ARA Member Programs Help Grow Leaders

Cindy Zimmerman

The Agricultural Retailers Association (ARA) recognized its Rising Stars Class of 2020 in a video shown from the main stage during the closing session of the ARA Conference & Expo, held virtually on Dec. 1-2.

Despite the transition to a virtual ARA Conference due to the COVID-19 pandemic, ARA Rising Stars were still able to attend educational sessions and expand their network among the agricultural retail industry’s top influencers and decision makers.

The purpose of the Rising Stars program, sponsored by Atticus, is to develop and hone their leadership skills while providing a platform for ARA and its member companies to reward top performers for going above and beyond. When employees are challenged, engaged in their own professional development, and get recognized for their hard work, they are more likely to continue advancing their career with the company already investing in their future.

Rising Stars is just one of many professional improvement programs offered by ARA. Donnie Taylor, Vice President of Membership & Corporate Relations, is excited about a couple of new programs introduced this year, ARA NAVIGATOR 360° and the ARA Fleet Optimization Program with FARMOBILE. Learn more about the professional programs offered by ARA in this interview.

Interview with Donnie Taylor, ARA (10:34)

If you missed the virtual 2020 ARA Conference & Expo, you can still register to enjoy all of the great content. Interviews and other news from the convention can be found in the AgNewsWire virtual newsroom.

Watch the video of this year’s class of Rising Stars.


ag retailers, ARA, Audio, Video

Industry Ag News 12/11

Carrie Muehling

  • AMVAC® Chemical Corporation, an American Vanguard® company, has named Archer Malmo the company’s integrated agency of record to support its SIMPAS-applied Solutions™ product portfolio.
  • Miami International Securities Exchange, LLC (MIAX®) and the Minneapolis Grain Exchange (MGEX) announce the planned December 14 relaunch of futures on the SPIKES® Index on MGEX via the CME Globex® platform. Miami International Holdings, Inc. (MIH), the parent holding company of the MIAX Exchange Group™, and MGEX announced the completion of MIH’s previously announced acquisition of MGEX for a combination of cash and MIH common stock. MGEX will continue as a wholly owned subsidiary of MIH.
  • Cultiva LLC, a provider of proprietary, food-grade biofilms used in agricultural markets, announces the appointment of Christina Coen, vice president and general manager of Nalco Water, an Ecolab company; to the company’s Board of Directors.
  • At GROWMARK, Inc’s 2020 Annual Meeting, the Board of Directors said goodbye to David Watt, who is retiring from the board. Watt of Murrayville, Illinois has served on the GROWMARK Board since 2002. He and his family raise operate a grain farm. Watt is a former director of the Prairieland FS Board, and past president of its predecessor company, Lincoln Land FS.
  • The Southeast Regional Fruit and Vegetable Conference announce the full 2021 Virtual Schedule including over 85 hours of educational programs across 15 different specialty crop commodity conferences. This year, SE Regional is offering allied industry partners 15 percent off an All Access Registration price. Use promo code, SEFRIENDS21, and register and save. All educational content and trade show exhibits will be available for on-demand viewing to registered attendees after the conference until April 30, 2021.
  • In preparation for National Ag Day 2021 on March 23, the Agriculture Council of America (ACA) is hosting an essay contest. The theme for this year is Food Brings Everyone to the Table. This essay contest is divided into two categories of competition: written essay and video essay. Both are national competitions. Both winners will receive $1,000. The contest is open to students currently enrolled in grades 9 through 12. Contestants must be a U.S. citizen and attending school in the U.S. Contestants must meet all requirements to compete. The deadline for submitting entries in the essay contest is January 31, 2021. The complete list of rules and regulations for this contest may be found online: https://www.agday.org/essay-contest.
  • Leading global apparel retailer Gap Inc. has joined the U.S. Cotton Trust Protocol as part of its integrated sustainability strategy and to help it achieve its commitment to use only 100% sustainably-sourced cotton by 2025. Gap Inc.’s target of sourcing 100% of its cotton from more sustainable sources by 2025 is set across its collection of purpose-led lifestyle brands including Old Navy, Gap, Banana Republic and Athleta.
Zimfo Bytes

#ASTACSS Content Lives On

Cindy Zimmerman

The American Seed Trade Association CSS & Seed Expo is a wrap, but the content lives on and will lead into the next ASTA conference, the virtual Vegetable and Flower Seed Conference in February.

ASTA President and CEO Andy LaVigne says they had nearly 1000 attendees at the virtual CSS & Seed Expo. “The great thing about virtual is you can continue the life of this event,” said LaVigne. “And you reach a lot more people. We had people from South America, Europe, even Asia, participating in our event this week.”

The event included the annual outlook from ag economist Dan Basse, as well as interesting sessions with the major players in the seed industry, sustainability, premium markets, genome editing, corn research, and much more. All content remains available for attendees and the platform will even be open for appointment setting through December 18.

You can find interviews and other content from the event in the 2020 ASTA CSS & Seed Expo Virtual Newsroom.

In this interview, LaVigne sums up the annual event and talks about how it will tie into future events. He also comments on the nomination of former Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack to serve in the same role under the Biden Administration.

ASTA Wrap up with Andy LaVigne, President and CEO (12:20)

ASTA, Audio, Seed

Tom Vilsack Officially Nominated for Ag Secretary

Cindy Zimmerman

Tom Vilsack last press conference at NAFB 2016

Tom Vilsack has officially been nominated to serve as Secretary of Agriculture in the Biden Administration, reprising the role he held under President Obama for eight years.

Vilsack was the only cabinet member to serve all eight years under Obama, and the longest serving Secretary of Agriculture in modern times (James Wilson served for 16 years under three presidents 1897-1913).

During his term, Vilsack frequently attended the major agricultural events and commodity organization meetings. He visited with the National Association of Farm Broadcasting at Washington Watch and almost every year at the NAFB convention. He has still remained in the industry since leaving USDA, being named president and CEO of the U.S. Dairy Export Council in 2017.

Most major farm and biofuel organizations have already reacted favorably to Vilsack’s nomination.

USDA

Sen. Pat Roberts Bids Farewell

Cindy Zimmerman

Sen. Pat Roberts, the Republican from Kansas who has served as a leader in both the House and Senate Agriculture Committees over his four decade career in Congress, said goodbye to his Senate colleagues Thursday in a farewell floor speech.

The outspoken senator who helped to write the past eight farm bills spoke about his background, how he went from journalist to politician, the importance of agriculture, the turbulence of the ’60s, and working together for the good of the country. “Let us once again become a body of respect, humility, cooperation, achievement, and yes, friendship. That can and should be our new normal,” said Roberts. “The entire country could use a little bit of what we say in Kansas – to the stars through difficulty.”

Listen to his farewell here:
Sen. Pat Roberts farewell floor speech 24:11

Audio, Farm Bill, politics

Genome Editing Panel at #ASTACSS

Cindy Zimmerman

Gene editing is still a relatively new technology but the promise that it holds for future food production continues to grow.

It was only four years ago that the American Seed Trade Association (ASTA) featured gene editing at the annual CSS and Seed Expo and held a press conference to introduce the technology to media. This year, ASTA CSS offered a session with today’s leading edge companies to talk about current and future directions of genome editing.

The panel, moderated by David Bubeck with Corteva Agriscience, featured Mark Cigan, GENUS; James Radtke, Cibus US; and Nicholas Bate, Pairwise Plants. In this interview, Bate discusses consumer acceptance of gene editing and how Pairwise has been working with Bayer on new traits for corn, soybeans, wheat, canola and cotton.

ASTA Interview with Nicholas Bate, Pairwise (5:16)

Find more content from ASTA CSS here:
2020 ASTA CSS & Seed Expo Virtual Newsroom

ASTA, Audio, Plant Breeding, Seed

#ASTACSS Sustainability Panel Features Familiar Iowa Farmer

Cindy Zimmerman

Sustainability is real for Iowa farmer and former National Corn Growers Association president Pam Johnson, a sixth-generation farmer who works with her husband, their two sons and their young families to produce corn and soybeans.

“We can see with our own eyes how things have improved and that we’re able to do a better job year after year,” she says. “And to me that continued improvement is what sustainability is all about.”

Johnson was on the panel of a Corteva Agriscience seminar at the ASTA CSS & Seed Expo this week entitled “Sustainability, Transparency and Collaboration – Action Beyond the Buzz Words,” along with Steven James of PepsiCo and ASTA chair John Latham, Latham Hi-Tech Seeds. She currently serves as a director of MAIZALL, an international maize alliance of the corn grower associations.

In this interview, we discuss MAIZALL, sustainable practices on her farm, and working with other industries on sustainability. She also comments on a new presidential administration, the state of the ethanol industry, and cautious optimism for 2021.

ASTA Interview with Pam Johnson, Iowa farmer (17:12)

Find more content from ASTA CSS here:
2020 ASTA CSS & Seed Expo Virtual Newsroom

ASTA, Audio, Corn, Sustainability

Precision Ag News 12/9

Carrie Muehling

  • Increased corn rootworm (CRW) pressure is projected to persist in corn crops throughout the Central and Northwest Midwest in 2021. But according to Wyffels Hybrids®, growers can take steps to predict the risk of significant rootworm feeding and protect their crops. The best way to predict rootworm risk the following year is to monitor corn rootworm beetle activity during the growing season, reports Wyffels’ Mitch Heisler, Product Marketing Manager, and Dr. Brent Tharp, Technical Product Manager. AMVAC® offers growers plenty of choices for corn rootworm protection to accommodate a variety of equipment and agronomic needs next year.
  • Late Friday, December 4, Kinze and Ag Leader were notified that John Deere filed a lawsuit alleging patent infringement related to True Speed/SureSpeed technology. Kinze and Ag Leader deny all allegations of infringement. This legal action has absolutely no effect on the availability of current Kinze and Ag Leader products.
  • House Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin Peterson of Minnesota announced the introduction of H.R. 8843, which makes an additional 25 million acres available over the next five years for general signup under the Conservation Reserve Program. Instead of a cap, the bill establishes a minimum floor of 50 million CRP acres nationwide.
  • GROWMARK recently expanded its partnership with Solinftec to change the way they do business on a broad scale. Solinftec is a Brazilian company with 13 years’ experience developing digital ag solutions for the largest agricultural operations in the world on more than 22 million acres of row crops, sugarcane, coffee and citrus.
  • Advanced Biological Marketing® announces a new and novel seed treatment for the row crop industry, AmpliMax™. Based on a metabolite from its Trichoderma line of products, AmpliMax is a biorational seed treatment with SabrEx® metabolite, yeast extract and humates providing outstanding and consistent results in the field. The new product has gone through extensive testing over the years and will be available for use on a wide range of plants including, but not limited to, row crops and cereals.
  • Heliae® Agriculture announced the collaboration with WinField® United Canada, an agriculture leader focused on long-term sustainability. This partnership will bring new value to ag retailers through assisting farmers’ transition to regenerative agriculture practices.
  • Wilbur-Ellis Company LLC announced its acquisition of the assets of Probe Schedule, LLC to provide its customers with one of the most technologically innovative irrigation water management systems in the world.
  • BASF is introducing Renestra insecticide for the 2021 growing season. Consisting of both a pyrethroid and the unique Inscalis® insecticide active ingredients, Renestra insecticide provides knockdown and residual control of a broad-spectrum of soybean pests, including resistant and non-resistant aphids, as well as a variety of other feeding insects.
Precision Ag Bytes, Precision Agriculture

ASTA Hires Senate Ag Veteran Janae Brady

Cindy Zimmerman

The American Seed Trade Association (ASTA) this week announced Janae Brady as the organization’s new Senior Director of Government Affairs. Brady served on staff for Chairman Pat Roberts (R-KS) on the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry during his time as both Chairman and Ranking Member and she will now lead ASTA’s federal government affairs efforts on behalf of the association’s more than 700 diverse member companies.

Most recently as Senior Professional Staff, she advised Chairman Roberts on policy issues including international trade, agricultural research, biotechnology, crop protection and agricultural defense. Brady successfully led negotiations on the trade and research titles during Senate and Conference consideration of the 2018 Farm Bill. Additionally, she represented the Chairman during the consultation process for multiple international trade negotiations, including the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement.

Prior to her time with Chairman Roberts, Brady worked on trade and food security policy issues at Gordley Associates, an agriculture policy government relations firm, where she represented organizations such as the American Soybean Association, as well as previously serving as a high school teacher. Brady grew up working on her family’s Kansas wheat and sorghum farm. She holds a Bachelor of Science degree from Kansas State University as well as a master’s degree from the George Washington University.

Brady started with ASTA this week at the same time as the organization’s biggest event, the CSS & Seed Expo, which is being held virtually this year. Get to know her in this interview.
ASTA Interview with Janae Brady, Congressional Affairs (5:49)

Find more content from ASTA CSS here:
2020 ASTA CSS & Seed Expo Virtual Newsroom

ASTA, Audio

Outlook for Beef in Trade Negotiations

Carrie Muehling

U.S. cattle producers are poised to recover from challenges during the global pandemic more quickly than their competitors, said Kent Bacus, National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA) Sr. Director of International Trade and Market Access.

“It’s important that we’re able to deliver the greatest profit margin possible to our producers, and any way that trade policy can help in that process and help us really tap into the 96 percent of consumers that live outside of our borders, then that is the direction that NCBA wants us to pursue, and that’s what we focus on day after day,” said Bacus, whose job is to expand market access for U.S. beef exports and bridge the gap between the government and cattle producers.

Bacus spoke about a number of trade negotiations underway for U.S. beef, in places like the United Kingdom, Japan and China. Emerging markets include the Southeast Asian region, particularly countries like Taiwan, Vietnam and Indonesia. Strong economic growth in those areas brings opportunities for U.S. cattle producers as people look to include higher quality protein into their diets.

2020 NAFB Interview with Kent Bacus, NCBA 11:50

Animal Agriculture, Audio, Beef, NAFB, NCBA, Trade