Congresswoman Visits Bayer Bee Center

Cindy Zimmerman

bayer-bee-ellmersEven though she had to miss the grand opening ceremony due to a conflict, Rep. Renee Ellmers (R-NC) made it a point to make it out to see the new Bayer CropScience North American Bee Care Center in Research Triangle Park.

“The research and development that they are doing here is going to help us grow more food into the future,” she said in an interview. “It is vital to the North Carolina economy but also to the world.”

Ellmers added that bees are an important part of the discussion about genetically modified crops. “It’s a discussion that’s being had on the national level,” said Ellmers. She is pictured here at the Bee Care Center with Bayer’s Robyn Kneen who was instrumental in the development of the center.

I also asked the Congresswoman about the new farm bill and why she is a strong supporter of immigration reform for farmers in her state. Interview with Rep. Renee Ellmers


Bayer CropScience Bee Care Center Grand Opening Photo Album

Audio, Bayer, pollinators

End of the USDA Telephone Newsline

Cindy Zimmerman

r2rThis week will mark the end of an era as the USDA Radio Newsline will no longer be available via the telephone starting tomorrow. I can remember recording that newsline on a reel-to-reel machine just like this one when I first started in the business back in 1980. At that time, the newsline was also sent out on small reel-to-reel tapes. That soon gave way to cassettes, and then the internet came along and changed everything.

According to the USDA announcement out today:

It was in 1968 when the Department of Agriculture made its news stories accessible through phone lines. It was known then as The Spot News Service. Now 46 years later, thanks to technological changes and upgrades the telephone news service will end effective Friday, April 18, 2014.

The USDA Radio Newsline will still be available electronically through the USDA.gov website. For your convenience you will still get the daily email highlighting all of the stories produced for that day.

FYI, you can get the news line stories via iTunes as a podcast and/or an RSS feed in your email, as well as, the same way you get the weekly features.

You really have to give USDA credit for adopting new technology quickly and keeping that newsline as relevant as ever, especially to Gary Crawford who has been there for the whole evolution. I can’t say I miss recording newslines off the phone on reel-to-reel, but I do wonder what will come next!

Media, USDA

Zimfo Bytes

Talia Goes

    Zimfo Bytes

  • Archer Daniels Midland Company announced three significant actions in the company’s ongoing portfolio management: an agreement to sell the company’s South American fertilizer business, pursuit of the sale of the company’s chocolate business, and the acquisition of the remaining stake of Alfred C. Toepfer International GmbH.
  • More than 150 area member-owners and guests joined the Wheat Growers’ Frederick agronomy staff to celebrate the opening of the Wheat Growers Frederick Agronomy Center.
  • Since the purchase of the Sil-All range of forage inoculants in 2011, Lallemand Animal Nutrition’s team of forage experts have developed a new product formulation in the United States to best meet the needs of today’s producers.
  • Semex sire 0200HO00402 Mainstream Manifold reached the pivotal Millionaire Sire mark at Semex, joining 11 other elite Semex sires that have each produced over one million doses of semen.
Zimfo Bytes

More Then Just Barns

Jamie Johansen

nh-pavilions-39 -editedThe Alliant Energy Center in Madison, WI is growing thanks to New Holland Agriculture. The expansion is underway and during the groundbreaking ceremony last week I spoke with Mark Clarke, director of the Alliant Energy Center.

“We’re partaking on a project that we started a little over 18 months ago and to see it finally come to together is really exciting for me. We are going to have some really neat buildings when this is all said and done.”

“What you are going to see is two brand new state-of-art building facilities and I don’t know if anywhere else in the United States is going to be able to compete with these when we are done. We designed these from an animal standpoint. We had the representatives from World Dairy Expo and Midwest Horse Fair at the table last summer when we were designing these buildings. We are going to have 290,000 square feet of exhibition space and they are really versatile.”

Listen to or download my interview with Mark here: Interview with Mark Clarke

nh-pavilions-33-editedAnother big player in this expansion is Ben Brancel, Secretary of Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection (DATCP).

“The state of Wisconsin is recognizing the value of the livestock industry and World Dairy Expo is an international exhibit that brings people from around the world.”

Ben explains that they already have had inquires about using the New Holland Pavilions for catering and sporting events along with many trade show type conferences.

They all know that the deadline is tight, but have great confidence in the endeavor. The Dane County Fair Grounds are accommodating with the use of tents for other activities held there throughout the summer. I know I’m not the only one who can’t wait for the ribbon cutting this fall.

Listen to or download my interview with Ben here: Interview with Ben Brancel

Checkout photos from the event here: New Holland Pavilion Groundbreaking Ceremony

Agribusiness, Audio, New Holland, World Dairy Expo

How ZimmComm Became Ten Years Old

Chuck Zimmerman

ZimmCast 435While ZimmComm New Media is celebrating ten years we’re doing some reminiscing about some of the milestones in our journey.

Chuck and CindySpeaking of miles, Cindy and I met up in a Delta Sky Club in Atlanta last night to record this week’s program. She was returning from the Bayer CropScience Bee Care Center opening and I was returning from a visit with New Holland. And, no, we did not plan our trips to be on the same flight back home to Pensacola. Funny how that works out.

We got out the Golden ZimmComm Microphone and got to work taking a look back at our ten years of developing an online community with a little help from our friends.

First AgWired PostThis blog we call AgWired got started in our first year when I did my first post in August of 2004. I was a little tentative then and became bolder as time went on. AgWired started out on Blogger before moving to WordPress and we’ve never looked back.

AgriBlogger first tweetIt was some time later that I did my first tweet. Fortunately, it’s not to embarrassing. But here it is. Did you know you can see your first tweet using Twitter Discover? I’m now 17,000 tweets down that highway!

We hope you will enjoy our look back. During the Connection Point last week we had a nephew working in our booth. He said that after listening to us talk to people about what we do for two days he had no idea what we do. Maybe this conversation will help clarify?

You can listen to this week’s program here. Ten Years of ZimmComm

Thanks to our ZimmCast sponsor, GROWMARK, locally owned, globally strong, for their support.

Subscribe to the ZimmCast podcast here.

Audio, ZimmCast, ZimmComm Announcement

Wheat Harvest Film Debuted at Ag Day Festivities

Jamie Johansen

ag-day-14-barry-conradThe debut of The Great American Wheat Harvest was seen by many during Ag Day activities this year in Washington D.C. Chuck took time to chat with Barry Nelson, John Deere, who was a huge sponsor of the production. He also spoke with the director, Conrad Weaver. Both couldn’t have been more excited with how the film turned out and can’t wait to get it out for the whole world to see.

“It exceeded my expectations.” Barry said, “After being able to see the final cut of the film, seeing the reaction from the crowd, but also how Conrad Weaver the producer was able to tell the story of these different custom cutters going on the harvester trail and how difficult it is. Boy, I think it’s a great story and now we are excited to see where the film is going to be debuted and shown across the US.”

Barry believes this film sets itself apart from other documentaries because it really tells the story of the families involved in this and how hard it is to predict the weather, manage the equipment and make sure they are in the right place at the right time.

You can listen to Chuck’s complete interview with Barry here: Interview with Barry Nelson

Conrad said, “It’s kind of like giving birth. You have all the toil for years and now you have birthed this thing called a movie and it’s exciting, it’s thrilling and it’s a relief to be done. But now the real work begins of getting the message out to the people.”

For the next two years Conrad said he will be busy making sure the world sees this production. They are also still looking for sponsorships to help fund marketing dollars to help get this in theaters everywhere. In the future Conrad is toying with some other project ideas all relating to agriculture. We should expect to continue to see and hear his name mentioned as a true advocate for the agricultural community.

You can listen to Chuck’s complete interview with Conrad here: Interview with Conrad Weaver

Coverage of National Ag Day is sponsored by BCS Communications

Ag Groups, Agribusiness, Audio, John Deere, Video, Wheat

Importance of New Bayer Bee Care Center

Cindy Zimmerman

bayer-bee-ncagThe new Bayer CropScience North America Bee Care Center is important for the future of one of the most critical little contributors to keeping the engine of agriculture running.

“They’ve been called the spark plug of agriculture,” said North Carolina Commissioner of Agriculture Steve Troxler at the grand opening of the center on Tuesday. “If the spark plug’s not functioning, neither is the car, so we’ve got to pay particular attention to our pollinators.”

bayer-bee-ncuTroxler stressed the vital role that research has in protecting pollinators and ultimately feeding the world. Dr. Richard Linton, Dean College of Agriculture and Life Sciences North Carolina State University, is pleased that the center will provide opportunities for students to achieve the goals of a land grant university. “It’s all about producing students for a very important industry of agriculture and it’s also about working with our stakeholders on research and outreach efforts,” he said.

Listen to my interview with the commissioner and the dean here: Interview with NC Ag Commissioner Steve Troxler and NC State Ag College Dean Rich Linton


Bayer CropScience Bee Care Center Grand Opening Photo Album

Agribusiness, Audio, Bayer, Education, pollinators

Google Glass Intern

Kristin Liska

IMG_0633 This past week at the NAMA convention, I was lucky enough to try the infamous Google Glass. Needless to say, I fell in love with it. I am sure for the first ten minutes I looked like an idiot trying to figure it out, but I got the hang of it. While I was wearing them, all I could think about was how this could help all of agriculture. An farmer has a problem in the field? Ask Glass to call your agronomist, or Google what a certain weed is.

Now Glass is “on sale” for more people to test out and see how it works. For $1,500 you can walk around and give feedback on how you enjoy them and where they need to improve. One of the main goals that Google has is to make them available to the public between the $500-700 range. Needless to say, once I am not a broke college student anymore, I will be purchasing a pair. And for the record, this is the only “selfie” I took during the NAMA conference!

2014 Agri-Marketing Conference Photo Album

Coverage of the Agri-Marketing Conference is sponsored by
Brownfield Ag News and Rhea + Kaiser
Coverage of the Agri-Marketing Conference is sponsored by Rhea + KaiserCoverage of the Agri-Marketing Conference is sponsored by Brownfield Ag News

Media, NAMA, Technology

NAMA Trade Show Through ZimmGlass

Chuck Zimmerman

Bruce Rasa TekWearAgGoogle Glass got a lot of attention during the Connection Point at this year’s Agri-Marketing Conference. Here’s Bruce Rasa, TekWearAg, doing a demo with Karen and Cliff from GROWMARK. Bruce patiently conducted countless demos during his time working with us in the ZimmComm booth. We really appreciate his participation and have enjoyed a great relationship as we work on ideas and potential projects for this new technology. TekWearAg is working on the application side of the technology so he’s someone you should contact if you are interested in a Glass application for your business or service.

While Bruce was doing demos I took ZimmGlass and wandered around the trade show floor. As you’ll hear in the video below it was quite noisy but I met some interesting people. Maybe you’ll see someone you know.

2014 Agri-Marketing Conference Photo Album

Coverage of the Agri-Marketing Conference is sponsored by
Brownfield Ag News and Rhea + Kaiser
Coverage of the Agri-Marketing Conference is sponsored by Rhea + KaiserCoverage of the Agri-Marketing Conference is sponsored by Brownfield Ag News

Ag Groups, NAMA, Video

New Holland VP Shares Smiles for Pavilion Expansion

Jamie Johansen

nh-pavilions-58-editedDemolition is already underway in Madison, WI at the Alliant Energy Center, home to World Dairy Expo and Midwest Horse Fair. Abe Hughes, Vice President of New Holland North America, was all smiles during the groundbreaking ceremony late last week. New Holland is partnering with Dane County to build the New Holland Pavilions which will include a 290,000 square foot expansion and replace the aging barns.

I spoke with Abe after the groundbreaking and he was more than excited for the opportunities this new facility will bring to Wisconsin and beyond.

“Well, I’ve got this huge smile on my face for a couple of reasons. Not only is it a gorgeous day here in Wisconsin and are farmers need some sunshine. It has been a long winter, but it is also a historical time for New Holland as we do the groundbreaking for the New Holland Pavilions here at the Alliant Energy Center. There was a real need here in this community to have a better facility. Our producers, our customers had to have better facilities in order to keep their animals and families coming to these shows. The decision was very easy for us to come fund this and help make this dream possible.”

Listen to or download the press conference here: Interview with Abe Hughes

Checkout photos from the event here: New Holland Pavilion Groundbreaking Ceremony

Agribusiness, Audio, Equipment, New Holland, Tractor