I thought my 3,000 plus miles in the last 9 days was a lot of travel but our Sec. of Ag Mike Johannes is doing much more. He’s travelling in China and Africa July 9-21 for multilateral and bilateral meetings on agricultural trade and development. Although it doesn’t have frequent postings he is writing a travelogue of sorts. I kind of think a blog would be a better way to do it but then what do I know? Here’s an excerpt from his latest post.
Monday, July 11, 2005 Posted 2:00 AM BEIJING, CHINA
I’ve been to China a number of times over the past several years. Each time I return I see significant changes. First of all, China’s economy is expanding rapidly. The pace of development is tremendous; that’s especially true in the larger cities. This is an economy to be reckoned with. It is certainly not an economy to turn away from — China is simply too good a market for our agriculture products.
It is important that I travel internationally to raise important issues with our international counterparts. One reason I am in Beijing is to work through some issues related to our ability to export beef into the Chinese market. We had a significant breakthrough. The Chinese agreed to send a technical team that will be in the U.S. this October. That is a very positive development. Full post
In this week’s 
Buttles Named Holstein Association 2004 Distinguished Young Holstein Breeders 
Andy and Lyn have both been involved in the dairy industry for many years. Andy graduated from the University of Wisconsin – Madison with a bachelor’s degree in Dairy Science. Lyn grew up on a dairy farm in Pennsylvania and earned her bachelor’s degree in Dairy Science from Penn State and has her master’s degree in Dairy Nutrition from University of Wisconsin – Madison. 
I know I’m not your average consumer and this information is about those folks. I see a package of pork I want and I just grab it! Not too much thinking goes into my decisions.
As if moving a daughter to another state wasn’t enough to deal with we had to drive right into this little storm! The photo is courtesy of 
I know we haven’t posted much the last couple days but it’s move a daughter to college week and we’ve been on the road. But just to show you that work is getting done here’s Cindy editing audio for one of our clients. We’re in Georgia at the moment and spent some time on the phone today interviewing corn growers about rootworm and corn borer problems and protection.
The 25×25 Ag Energy Work Group held a press conference today with former CIA director James Woolsey. It was a discussion on the idea that reducing our dependence on foreign oil is an issue of national security. Here’s what their news release said:
Since I mentioned the Royal in the last post and since it’s a barbeque kind of day then you should know about a new item at the