The voice of animal agriculture in Canada

It was 1988, 22 years ago that some forward thinking Canadian farmers recognized that people really didn’t understand what they did, so they formed the Ontario Farm Animal Council, OFAC. Executive Director Crystal Mackay says the organization has evolved over the years and they’ve been involved in a number of projects that tells the story. Crystal says one project is their “Faces of Farming” calendar.

AUDIO: Crystal Mackay, Exec. Director, OFAC (3:00 MP3)

Discussing new technologies in alfalfa production

Gary Smith of Mission Hill, South Dakota has been in the hay business in southeastern South Dakota since 1979.  And he says, so far, 2010 has been the most challenging year he’s ever experienced, what with constant rain and high humidity.  While talking with Smith about that recently, we also asked him about new technologies in the hay business, including Roundup Ready alfalfa.  At the present time, Gary says he’s not planning to plant it on his farm.

AUDIO: Gary Smith (3 min MP3)

Basic ethics were not heeded

Commentary. Had basic ethics of journalism been heeded, the fiasco/debacle/extraordinary mess stemming from the release of a video clip from a speech by Georgia USDA official Shirley Sherrod would never have occurred.

It all started last Monday when Andrew Breitbart of the website Big Government.com posted a video clip from a speech that Sherrod made at an NAACP event in March where she talked about wanting to discriminate against a white farmer in danger of losing his farm. In no time at all – what I’m sure to Shirley Sherrod and her family felt like the entire country – had heard and/or seen the clip.

Shortly thereafter, Sherrod was very publicly condemned by the NAACP and on Tuesday she was very abruptly and publicly dismissed from her job at USDA. Later that day, it was made clear the video clip by which NAACP, the White House, USDA, some in national media, many so-called “citizen journalists” with blogs, Twitter and FaceBook accounts had used to judge Sherrod was only a small part of her speech and had indeed been taken out of context as she had claimed.

It became apparent that the video was only part of her speech, during which she revealed that this situation changed her attitude towards racism. As a matter of fact, the farm couple from Iron City, Ga. she mentioned in the clip quickly came to her defense and credits her for helping save their farm.

“We probably wouldn’t have our farm today if it hadn’t been for her leading us in the right direction,” said Eloise Spooner.

 

The official apology from the White House came Wednesday and later that day, an obviously regretful Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack offered his apology. During a press conference, the former Iowa governor said time and again that he “deeply regretted” the decision made in haste to ask Sherrod to resign.

“As a result, a good woman has gone through a very difficult period and I’m going to have to live with that for a long, long time,” he said.

The ag chief took full responsibility for his knee-jerk reaction to the accusation that one of his staffers had made racist comments.

As the RTNDA Code of Ethics states, “Professional electronic journalists should pursue truth aggressively and present the news accurately, in context and as completely as possible. . .Professional electronic journalists should present the news with integrity and decency, avoiding real or perceived conflicts of interest and respect the dignity and intelligence of the audience as well as the subjects of news. . .Professional electronic journalists are accountable for their actions to the public, the profession and to themselves.”

Manipulating video or audio or photos or the written word for self-serving purposes is irresponsible. It is also irresponsible for us to accept as fact every politically-motivated mud-spattered claim made against a party, an issue or a candidate.

It is important for us, as individual consumers of information, to differentiate between sources of “news” and sources of “views.”

Just because you read it on a blog doesn’t make it so.

Another dispute between the CBB and NCBA

Calling the findings “extremely troubling”, the Cattlemen’s Beef Board (CBB) says it has discovered many expenses that were either improperly charged to the checkoff or insufficiently documented by the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA).  Beef Board CEO Tom Ramey tells Brownfield’s Ken Anderson that one of the discrepancies involved travel expenses for the spouses of staff and volunteer leadership of NCBA.  And he admits this latest development isn’t going to help already strained relations between the CBB and NCBA.

AUDIO: Tom Ramey (3 min MP3)

Water-optimizing corn

Syngenta has unveiled Agrisure Artesian™ technology, the new line of water optimized hybrids. Wayne Fithian says this is not just drought tolerant corn but a hybrid that yields better in good growing conditions as well so growers do not have to trade-off.

This is actually the first of two technologies they are developing; the other is a water-optimized hybrid utilizing a genetically modified (GM) trait. These hybrids are anticipated to be available post-2015, pending receipt of all regulatory and key import market approvals.

AUDIO: Wayne Fithian talks about the technology

Great time to be in cattle biz, analyst says

Allendale Analyst Rick Nelson tells Brownfield this is a “great time to be in the cattle business.” Nelson talked with Brownfield’s John Perkins after the latest USDA cattle-on-feed numbers.

AUDIO: Rich Nelson (3 min. MP3)

College bound and financially confident

While the harvest season is a busy time for any producer, it is not the time to let other important issues be pushed to the side. This includes preparing college bound students to be financially responsible. The number of producers who have attended college has tripled in the past fifty years according to the USDA and continues to grow as farm kids move on to higher education. Sharon Burns, an associate professor at Purdue University has some suggestions for parents and students on creating financial plans for the school year.

AUDIO: Sharon Burns (3 minutes,mp3)

What’s new from DuPont Crop Protection?

Dupont Crop Protection has added the letter “Q” to some of its traditional herbicides to designate a safener that has been added to those products. And, for 2011, the company is introducing a new herbicide called Realm Q.  We discussed those developments and other topics with Jeff Carpenter, U.S. corn portfolio manager for DuPont Crop Protection. 

AUDIO: Jeff Carpenter (6 min MP3)

Kruse says he’ll keep advocating for ag

Advocating for agriculture. That’s what outgoing Missouri Farm Bureau President Charlie Kruse tells Brownfield he’ll keep doing after stepping down as president for the past 18 years. Kruse – a fourth generation farmer – will not seek reelection as Missouri Farm Bureau President in December.

AUDIO: Charlie Kruse (3 min. MP3)

The significance of practical research

Vince Davis, Extension soybean specialist at the University of Illinois says practical research provides results to growers who are looking for answers to help them make the right management decisions on their farm. As an example, Davis says at the University of Illinois they’re looking at reducing seeding rates and how that effects other management decisions like weed control, row spacing decisions and also planting date decisions.

AUDIO: Vince Davis, Extension soybean specialist, Univ. of IL (3:00 MP3)

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