While attending the National FFA Convention in Indianapolis, Indiana, Senior Farm and Ranch Broadcaster Ron Hays caught up with current National FFA President Amara Jackson to talk about her year of service as it is coming to an end.

Jackson said that she didn’t love agricultural education when she was first put in the class during her freshman year of high school. She was already busy with her horse, dance, band, and serving on the student council. Her older sister convinced her to attend one FFA meeting and the rest is history.

“After that, I fell in love with the people, my agricultural educators, and their support,” she shared. “Then I went to my first state convention in Michigan, and that’s when I realized how much opportunity there was for students like me and how much of a priority I wanted FFA to be in my life.”

She competed in Prepared Public Speaking and Parliamentary Procedure during her time in FFA and feels that they taught her to be a better communicator, to take control of a room, and to better connect with the people around her.

As she prepares to take off her FFA jacket for the last time this weekend in Indy- she plans to return to Stillwater in January to continue her studies in Ag Communications and Agribusiness- Go Pokes!

Our coverage of Oklahoma FFA engaged at the National FFA Convention is being powered again in 2024 by Oklahoma Farm Bureau. Watch for our stories and interviews from Indianapolis on our Website, Daily Email, our statewide Radio Oklahoma Ag Network and our Social Media Channels. Click here for the OKFB website to learn about how they are making a difference in the lives of Oklahomans.

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Major User of Fresh Ground Beef- McDonalds- Dealing with E Coli in the Chain's Quarter Pounders

The Golden Arches of McDonalds may be facing their biggest food safety problem in the history of the company. According to the CDC- the Center of Disease Control- "This is a fast-moving outbreak investigation. Most sick people are reporting eating Quarter Pounder hamburgers from McDonald’s and investigators are working quickly to confirm which food ingredient is contaminated. McDonald’s has pulled ingredients for these burgers, and they won’t be available for sale in some states."

The CDC goes on to say "CDC, FDA, USDA FSIS, and public health officials in multiple states are investigating an outbreak of E. coli O157:H7 infections. Most people in this outbreak are reporting eating the Quarter Pounder hamburger at McDonald’s before becoming sick. It is not yet known which specific food ingredient is contaminated.

"McDonald’s is collaborating with investigation partners to determine what food ingredient in Quarter Pounders is making people sick. McDonald’s stopped using fresh slivered onions and quarter pound beef patties in several states while the investigation is ongoing to identify the ingredient causing illness."

At the Oklahoma Farm Report- we are reaching out to Lopez-Dorada Foods as they are the grinder for McDonalds for their beef in this part of the country- including several of the states involved, We do NOT know at this point if Lopez is part of the food safety investigation or not- we hope to learn more during the day today.

Industry experts have reminded us that those fresh hamburger patties are thoroughly cooked in standardized equipment- it's much more likely that something like the onions that are added to the sandwich after cooking could be- emphasis- could be the culprit. CDC is investigating.

We did do a Beef Buzz with John Patrick Lopez this summer about their company and the beef they produce for McDonalds- including the fresh beef that has been produced since May of 2018 for specifically the Quarter Pounder.

Election Day Battle Pits Animal Ag Groups Against Extremist Group in Denver

Senior Farm and Ranch Broadcaster Ron Hays features comments from Colorado Cattlemen’s Association Executive Vice President Erin Karney Spaur about the fight against a relatively new anti-animal agricultural group currently staged in Denver, Colorado.

Leading into the 2024 election, while many people are focused on the Presidential Race and other high-ranking elections, Karney says that there is an anti-animal agricultural group that people in the livestock business need to be watching and a ballot initiative to be aware of.

The group is known as Pro Animal Future, and they have been integral in getting Initiated Ordinance 309 onto the ballot in the city and county of Denver. The initiative would ban slaughterhouses in the city and county of Denver, namely a sheep slaughterhouse called Superior Farms, the only remaining slaughterhouse in Denver. Also on the ballot is Initiated Ordinance 308 which would ban fur sales in the area.

“When you think about Denver, you think about the stockyards because it was the meat-packing district down there,” Karney said. “One slaughterhouse remains, Superior Farms.”

Why should a cattlemen’s association be concerned about preserving a lamb slaughterhouse? Karney said, “Ultimately, it comes down to Pro-Animal Future and their broad goals of, not only eliminating that slaughterhouse but also eliminating animal agriculture.”

Oklahoma Cotton has faced some ups and downs over the years. Farm Director KC Sheperd caught up with NexGen Regional Manager Shane Osborne to discuss this year’s cotton crop.

The statewide cotton outlook is gauged off of dryland fields, and Osborne says that things look bleak across most of the state. Rains have fallen in areas along Interstate 40, from Erick to Oklahoma City, and that will produce the bulk of the dryland cotton for Oklahoma this year.

“It’s a pretty tough year,” he admitted. “There are not a lot of things going our way. We came into this year in pretty good fashion, but that’s kind of the story of cotton. What matters the most out in the field is the very end of the season. The plant doesn’t really fruit up heavily until August, and a lot of money rides on how August and early September treat us, and it was not very well at all this year.”

The season brought temperatures so high that irrigation couldn’t even keep up, and little to no rainfall to help. Oklahoma’s irrigation systems are only supplemental, so rainfall is still heavily depended upon in the state.

The American Peanut Council today launched the 2024 crop enrollment for the Sustainable U.S. Peanuts Initiative. In its fourth year, the initiative is supporting America’s peanut industry with metrics on the most efficient use of production resources and encouraging farm operation sustainability practices that will help meet customer expectations, lead to increased demand for peanuts and set the stage for long-term economic viability.

For growers who weren’t able to take advantage of early bird sign up during pre-harvest, they can enroll their ‘24 crop through April 2025 (or update their information from previous crop years) at https://sustainableuspeanuts.org/. An informational toolkit for growers can be accessed here: https://peanutsusa.com/our-work/sustainability.html.

“For peanut growers to be productive and profitable, the industry will need to increase demand for peanuts, and in our current market one of the biggest drivers for demand is quickly becoming sustainability,” said American Peanut Council President and CEO Richard Owen. “Because consumers are demanding sustainable food production practices, manufacturers, retailers and our international trading partners have the same expectations. To be competitive, both domestically and internationally, the industry will need to prove and document peanut sustainability, which is the goal of the initiative.”

Attorney General Gentner Drummond is pushing back against a Biden-Harris Administration rule to allow illegal immigrants to remain where they are in the country while also affording them the possibility of employment and access to public benefits programs.

In an amicus brief filed last week in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, Drummond and six other attorneys general expressed support for a lawsuit challenging the Biden-Harris administration’s “Parole-in-Place” (PIP) rule. This rule would allow over a million illegal aliens to remain in the United States and live as temporary legal residents until they can apply for permanent residency.

“The Biden-Harris administration’s ‘Parole-in-Place’ rule would greatly exacerbate the nation’s border crisis, which is already creating unprecedented criminal activity in Oklahoma,” said Drummond. “This misguided policy increases costs and administrative burdens for our state when the federal government should be working hard to decrease them. As Oklahoma’s chief law enforcement officer, I believe it is important to challenge this rule to protect the public safety as well as our resources. We must secure our communities.”

In August 2024, the Department of Homeland Security implemented the PIP rule, which only added fuel to the nation’s illegal immigration crisis. The program incentivizes more illegal immigration, sending an unmistakable signal that the U.S. is unwilling to enforce immigration laws. 

More than 40% of adults and more than 19% of children have obesity in the U.S., according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Oklahoma has one of the highest obesity rates in the nation at over 40% for adults and over 30% for children.

To improve these grim statistics, Oklahoma State University Ag Research scientists are studying how one of the human body’s best-kept secrets in the form of a protein could help fight obesity.

OSU researchers recently discovered a protein called CTRP6 secreted by white blood cells in adipose tissue, the primary tissue that stores fat in the body. The white blood cells, also known as macrophages, are prominently found in obese adipose tissue, making up to 50% of all adipose tissue cells in the obese state, compared to just 5% in the lean state. Macrophages play a crucial role in regulating inflammation within adipose tissue, contributing to obesity and serious health conditions like diabetes.

“We discovered that CTRP6 causes macrophages to become more aggressive and release a lot of cytokines that promote inflammation. This increased inflammation can lead to problems like insulin resistance and worsening obesity,” said Xia Lei, assistant professor in the OSU Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology.