USDA Forecasting Record Corn and Soybean Yields

Cindy Zimmerman

The latest Crop Production report from USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) is forecasting record corn and soybean yields this year, with higher total production for soybeans and slightly lower for corn.

Corn production is expected to be down 1% from last year at 15.1 billion bushels while soybean production is forecast to be 10% higher than 2023 at a record high 4.59 billion bushels.

Average corn yield is forecast at record high 183.1 bushels per acre, up 5.8 bushels from last year. NASS also forecasts record high yields in Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Michigan, Nebraska, South Dakota, Washington, and Wisconsin. As of Aug. 4, 67% of this year’s corn crop was reported in good or excellent condition, 10 percentage points above the same time last year.

Soybean yields are expected to average a record high 53.2 bushels per acre, up 2.6 bushels from 2023. If realized, the forecasted yields in Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Mississippi, Missouri, and Ohio will be record highs.

All wheat production is forecast at 1.98 billion bushels, up 9% from 2023, and in the first NASS production forecast of the season for cotton, all cotton production is forecast at 15.1 million 480-pound bales, up 25% from last year.

Corn, Cotton, Soybean, USDA, Wheat

EPA’s Ag Office Head Steps Down

Cindy Zimmerman

Snyder addresses ethanol stakeholders in Washington DC, March 2024

The head of EPA’s recently-created Office of Agriculture and Rural Affairs announced he was stepping down this week, after only five months in the new position.

Rod Snyder became senior adviser for agriculture at EPA in October 2021 after serving as president of Field to Market: The Alliance for Sustainable Agriculture for seven years. EPA Administrator Michael Regan announced the new office and Snyder as head of it at Commodity Classic in March. “With Rod’s leadership and with the establishment of this new office, we will ensure agriculture and rural stakeholders have a continual seat at the table at EPA for many years to come,” said Regan.

In an exclusive interview with Agri-Pulse, Snyder said he had no “specific plans for his next career move” but will be focusing on his family and personal life. There has been no statement from EPA yet regarding a replacement for Snyder in the ag office.

EPA

ACN Awards at Ag Media Summit

Cindy Zimmerman

So many awards are presented at the Ag Media Summit it gets hard to keep track of them all!

The Agricultural Communications Network presented awards for writing, design, photography, MarComm and digital & social media. All of the photos can be found here.

Of the Year Winners:
Communicator of the Year: Katrina Huffstutler, Grant Company
Designer of the Year: Rachael Davis, Noble Research Institute
Story of the Year: Mike Wilson, Farm Progress
Writer of the Year: Mike Wilson, Farm Progress
Photo of the Year: Steve Werblow, The Furrow
Photographer of the Year: Katie Knapp, The Furrow

Service Award Winners:
Distinguished Service Award – Posthumously awarded to George Rehm, University of Minnesota (U of M) Extension Soil Fertility Specialist
Lifetime Achievement Award – Kelly Schwalbe, Retired PR Professional

Andy Markwart Horizon Award Winner:
Wyatt Bechtel, broadhead.

For a complete list of all the winners, click here.

ACN, Ag Media Summit, Journalism

Industry Ag News 8/12

Carrie Muehling

  • Agri-Pulse is pleased to announce Hannah Fonseca has transitioned to the Agri-Pulse sales and marketing team as the digital media firm’s Eastern sales representative. Looking to expand Agri-Pulse’s reach along the East Coast, Fonseca will be based in Durham, North Carolina.
  • The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced changes to the Farm Service Agency’s (FSA) Farm Loan Programs, effective Sept. 25, 2024 — changes that are intended to increase opportunities for farmers and ranchers to be financially viable. These improvements, part of the Enhancing Program Access and Delivery for Farm Loans rule, demonstrate USDA’s commitment to improving farm profitability through farm loans designed to provide important financing options used by producers to cover operating expenses and purchase land and equipment.
  • U.S. Department of Agriculture Under Secretary for Trade and Foreign Agricultural Affairs Alexis M. Taylor will lead 24 U.S. agribusinesses and organizations on a trade mission to Bogota, Colombia, Aug. 13-15, to boost American agricultural exports and build upon the successes of the U.S.-Colombia Trade Promotion Agreement.
  • The Renewable Fuels Association welcomes Enerflex Ltd. and Skyven Technologies as its newest associate members. These companies share RFA’s dedication to promoting sustainable energy solutions and fostering the growth of the renewable fuels industry.
  • National FFA Organization, a nationally-recognized school-based student leadership development organization, announced that it reached a record-breaking milestone of having more than one million FFA members: 1,027,273. States that have shown the largest membership percentage growth this past year are Utah, Florida and Alaska.
  • The United States Postal Service has announced it will make available on August 22, 2024, a Pictorial Postmark, commemorating ANTIQUE TRACTOR PRESERVATION DAY in the State of Kansas, as proclaimed by Kansas Governor Laura Kelly. The Postmark will be available August 22, 2024. Learn more at: Talking Tractors.com.
  • “A Voice for Agriculture” is the theme of the 81st convention of the National Association of Farm Broadcasting. Don’t miss this annual event that brings together farm broadcasters and other leaders and decision-makers from the agriculture industry for three days of educational events, networking and collaborating on common issues and trends facing our industry. From the Trade Talk and Newsmaker sessions to the NAFB Hall of Fame and Young Professionals programming, and more – it’s all in Kansas City from Nov. 13 – 15! Click here for additional convention information.
  • North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum joined local, state and federal officials and community members this week for a ribbon cutting ceremony for the new North Dakota Soybean Processors plant near Casselton, lauding the project as a “breakthrough” in an ongoing shift toward processing more of North Dakota’s raw farm commodities in the state. Construction on the state-of-the-art facility started nearly two years ago, and it began accepting soybeans in July. During its first year of operation, the plant is expected to process up to 42.5 million bushels of soybeans into soybean oil, soybean meal and soybean hull pellets. The facility employs about 75 people.
    • Zimfo Bytes

    2024 Ag Media Summit Awards

    Chuck Zimmerman

    Ag Media Summit - AwardsA big part of the Ag Media Summit are the awards. There are many of them from each organization represented including Livestock Publication Council, The Ag Communicators Network, and National Agricultural Communicators of Tomorrow. There are photos of all of them in the online summit photo album.

    I want to highlight two of our best friends that received awards starting with Cindy Cunningham, Public Relations Managing Supervisor at Woodruff. Cindy received the LPC Ed Bible Distinguished Service Award. Like a lot of these awards it can be very emotional not only for the recipient but also many, many of us in attendance.

    Ag Media Summit - AwardsAlso, receiving an award is Kelly Schwalbe, Retired PR Professional. Kelly received the Ag Communicators Lifetime Achievement Award.

    Cindy (Zimmerman) and I have made so many friends over the years and we’re very blessed for that. We’ve not only worked with these two professionals but we’ve spent lots of other social time from trips to the Lake of the Ozarks to pheasant hunting in South Dakota. Congratulations to them and all who have received awards.

    You will be able to find the full lists of winners on the organizational websites.

    2024 Ag Media Summit Photo Album

    ACN, LPC, Media

    Talking Retirement at Ag Media Summit

    Chuck Zimmerman

    Dr. Chris Kuehl, Armada Corporate IntelligenceDuring this year’s Ag Media Summit I talked to a variety of folks about retirement. This included members who have retired, members who retired and went back to work, people who are considering retiring (asking me, “When are you going to retire?”), and one of our keynote speakers, Dr. Chris Kuehl, Armada Corporate Intelligence. He is an economist who not only had great information but a sense of humor that kept us laughing. I would recommend him as a speaker anywhere.

    I picked out an excerpt of his talk since it was about extending retirement. He says, “If we use the same demographics that we used in the 1930’s when we set 65 as retirement age, the retirement age now would be 85.” Yeow!

    You can listen to him here:
    Dr. Chris Kuehl Excerpt on Retirement

    2024 Ag Media Summit Photo Album

    ACN, Ag Media Summit, Audio, LPC

    The Greg and Gregg Show at AMS

    Cindy Zimmerman

    Greg Henderson and Gregg Hillyer at AMS

    The 25th anniversary of Ag Media Summit was celebrated this week and it was interesting to take a walk back through the history of the event with a couple of guys who have been around for awhile – Gregg Hillyer, Editor In Chief at The Progressive Farmer, and Greg Henderson, Editorial Director at Drovers/Farm Journal.

    Henderson says AMS basically began when the ag publishers got together and decided not to send their editors to two separate meetings. “They were going to the Ag Editors meeting in October, and they were going to the Livestock Publications Council meeting in July. And so the idea was, let’s bring these two together,” and it became his job to make that happen.

    Hillyer says it was a little tricky to start. “Even though we had some cross membership between the two organizations, we both kind of had different viewpoints in terms of sponsorships and code of ethics and things of that sort, so there was really a lot of originally disagreement in those earlier discussions,” he said.

    Listen here:
    Gregg and Greg Show - Look back over the years of Ag Media Summit

    2024 Ag Media Summit Photo Album

    ACN, Ag Media Summit, Audio, LPC

    Alltech Honors Young Leaders at Ag Media Summit

    Cindy Zimmerman

    (right to left) Breanna Selsor, Iowa State; Hannah Hudgens, Texas Tech; Allie Herring, Texas Tech; and Ryan Hess, Texas Tech; with Jenn Norrie (far left), Alltech

    Four students currently studying agricultural communications were honored for their excellence, professionalism and leadership earlier this week at Ag Media Summit (AMS). The Livestock Publications Council (LPC) Student Award Program, sponsored by Alltech, provides travel scholarships for four students to attend AMS.

    “Alltech is proud to support the next generation of agricultural communicators as the ambassadors and voice of our industry,” said Jenn Norrie, Alltech’s communications manager for North America and Europe. “These young leaders are playing an instrumental role in sharing stories of farmers and ranchers and are helping to educate the urban population on where and by whom their food is produced.”

    Three of the four finalists for this year’s Forrest Bassford Student Award, presented by the LPC, were from Texas Tech University – Allie Herring, Ryan Hess, and Hannah Hudgens – with the fourth, Breanna Selsor, from Iowa State University.

    Following a competitive application and interview process, the award was presented to Herring, a senior studying agricultural communications and agri-business at Texas Tech.

    The Forrest Bassford Student Award was established in 1992 to honor Bassford’s contributions to the Livestock Publications Council and his passion for supporting young people in the field of agricultural communications.

    2024 Ag Media Summit Photo Album

    Ag Media Summit, Alltech

    Feedstock Management Group Debuts at Tech Hub LIVE

    Cindy Zimmerman

    The North American Bioeconomy Data Alliance (NABDA) is a new working group focused on feedstock management that debuted at the recent Tech Hub LIVE event in Des Moines.

    Spearheading the group are Joyce Hunter with Mission Critical and Kathleen Glass with AquaSpy, who also led a Roundtable Discussion on the topic at THL. NABDA is engaging industry partners help the U.S. and Canada improve data literacy and standardization to optimize the production, processing, and utilization of biological feedstocks.

    “It’s looking at all of the feedstock that’s available and how we are going to compensate farmers for what they are growing,” said Hunter. “We’re looking for input from farmers, producers, technology companies…we want all voices included.”

    The working group plans to gather input over the rest of this year and present findings at the VISION Conference in January.

    Hunter, who served in the Obama administration USDA, also spoke to the Women in Ag Tech group which met for the third time at Tech Hub LIVE about the importance of being involved in public policy and government relations.

    Learn more in this interview.

    2024 THL WiAT speaker Joyce Hunter, Mission Critical 7:04

    2024 Tech Hub LIVE Photo Album

    Audio, Biofuels, Tech Hub LIVE, Technology

    Iowa Economic Development Spurs Sukup Innovations

    Cindy Zimmerman

    Megan Brandt, Sukup Innovations, and Renee Hansen, Sukup Mfg., at Tech Hub LIVE

    Sukup Manufacturing Co., based in Sheffield, Iowa, has long been at the forefront of innovation since its inception in 1963. After Sukup aquired automation technologies company Ramco Innovations, the company announced the creation of Sukup Innovations in May of this year with the goal of bolstering agricultural innovation through automation.

    Renee Hansen, Sukup Manufacturing, External Relations Manager, and Megan Brandt, Program Manager, Sukup Innovations, were at Tech Hub LIVE last week to talk about how Iowa and ag tech go together.

    “Iowa really is the Silicon Valley of ag tech,” said Hansen. “Sukup Manufacturing is really trying to take that to another level, help with the productivity and efficiency of the producer and we’re at Tech Hub LIVE because we want to be a player in this space.”

    Brandt says the first product offering from Sukup Innovations is Synk™, a new bin monitoring solution designed to enhance grain storage management for farmers.

    “I think people at first questioned why two very different companies would come together until they figured out why Sukup was trying to bring this technology out to the farm,” said Brandt. “So having two separate powerhouses with not a lot of preconceived ideas of what wouldn’t work and what would work is going to be, I think, powerful.”

    In addition to Ramco, Sukup Innovations includes an innovation lab called Maple Studios which brings in early stage manufacturing tech startups and Hansen says the Iowa Economic Development Authority is very helpful in supporting early stage companies. “We have a lot of different funds that come from the federal government and the state government and we have a lot of programs, including Ag Tech focused funds, locally and across the whole state,” she said.

    Learn more in this interview from THL.
    2024 THL Sukup Manufacturing/Innovations 7:47

    2024 Tech Hub LIVE Photo Album

    Agribusiness, AgWired Precision, Audio, Tech Hub LIVE, Technology