Zimfo Bytes 4/19

Carrie Muehling April 19, 2019

Wrangler® partnered with cotton growers in five states to create a locally-sourced denim collection that honors land stewardship and champions state pride. The Wrangler Rooted Collection™ is a limited, premium line made from 100 percent sustainable, traceable-to-the-farm cotton. Each piece is grown, milled, cut and sewn in the United States, helping to ensure America’s denim heritage for future generations.
To help residents, farmers, and ranchers affected by the devastation caused by recent flooding, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue has directed the U.S. Department of Agriculture to aid Iowans in their recovery efforts. USDA staff in the regional, state, and county offices are providing a variety of program flexibilities and other assistance to residents, agricultural producers, and impacted communities at large.
UnitedHealthcare brought its 4-H Food Smart Families program to the Florida Capitol Courtyard in Tallahassee on April 5. More than 700 4-H youth from across the state, including 4-H Health Ambassadors, participated in the event by motivating Floridians to adopt healthy lifestyles and become ambassadors for better health in their communities.
The Collaborative for Fresh Produce is a new non-profit organization that is partnering with commercial farmers and food banks to fight hunger by fighting food waste.
AdFarm has been selected as the new North American agency of record for New Holland, a brand of CNH Industrial. AdFarm will serve as the marketing and communications partner for New Holland North America, including their agriculture and construction products.
The American Farm Bureau Federation has promoted Paul Schlegel to vice president, public affairs. Schlegel has been handling interim duties in this role since October, overseeing the Public Policy, Economics, Communications and Advocacy & Political Affairs teams.
The American Farm Bureau Federation is accepting speaker proposals for the 2020 AFBF Annual Convention & Trade Show in Austin, Texas this January, 17-22, 2020. Submit your proposal by Friday, May 24, 2019.
Starting with the May 10 issue, changes will be made to the World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates Report (WASDE). To learn more, please see a detailed list of changes and tables that will be modified.

ZimmCast 614 – Golden ZimmComm Mic Interviews

Chuck Zimmerman April 18, 2019

This week’s program features interviews that Cindy and I did during the 2019 Agri-Marketing Conference in Kansas City. The Golden ZimmComm Microphone got a workout!

At the beginning of this episode you can hear from Sheri Seger, DTN/The Progressive Farmer, outgoing NAMA President and Scott McClure, Brighton, incoming NAMA President. After that I’m sharing all of the other interviews we did in our Connection Point booth, which can also be found on the AgNewsWire page for the Conference.

The interviewees include:
Richard Bettison, Beck Ag
Peggy Findlay, Commodity Classic
Kevin Lind, Cornstalk LLC
Marilyn Cummins, Cummins Consulting
Craig Dick, Cropstream
Sam Romain, Dominate with SEO
Gardner Hatch, Woodruff
Janet Adkison, RFD-TV
Greg Lammert, Rhea and Kaiser
John Rozum, AEM
Sally Behringer, New Leaf Marcom
Tom Slunecka, MN Soybeans

We offered free Golden Mic Interviews to whoever stopped by and had quite a few take us up on the offer. You may know some of them and if not, you’ll get to meet them now. And, yes, we were giving away foam Gold Mics!

The winner of our booth drawing for a flex bluetooth keyboard from Zagg was Hanna Plants, Two Rivers Marketing. The winner in the NAMA Foundation Silent Auction for the Beats Pill+ custom colored by Colorware was Brittany Hanson, Bayer CropScience. We thank her for supporting the Foundation.

I hope you enjoy it and thank you for listening.

Listen to the ZimmCast here: ZimmCast - Golden Mic Interviews From #NAMA19

2019 National Agri-Marketing Conference Photo Album

Audio, Marketing, NAMA, ZimmCast

2019 IFAJ/Alltech Young Leaders Announced

Cindy Zimmerman April 18, 2019

The International Federation of Agricultural Journalists (IFAJ) has announced the recipients of this year’s IFAJ/Alltech Young Leaders in Agricultural Journalism Award. The program honors 10 young agricultural journalists and communicators who have demonstrated outstanding achievement in reporting as well as excellent potential as leaders of the industry in the years to come. The honorees were chosen by an international jury among applicants from many of IFAJ’s 50 member countries.

This year’s IFAJ/Alltech Young Leaders are:

Prince Appiah, Multimedia Group, Ltd., Ghana
Moses Bailey, Radio Gbarnga/The Bush Chicken, Liberia
Kasey Brown, Angus Media, United States of America
Marzell Buffler, Landmedien Deutschland, Germany
Melissa Dahlqvist, Swedish Agro Machinery, Sweden
Seedy Darboe, Network of Ag Communicators, The Gambia
Louise Denvir, RTÉ, Ireland
Abi Kay, Farmers Guardian, United Kingdom
Samantha Tennent, Dairy NZ, New Zealand
Angus Verley, Australian Broadcasting Company, Australia

The 10 honorees will attend the 2019 IFAJ Congress in Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA, in July. The Young Leaders will also participate in a Boot Camp in the days prior to Congress, which includes professional development and networking workshops and farm visits in southern Minnesota.

AgWired Animal, Alltech, IFAJ

GROWMARK FS Expands Reach into Northern New York

Cindy Zimmerman April 18, 2019

GROWMARK FS has just acquired Miller Spraying in Lowville, NY, expanding its footprint in the northern regions of New York.

Aaron Miller, who launched Miller Spraying in 2001, will continue in a consultation role and his team will stay on as GROWMARK FS employees.

“As GROWMARK FS explored the opportunity of expanding its reach into the North Country and beyond, we became excited to continue the customer focus that Aaron and his team have fostered,” said GROWMARK FS Atlantic Region Manager John A. Richman. “The customer focused and team-oriented nature of Miller Spraying fits perfectly with that of GROWMARK FS.”

GROWMARK FS is reaching out to customers of Miller Spraying, and looking forward to providing expanded solutions for current and future customers in New York’s North Country.

GROWMARK FS operates more than thirty full service agricultural retail locations throughout New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Maryland, Delaware and Virginia. GROWMARK FS is part of the larger network of GROWMARK, Inc., an agricultural cooperative with annual sales of $8.5 billion providing agronomy, energy, facility planning, and logistics products and services, as well as grain marketing and risk management services throughout North America.

GROWMARK

Egg Prices Down for Easter

Cindy Zimmerman April 18, 2019

About 180 million eggs are purchased each year in the United States for Easter, and this year they are a little less pricey than normal.

According to an American Farm Bureau Federation (AFBF) analysis, the typical seasonal bump in retail egg prices that normally occurs just prior to Easter did not not happen this year because an increase in the supply of eggs has placed downward pressure on retail prices.

“At 79 cents per dozen, retail egg prices showed a moderate price decline two weeks prior to Easter, rather than the normal seasonal bump,” explained AFBF Economist Michael Nepveux. In March, wholesale large egg prices averaged 93 cents per dozen, a 56 percent decline compared to a year ago.

The current supply of eggs is more than adequate to meet retail demand for the holidays, Nepveux noted.

In March 2019, wholesale egg prices averaged 93.02 cents/dzn. This is a decline of 56 percent from 2018, but an increase of 38 percent from 2017.

Read the AFBF Market Intel update.

AFBF, AgWired Animal, Food

New CEO Joins Beck Ag

Carrie Muehling April 17, 2019

Richard Bettison began his new role as CEO of Beck Ag on April 8, just in time to attend the Agri-Marketing Conference in Kansas City last week and become a new member of the ZimmComm Golden Mic Club. Bettison said he has known Beck Ag as a customer and now looks forward to working with an incredibly talented group of people serving the agriculture industry.

“I think there is a lot of change in the marketplace and that’s what’s exciting about joining Beck Ag,” said Bettison, who previously worked for Syngenta and AGDATA, LP. “They really are transforming their business to provide much more data analytics and services to the market, understanding trends, being thought leaders in the industry to help organizations think about how they should allocate resources more effectively.”

Bettison said he looks forward to building relationships with key players in the marketplace that will help Beck Ag to serve clients in a more meaningful way.

Listen to Chuck’s Golden Mic interview with Richard here: NAMA19 Interview with Richard Bettison, new Beck Ag CEO

2019 National Agri-Marketing Conference Photo Album

Marketing, NAMA

Precision Ag Bytes 4/17

Carrie Muehling April 17, 2019

An agricultural industry collaboration led by Growing Matters, a coalition committed to neonicotinoid product stewardship, launched “BeSure!” – a stewardship-awareness campaign to promote best-management practices to farmers and applicators who use neonic products. Powered by Growing Matters along with the American Seed Trade Association and the National Pesticide Safety Education Center, BeSure! is designed to strengthen awareness of stewardship practices to protect bees and other wildlife during the handling, planting and disposal of treated seeds, and from other neonic applications used throughout the growing season.
Since 1956, when U.S. Olympic track and field star Bob Richards first graced its cover, Wheaties cereal boxes have featured athletic champions who have overcome challenges in pursuit of their personal best. General Mills, the makers of Wheaties, recently featured soil health champion Gabe Brown on a specially prepared box cover. While the company has no current plans to put the mock-up into mass production or distribution, the cover is a special tribute to Brown’s work as a regenerative agricultural advocate and educator. It is also emblematic of the food giant’s renewed commitment to expand the use of soil health-improving practices among General Mills’ cereal grain growers.
Miravis® Ace fungicide for improved control of Fusarium head blight (head scab) in wheat is now available from Syngenta for the 2019 season. The convenient premix of propiconazole and Adepidyn® fungicide, a new mode of action for head scab, will help wheat growers unlock a completely new way to manage head scab and get ahead of diseases such as Septoria that could be more prevalent if current weather patterns continue.
TerrAvion, the leading aerial imagery provider for the agricultural industry is excited to partner with Skymatics, to be their aerial imagery provider for agriculture.
Registration is now open for AgGateway‘s Mid-Year Meeting, June 10-13 at Prairie Meadows in Altoona, Iowa, just outside of Des Moines. Registration is just $250 for both members and non-members. The special hotel rate at Prairie Meadows available until May 22 is $122/night.
Inari continues to expand its capabilities with exclusive patent licenses to technologies developed at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. The technology, Promoter Fine Tuning, helps Inari researchers influence plant architecture and other agricultural traits by managing the extent to which specific existing genes are expressed. This approach — already proven in the field — will initially be used to increase yields and reduce the amount of land required to grow more food.

AgWired Precision, Precision Ag Bytes

NAMA Gavel Passes from Seger to McClure

Cindy Zimmerman April 17, 2019

Sheri Seger, DTN/Progressive Farmer, passed the gavel of National Agri-Marketing Association (NAMA) president on to Scott McClure, Brighton Agency, at the Agri-Marketing Conference last week in Kansas City.

Scott has been active with NAMA for many years at both local and national levels. He has served as a Best of NAMA judge for five years, he was the Agri-Marketing Conference Vice Chair in 2012 and chaired the committee in 2013. Scott joined the Executive Committee in 2014.

He stopped by the Golden Mic interview stand to talk about his plans as NAMA president and what’s new with Brighton:

NAMA19 Interview with incoming president Scott McClure, Brighton

2019 National Agri-Marketing Conference Photo Album

Agencies, NAMA

AMVAC® Cotton Industry Advancement Scholarship

Cindy Zimmerman April 16, 2019

AMVAC Chemical Corporation is now accepting applications for its 2019 Cotton Industry Advancement Scholarship. Seven $2,000 scholarships will be awarded.

Applicants must be nominated by a practicing cotton consultant, have worked for a cotton consultant at some point between 2017 and 2019 and be either a senior in high school or currently enrolled full-time in an undergrad or graduate-level agricultural program at an accredited college or university.

Information on how to nominate a student is available https://www.AMVAC-chemical.com/scholarship. All applications must be completed and submitted by the July 1, 2019, deadline to be considered. Winners will be selected by a panel of judges and announced by August 1, 2019.

AgWired Precision, AMVAC, Cotton