Howdy Neighbors!

Here's your morning farm news headlines from the Director of Farm Programming for the Radio Oklahoma Network, Ron Hays. Our email this morning is a service of Midwest Farm Shows, featuring the Southern Plains Farm Show in Oklahoma City April 19-21, 2007, as well as the Tulsa Farm Show held each December. Check out details of both of these exciting shows at the official website of Midwest Farm Shows by clicking here.

Our E-mail the next few days is also being sponsored by Laura's Lean Beef- Laura's Lean Beef Co., a natural beef provider based in Lexington, KY, will hold a gathering 10:00 am Jan 24 at the Heart of Oklahoma Exposition Center in Shawnee, Ok to introduce local producers to the benefits of raising the lean, heavily muscled cattle that will perform well on Laura's bonus grids. For more information on this meeting- you can can e-mail Beth Whiteford at bwhiteford@LLBcorp.com. Or click here to be taken to their web site for more producer information on Laura's Lean Beef!

If you have received this by someone forwarding it to you, you are welcome to subscribe and get this weekday update sent to you directly by clicking here.

Today the AFBF gets a real feel of how the farm policy discussion may develop this year in the aftermath of the Democratic takeover of Congress this past November. They have on their program both the Chairman of the House Ag Committee, Blue Dog Democrat Collin Peterson of Minnesota as well as USDA Secretary Mike Johanns, who has positioned USDA to be the most involved in a farm policy debate this year as USDA has been since at least the 1980s.

We were hopeful that the Oklahoma YF&R contestants would advance on Sunday here in Salt Lake City- but that was not to be. Oklahoma's YF&R will be represented on the Executive Committee of the group at the national level in 2007, as Danielle Budy of Alva has been chosen to be the Vice Chairperson of the group.

Click here to listen to Ron converse with Steve Kouplen of AFBF here in Salt Lake City.

For example, we have posted from Sunday the interview we have linked above from Oklahoma Farm Bureau President Steve Kouplen- but we also have a fascinating conversation that we had with Dr. Keith Collins of USDA regarding what he calls the "stunning" developments in ethanol and biofuels in this country. Go to the Blog and scroll down and you will see the link for listening to our conversation with Dr. Collins.

We also talked with Jim Sartwelle, the Livestock Economist of the American Farm Bureau about cattle prices for the new year, and we also assembled a Readers Digest audio version of what we heard that we thought was interesting and important from the annual address to the membership from the President of the AFBF, Bob Stallman. There will be more added during the day on Monday- so check back a few times and see what else we add.

Click here for our AFBF Convention Blog for the latest this week from SLC.

The airlift extended to Sunday to cover mostly animals still in the northwestern corner of Cimarron County that remain isolated. Late Sunday evening, we did get confirmation that the feeding is done, the helicopters have been sent home and the approximately 10,000 cattle have gotten hay for their bellies to help hold them over until their owners are able to get in and re-establish contact with them.

In response to the rash of devastating winter storms in the High Plains, the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA) has launched a disaster relief effort for cattlemen. The effort will be similar to NCBA’s recent hurricane relief fund, which helped thousands of cattlemen recover from historic storms. In order for the donations to be tax deductible- the cattlemen are running this through their National Cattlemen's Foundation or NCF. Credit card contributions can be made by calling 1-866-BEEF- USA (1-866-233-3872) with Visa, MasterCard, and American Express cards accepted. Online contributions can also be made by going to the NCF Web site and the “Make a Contribution” page. We have linked it below.Donations are tax deductible. In conjunction with NCF, state cattlemen’s associations in the High Plains region will manage distribution of funds donated. That will include the Oklahoma Cattlemen's Association.

Click here for the Make A Contribution page of the National Cattlemen's Foundation.

"In my 28 years with the Conservation Commission, I have never seen this much conservation construction at one time," said OCC Assistant Director Ben Pollard. "The OCC staff and our conservation district partners are to be commended for their efforts in putting conservation on the ground," Pollard said.

Beltwide Cotton Conference: January 9-12, 2007. This meeting is the first big agricultural event to return to New Orleans and is a gathering of all segments of the U.S. cotton industry. Everything from production to policy is fair game at this annual gathering. We will offer coverage from this event through the help of several farm broadcast colleagues who will be on the scene.

International Livestock Congress: Friday, January 9th is the 2007 edition of the ILC to be held this year at the National Western Livestock Show in Denver. This event has been held for years in Houston, was held in Calgary last year and moves to Denver this year- with a lot of emphasis on practical issues to help a cattle producer run a better operation. We have linked the web site for the ILC below.

Click here for the International Livestock Congress website

The 2007 conference agenda has been planned to include a variety of topics such as traditional farming, women's safety, recordkeeping and backyard conservation. The planned keynote speaker is Dr. Mac McCrory with OSU/OKC who will present: "As years go by, does intimacy fade?" This year's conference will also feature a "Made in Oklahoma" mini-mall that will highlight products that are made right here in our state, such as buffalo meat products, wine, bath and body products and other food items and gives attendees the opportunity to visit with people who own and operate Oklahoma based businesses.

Although the title of the conference implies that the conference is for women, men are welcome as well. For additional conference information, please contact Sheri Nickel at the Garfield County Conservation District at (580)237- 7880.

Another culinary trend that the Food Network notes is the popularity of Asian flavors. Pork Checkoff officials say they are excited about that as they have several activities planned for 2007 during this "Year of the pig." We have linked the entire Food Network article that includes their ideas on pork below.

Click here to read about the top culinary trends for 2007 as predicted by the Food Network.

We have today's Beef Buzz from the Radio Oklahoma Network linked below- and we talk with Phil about the Korean beef mess- and that it really stems from our government being sloppy in their negotiations with Korea a year ago- and agreeing to boneless beef under 30 months of age. We discuss that as well as the encouraging signs seen with Japan through the "We Care" campaign.

Click here for today's Beef Buzz as Ron talks with Phil Seng of the US Meat Export Federation!

We also invite you to check out our website at the link below to check out an archive of these daily emails, audio reports and top farm news story links from around the globe.

Click here to check out WWW.OklahomaFarmReport.Com