Celebrating Agriculture’s Role in National Donut Day

You probably woke up Friday morning without a clue of its relevance. Unbeknownst to you, Friday counts among the world’s leading holidays of celebration. In fact, it’s the most glazed, sprinkled and jelly-filled of them all.

It’s National Donut Day.

I’ll hold for your “m’mm” moment.

M’mm.

Now, can we continue? Good.

Now before you get skeptical—and yes, you’re right in thinking that every day is a good day for a donut—about the realism of National Donut Day and its importance on the calendar, look no further than the Donut Day’s history.

Bringing back native pollinators

Traditional honeybee hives are facing threats from a condition called “Colony Collapse Disorder.” While its causes are still unclear, the disorder has killed millions of bees and adversely affected pollination of many fruit and vegetable crops.

Find out what habitat conservationists in Orange County, California are doing to help bring native bees back in this episode of America’s Heartland:

Watch 816 on PBS. See more from America’s Heartland.

New Century Farmer – Day Four

This week, students attending the New Century Farmer conference will be blogging about the lessons they’re learning and the friends they’re making there. The conference is taking place on the Pioneer campus in Des Moines, Iowa.  Topics covered include the global agricultural marketplace, farm financing, demographic trends and risk management. 

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Today was a very informative and exciting day for those of us that have the privilege of being at the New Century Farmer Conference in Des Moines, Iowa. We started the day off with an excellent presentation by Farm Credit Services representative Gary Matteson, followed up by a very intense round of discussion.

The information Gary Matteson provided us with was excellent. It related perfectly to the situations most of the attendants are dealing with. Basically, he explained to us the different opportunities there are for young and beginning farmers to borrow money for farm investments and expenses. One thing that was really amazing was the amount of young people in the room who have already successfully borrowed substantial amounts of money for their operations.

New Century Farmer – Day Three

This week, students attending the New Century Farmer conference will be blogging about the lessons they’re learning and the friends they’re making there. The conference is taking place on the Pioneer campus in Des Moines, Iowa.  Topics covered include the global agricultural marketplace, farm financing, demographic trends and risk management. 

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To start off the third day of the New Century Farmer conference, we heard from Matt Erickson who spoke with us about the importance of the Farm Bill, Budgeting, and Risk Management. As the next generation’s producers of the world’s food, fuel, fiber, and natural resources we need to educate ourselves about the policies and financial status of our government and how it directly affects us and our farming operations.  Further, we explored the significance of becoming involved with sharing our story with legislators and taking charge of our own financial decisions.

New Century Farmer – Day Two

This week, students attending the New Century Farmer conference will be blogging about the lessons they’re learning and the friends they’re making there. The conference is taking place on the Pioneer campus in Des Moines, Iowa.  Topics covered include the global agricultural marketplace, farm financing, demographic trends and risk management. 

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On Tuesday, July 10, we kicked off the day by visiting commodity groups, both crop and livestock based. During the livestock tour, Corey Geiger from Hoard’s Dairyman and Jeff Muchow from Iowa Premium Beef shared many points about  trends and issues in the beef and dairy industries.

On the crop commodity tours, we engaged with the Iowa Soybean Association and the Iowa Corn Growers.  Our discussions ranged from global communication and trade efforts to issues facing beginning family farmers transitioning from one generation to the next.

Peter Woltz of Timber Ridge Cattle Co. shared his knowledge of marketing and niche marketing from the standpoint of his own flax-fed beef cattle operation. From Peter, we learned that we have to think outside of the box for new opportunities and enterprises.  We must realize that our enterprises may take us down many avenues and that we must keep an open mind to expansion or alternate avenues.

The highlight of the day was having the privilege of touring the research plots, labs, and state of the art greenhouses at Pioneer Hi-Bred International. We gained valuable insight into what goes into the crop development phase to make our hybrids as vigorous as possible. It was very clear that research and customer satisfaction are Pioneer’s leading priorities. Their dedication to the American and global consumer will continue to allow them to make strides in yield innovation. Their support of this program is invaluable!

The theme of today at NCF was “Planting the seed for your vision!” We took some time out of the day to work on the first draft of our visions, and what we foresee for our operations in the future.  It was a very eye opening experience to take a look at the foundations of our operations and think about what it is currently and what we would like to see it become.

Once again, we wrapped up the day with “Ag in a Bag.” We each brought 5-6 significant items that uniquely defined us and shared these with the group. This allowed us to gain a slight glimpse into the present, and as we hear each others visions near the end of the week, we may get to share in each others passions and excitement for the future of our operations!

~Chelsea McFarland – Kentucky

~Nathan Sahr- Minnesota

~Seth Menefee- New Mexico

The New Century Farmer program is sponsored by Pioneer Hi-Bred, a DuPont business; Case IH; CSX Corporation; and Farm Credit; with media partner Successful Farming as a special project of the National FFA Foundation. The program is designed to provide participants with valuable skills and knowledge applicable to their own farming operations. In addition, they will build a network of colleagues that will benefit them throughout their careers.

New Century Farmer Conference – Day One

This week, students attending the New Century Farmer conference will be blogging about the lessons they’re learning and the friends they’re making there. The conference is taking place on the Pioneer campus in Des Moines, Iowa.  Topics covered include the global agricultural marketplace, farm financing, demographic trends and risk management. 

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We began the morning bright and early by traveling to Pioneer where we had the opportunity to hear from Dr. David Kohl. He was a very energetic speaker who was full of  valuable information. First he spoke of our “Swiss cheese economy” which is related, connected, and dependent on every other country in the world to prosper.

Then, he talked about the  importance of setting goals. He said that 80 percent of all people have no goals, 16 percent have mental goals (those that are not written down), and the remaining 4 percent have goals that are written down. The 16 percent who have mental goals  will encounter profits three times higher than those without goals. The elite 4 percent with goals written down will make nine times more than those without goals. He encouraged us all to set our own goals in order to become successful.

Next, Dr. Kohl gave us a list of things to watch for in global economics to help  us market our own commodities and make  our operations  more profitable.

He ended his presentation by giving us ten golden rules that we can use in our operations. These rules varied from business and profit rules, to employee management, to setting our missions and goals.

One thing Dr. Kohl said made a particular impression on the group: “Better is better before bigger is better.”  That really hit home, and helped us start thinking about the directions we could take our own operations in and still be profitable.

SAE: Opportunity

There are no more inspiring agriculturalists in America than FFA members. Last week was the 83rd Kentucky FFA State Convention. While it was the tenth and final state convention for me this year, the FFA experience in Kentucky was far from over. For the next few days we were getting out of our FFA jackets, out of downtown Lexington, and visiting Supervised Agricultural Experiences firsthand.

SAE programs are a huge part of the overall agriculture education experience. We take our knowledge from inside the classroom outside to forests, agricultural fields, barns, laboratories, animal clinics, or any agricultural pursuit we desire. Then the work begins, that’s right, work.

“Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.”

- Thomas Edison

Over the course of our time in Kentucky, I met FFA members like Garrison Thompson who takes on opportunity, and enjoys the work. He has a large SAE program that employs three of his classmates, while also serving as the SAE chairman for his FFA chapter. Garrison has those qualities of leadership we should all possess. Watch this video from our time in Kentucky visiting SAE’s, and put some thought into how you might improve your own SAE, or help other chapter members start their program. SAE opportunities abound, and those who put in the work, reap huge rewards.

<p><a href=”http://vimeo.com/44198642″>SAE Opportunity</a> from <a href=”http://vimeo.com/user11384007″>Seth Pratt</a> on <a href=”http://vimeo.com”>Vimeo</a&gt;.</p>

By Seth Pratt

More Adventures in Vietnam via Boat, Bus, and Moped Dodging!

For the next two weeks, participants in the 2012 International Collegiate Agricultural Leadership (I-CAL) program will be blogging about their travels in Malaysia and Vietnam.  Check back often, as they’ll be sharing some great insights from their trip along with some amazing photos!  (To see even more photos of the trip, check out U.S. Grains Council’s Flickr site.)

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Hello from Ho Chi Minh City!

Our second full day in Vietnam was filled with many different cultural and agricultural learning opportunities, and a full night’s rest prepared us all for a full day. We started out with bus ride south towards the Tien Giang Province to visit an aquaculture farm.

Along the way, we passed by hundreds of rice plantations and observed Vietnamese rice farmers transplanting and spraying the fields. Their work is very laborious compared to the mechanized American way of farming, so it was very interesting to see these practices.

We unloaded our bus and boarded a small boat that transported us up the Mekong  River to tour a small family aquaculture farm. The farmer greeted us with fresh coconuts filled with coconut juice from his garden, which we all happily accepted.

FFA comes to Iowa with NASCAR driver Justin Allgaier

NASCAR driver Justin Allgaier will race in the heart of the midwest Sunday, in a state known for its agriculture. It’s fitting, perhaps, that FFA will be racing right alongside him.

Riding along on the right rear trunk panel of his No. 31 BRANDT Racing Chevrolet — just as it has since February — will be the FFA emblem thanks to a relationship that the National FFA Organization has bridged with his sponsor, BRANDT Consolidated, Inc. The car is a hard one to miss with a bright red-orange paint scheme.

BRANDT President and CEO Rick Brandt has directed his company to put an all-agriculture car on track in 2012 with goals to spotlight the hard work and dedication that powers agriculture.

“At Brandt, we are deeply committed to the future of agriculture. And, I am thrilled to have such an iconic, like-minded organization join our team for the 2012 season,” said Brandt. “Simply put, through its long history the FFA has shaped the future of agriculture: They transform students into industry leaders.”

Robots are Future Farmers of America?

MIT professor Mary “Missy” Cummings says that robots may begin playing a more significant role in the agriculture industry. According the CNBC report:

Another area primed for robotics is the farming industry. Farmers cannot find enough people to do the the field work, so crop dusting has become and up and coming technologies.

There are currently robot tractors and robot helicopters that exist that can coordinate and perform harvesting and crop dusting without humans, and this technology is ready to be adopted whenever a business model is figured out, Cummings said.

“The technology is pretty much ready to go. … I think it’s just making the connection to the business model. … I think we are there, we are on the cusp of that, but we just need the business model,” Cummings said.

Cummings estimates though that it will be about one to three years when these types of robotic farming equipment will be in use.

Many people fear that the use of robotics will lead to fewer jobs for humans. But, we see this as a potential opportunity for FFA members.  The agriculture industry of future may need engineers who can design these robots and people with enough skill and knowledge to operate them on the farm. So, if you’re someone who likes math, mechanics and/or computer technology, now is a great time to be planning a future career in agriculture!

For a more detailed explanation of the types of robotics currently in development for agriculture check out the article titled “These May be the Droids Farmers are Looking for” on Wired.com.