the Farm Animal Program of the American Humane Association on the podium at the Farm Foundation Forum on animal welfare.

    Here’s what our man on the scene, Mace Thornton, (@AFBFMace) is saying about his presentation:

    Tim Amlaw of American Humane @ FF forum on farm animals: AH been around since 1877. In Ag AH believes in on-ground, science based approach.

    Tim Amlaw of AH @ FF forum on frm anim care: AH certified program relies on science to bebefit farmer and consumer.

    Amlaw of AH @ FF forum on frm anim care: AH cert progrm. Trained auditors. “True humane tracking” Engagemnt among sectors, farm to consumrs.

    Amlaw of AH @ FF forum on farm anim: video monitoring an application for farmers to see solution to challenge…immed corrective action.

    Amlaw: consumers demanding humane choices and producers are adapting.

    I’m posting these as quick as I can amid other work going on. If you were following along on Twitter would you agree that it’s “almost like being there?”

    Ag Groups, Farm Foundation