AgWired

The Country Living Association is now sending out a “Tip of the Week.” The latest one features these little guys and talks about pet care in warm weather. Members also get a free sample of a product to help with the problem of “hot spots.”

It’s just part of how they’re “Making the good life better.”

Paul Schrimpf, PrecisionAg Institute, has an interesting article in his latest PrecisionAg e-news on texting. He writes about an announcement from Jacquie Ream, former teacher and author, on her opinion about kids communicating today:

“We have a whole generation being raised without communication skills,” says Jacquie Ream, former teacher and author of “K.I.S.S. Keep It Short and Simple” (Book Publishers Network). She contends text messaging and the internet are destroying the way our kids read, think, and write.

Say with me, “She sure doesn’t get it.” Kids today are communicating more than ever and texting is just part of it. Maybe she thinks we should get rid of the internet, mobile phones, computers and just get ourselves a bottle of ink and a quill. In fact, if you go to her book promotion site that’s just what you see in the boring introductory flash video (why do people do that?). Interesting ideas from someone who has a book with a title about the KISS principle. I agree with what Paul says in his article.

As for me, I see it as a tool to supplement communication, not one that replaces it. Used to be that we would connect with our friends two ways … call on the phone or show up on the doorstep. My high school daughter can, and does, connect with friends in a half dozen ways I am aware of, and probably more I’m not. Why? Because they can.

If you’re ready to retire then maybe you want ag communications to stay the way it has always been. However, the way we communicate is changing and texting is just a part of how farmers are getting information now. Check out Commodity Update and AgWired Mobile if you want to get on the bandwagon and be on the leading edge.

Just text “agwired” to 46786

Do it and join the dozens of people who are already subscribed to get agricultural marketing news in the fastest and easiest form available. Once you subscribe then we’ll deliver the news to you in headline form so all you have to do is look at your phone. It just doesn’t get any easier than that.

Will we break your text limits? I don’t think so. Since we started the new service last week we haven’t been sending more than about 4 headlines in a day. It could be more, it could be less. It depends on what we find that we think you want and need to know.

The feedback has been great so far. For example, one subscriber told me that he had just left a client meeting and got an AgWired Mobile message with new information about that very same client. He found that helpful. Another subscriber told me that a headline story we sent was going to be helpful to him when he met with a client the next morning. In either case, they don’t believe they would have received that information any other way. Although almost everything pushed through AgWired Mobile will appear on Agwired too and in longer form.

Here’s a couple of examples of some AgWired Mobile feeds from this week:

Penton Media launches targeted online career center: AgriBizJobs.com. Offers services to employers and jobseekers. www.agribizjobs.com

Craig Louder, Utah State University, wins the Alltech Young Scientist Award presented at the Alltech Symposium.

Argonne National Laboratory releases new report on increased efficiency of ethanol plants. Report available at www.ethanolfra.org.

So don’t delay. Subscribe today and if you like it we would sure appreciate you telling your friends and colleagues about it too.

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If you ever want to unsubscribe (why would you?) then just text “agwired stop” to the same number.

Only one food and beverage exhibitor received an invitation to the 2008 USDA BioPreferred Showcase Conference. Naturally Iowa was one of twenty companies overall to attend the conference meant to give the federal government ideas on how to choose environmentally-friendly products.

The invitation to participate in the conference was only extended to companies that can help the USDA “meet the challenge that Congress has set for us — to increase government procurement and use of biobased products” (source: U.S. Department of Agriculture). Naturally Iowa is currently the only dairy in the world that produces Ingeo? bottles, which are made from plants, not oil.

“Naturally Iowa was very well received at the 2008 USDA BioPreferred(SM) Showcase Conference,” said Richard Jensen, Plant Operations Manager for Naturally Iowa. “We believe that this conference gave the company tremendous exposure as the only dairy company in the world producing biobased Ingeo? containers.” “This conference was an outstanding forum for networking with officials from the GSA and procurement officers,” said William Horner, President and CEO of Naturally Iowa, Inc., “and it gave us a roadmap for taking advantage of the BioPreferred program as we move forward with our plans to aggressively market to the Federal Government.”

Maybe I should start a “Blog of the Week” post or something. It’s getting hard to keep up with all of them but I’ll do my best to point you to them, especially good ones like this one newly created by Michele Payn-Knoper.

She’s a professional speaker and agrifood consultant who has started a new blog “to help build connection between farm gate and consumer plate.”

Michele Payn-Knoper is the author of the Cause Matters blog. “The faces behind the food plate have inspired me to find a better way to share material related to telling agriculture’s story,” she says.

Her latest post is entitled “The First Environmentalist: A Farmer.” Great to read and share during this Earth Day week.

It looks like companies and job seekers have a new resource in the agricultural industry with this announcement from Penton Media.

Penton Media’s Agriculture Group today announced the launch of its new targeted online career center, AgriBizJobs.com at www.agribizjobs.com. The site offers industry employers a growing, qualified audience of agriculture professionals, while providing industry jobseekers with agribusiness-specific, categorized job listings. AgriBizJobs is a joint effort of Penton’s leading agricultural brands including BEEF®, Corn and Soybean Digest™, Farm Industry News®, Farm Press®, Hay and Forage Grower® and National Hog Farmer® and will be promoted across all of these branded print and online outlets.

Employers can view complete but anonymous resumes for free, and pay only to connect with a jobseeker. Jobseekers can post resumes in agriculture-specific employment categories and sign up to receive e-mail alerts when new positions are posted that match their search criteria. The site’s Anonymous Resume Bank enables both active and passive jobseekers to list their experience and qualifications in a protected environment, allowing them to stay connected to the employment market while maintaining full control of their confidential information.