Congrats to Cloverdale and South Putnam FFA's New State Officers

Indiana FFA Unveils New State Officer Team

Posted on 24 June 2012 by Andy Eubank

 

Life on the farm is something each member of the new Indiana FFA state officer team shares with the others. The seven were introduced as the 83^rd state convention concluded last week, and two of them are from Putnam County, including new state president Cameron Mann.

Cameron told HAT she’s had her eye on state office since her freshman year in the Cloverdale FFA chapter.

“It’s always been something I thought would be such a unique opportunity and a once in a lifetime experience and great chance to give back to this organization,” she said. “More specifically this year I really thought about it and decided that this is definitely what I wanted to go for, and I’m just so blessed to have this opportunity and to be here today.”

She lives on the farm where the family is involved in hog and grain production, and those high school years were certainly busy.

“In high school I was very active in all the school clubs. I was in student council and I was the class president, and I was also involved at the county level with the 4-H program. And we have a Putnam County youth philanthropy committee which does some charity work and gives out grants for community service. Those are some of my favorite actitivies.”

Katherine Spencer will serve as FFA state secretary. She told HAT, “I am from the South Putnam FFA chapter in Putnam County. Cameron and I are from the same county, same district, good friends, and we’re both excited to be serving together and representing our county. I grew up on my family farm. We’re a grain production farm on both sides of my family, and that’s my farm experience. And I garden which is one of my passions.”

Get to know Cameron and Katherine and their goals for Indiana FFA this year in the HAT interview:

Click Play To Listen: 

Rounding out the officer team are Sentinel: Brandon Bergdall from Bellmont FFA, Reporter: Shelby Riley of Hamilton County, Treasurer: Mallarie Stookie, Warsaw FFA, SR VP: Briley Fichter of Castle FFA (Warrick County) and NR VP: Marshall Perkins from Prairie Heights FFA.

Also during the convention last week the State Stars were honored. Winners were Star Farmer, Mallarie Stookey; Agricultural Placement, Katelin Schomber; Agribusiness, Chad Jones.

(Photo by Nicolette Weiler, Connersville High School)

Click Play To Listen: 

Local Master Farmers Honored

2012 Master Farmers honored at June 20 banquet

Six Indiana farmers were given the title of "Master Farmer" at a banquet held June 20 in Plymouth. Indiana Prairie Farmer and Purdue University Extension hosted the event, which served as a nice bridge between days one and two of Purdue's 2012 Farm Management Tour. In a somewhat unique nomination, three brothers who farm together were added to the impressive list of Master Farmers: Kerry, Kim and Kent Ames from 4-K Farms in Fillmore, Ind. were each named. Bill Schroeder (Reynolds), Ed Carmichael (Sullivan) and Gene Schmidt (Hanna) were also bestowed the title of Master Farmer at the recognition banquet, after which they all shared their secrets to success in a panel discussion with Purdue ag economist Chris Hurt (pictured above). All of the new Master Farmers have been or are currently involved in Farm Bureau, and we applaud them for being recognized as the best of the best in the Hoosier farming community.

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Senate passes Farm Bill, now on to the House

Farm Bureau pleased with Senate’s passage of farm bill

            The bipartisan farm bill approved today by the U.S. Senate includes many provisions that are good for Indiana farmers and provides a valuable safety net, according to Indiana Farm Bureau President Don Villwock.

            “We will continue to work with the House to get the best bill possible for farmers across the state,” he said.

            “While no farm bill is perfect, this is a solid bill that was worthy of Senate approval,” noted American Farm Bureau President Bob Stallman. “The bill includes important reforms and is fiscally responsible, while including important provisions to enhance crop insurance, maintain a viable marketing loan program and minimize the potential for farm program provisions to drive producer decisions.”

            As passed by the Senate, the bill provides $23 billion in savings, protects and strengthens the federal crop insurance program, and encourages farmers to use market signals rather than government programs to make planting decisions.

            The measure, which was approved on a bipartisan 64-35 vote, now moves to the House of Representatives’ Committee on Agriculture, which is expected to begin work in July.

            “We still have a lot of work to do but this is a good start,” Villwock said, adding that Farm Bureau would particularly like to thank Sens. Richard Lugar and Dan Coats for their support.

Agriculture wins one in D.C.

The Department of Labor has officially and formally withdrawn any action affecting child labor in Agriculture.  They will be partnering with Farm Bureau to assist in providing programs on Farm Safety to help prevent Farm Accidents involving children.

News Flash

The Ames boys; Kerry, Kim, and Kent have been named Master Farmers.  More details will follow as more information is available.

The Importance of Corn

Over the next three months, more than 90 million acres of corn will grow tall, tassel, grow ears and then die. Only a handful of people will even notice or even care. Most Americans will fly past a field of corn at 70 mph never really seeing what is there. A few may pause from their texting and wonder why we grow so much corn. On the whole, however, most Americans are clueless about the important role that corn plays in their lives and in their futures.

Corn, or Maize to the rest of the world, has played a very important role in human history — mostly as a food source for humans and animals. The development of the modern US corn industry has been primarily as a protein source for livestock. In the past few decades, we have begun to think of corn as an energy as well as protein source. Currently, most of the gasoline sold in the US contains 10% corn ethanol.  Corn is now moving into the biodiesel market with many ethanol plants now extracting the oil from corn for use in diesel fuel. Despite the considerable efforts of big oil companies and radical environmentalists — (an interesting alliance) — to stop the growth of corn-based renewable energy, the US is moving toward making corn part of its energy portfolio.

But corn may have an even bigger role to play in our nation’s future, a role that has nothing to do with protein or gasoline. At the National Corn Utilization Conference last week in Indianapolis, some of the top corn researchers in the country were all a twitter about the new potential for corn.

Dr. Mike Ladisch from Purdue, said the next big role for corn will be as a raw material for chemicals. According to Ladisch, “Corn is an excellent source of very pure sugars and starches.”  He said, with the advances we have seen in biochemical and chemical engineering, there are a wide variety of new products that can be made from these sugars and starches. He noted that chemicals companies are not looking at corn as a plant but rather as a biological chemical producing factory capable of producing a large, economical, and renewable source of chemicals raw materials. He added that corn will begin to replace petroleum in many industrial and manufactured products. 

Does this mean another competitor for our corn supply? Ladisch said no, because many of these chemical processes will be byproducts of existing corn processing activities. What this does mean is that the value of the corn crop will increase and the importance of corn production in the Midwest will grow.

Former Purdue Ag Dean and Word Bank executive Bob Thompson once told me the Corn Belt states of the Midwest are uniquely suited with the right soil and climate to grow corn.  No other region in the world can produce corn as efficiently and in greater quantities than the US Midwest.  In the future, the world will be demanding more food, energy, and industrial raw materials, and corn will be able to play in all those markets.  So in the next 50 years, the Corn Belt states of the Midwest will be as important as OPEC is today. Our weather, planting decisions, and crop conditions will make headlines and move world markets.  That may help you feel a bit better about that farm ground you just bought for $10,000 an acre.

by Gary Truitt

Putnam County Farm Bureau meeting

Next meeting is Tuesday, June 12 at 7 pm.