USDA Announces Cancellation and Postponement of Selected Reports

The U.S. Department of Agriculture  announced Thursday morning that the National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) and World Agricultural Outlook Board (WAOB) have cancelled or postponed publication of selected USDA statistical reports impacted by the lapse in federal funding.

NASS's Crop Production and Cotton Ginnings reports and the WAOB's World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE) scheduled for October 11th are canceled. The next scheduled release for these reports is November 8, 2013. Additionally, NASS's Crop Progress reports scheduled for October 7th and 15th are cancelled. NASS's Cattle on Feed and Peanut Prices reports scheduled for October 18th are postponed.

While the lapse in federal funding has ended, NASS has not been able to engage in the necessary data collection and analysis over the past few weeks. NASS is assessing its data collection plans and evaluating the timing of upcoming reports. 

Fact Check Mr. President: The House and Senate Have Already Started Farm Bill Negotiations 

In his remarks to the nation on Thursday morning, President Barack Obama offered three items that he hopes Congress will move forward on in the remaining days of 2013- and one of those priorities of the President is the Farm Bill:

"[N]umber three. We should pass a farm bill, one that American farmers and ranchers can depend on, one that protects vulnerable children and adults in times of need, one that gives rural communities opportunities to grow and the long-term certainty that they deserve. Again, the Senate's already passed a solid bipartisan bill. It's got support from Democrats and Republicans. It's sitting in the House waiting for passage. If House Republicans have ideas that they think would improve the farm bill, let's see them. Let's negotiate. What are we waiting for? Let's get this done."

Quickly after the President's remarks- the House Ag Committee offered the following "Fact Check" in a news release:

"The House adopted a motion to go to conference on Friday, October 11. The House named conferees to negotiate differences in the House and Senate-passed farm bills on Saturday, October 12.

"As reported in Politico, the four principals of the House and Senate Agriculture Committees met on Wednesday, October 16, to discuss next steps in enacting a comprehensive farm bill this year.   The first, formal conference meeting is expected when the House and Senate are in session together. " (which is now expected to be the week of October 28) 

We have the President's remarks in my Friday morning Farm News as heard on the Radio Oklahoma Ag Network- along with a comment from Wednesday of this week by Congressman Frank Lucas who is on the same page as the President when it comes to getting a farm bill done this year.  

NAWG and U.S. Wheat Associates Applaud 2013 World Food Prize Laureates, Reinforce Support for Biotech Wheat

The National Association of Wheat Growers (NAWG) and U.S. Wheat Associates (USW) Thursday reinforced their support for the continued development of biotech wheat by joining others in the industry to congratulate the 2013 World Food Prize recipients, whose work has been instrumental to this vital technology.

While biotech wheat is not currently available to farmers, NAWG, USW and the wheat farmers who lead them support innovation, research and the responsible introduction of new wheat varieties, including biotech wheat. Both organizations are working with industry partners throughout the wheat value chain to prepare the path for these new varieties of wheat - both biotech and non-biotech - that will improve farmers' ability to increase yields, use fewer agricultural inputs and continually improve the quality of their crop. 

Click here to read more. 

Tyler Schnaithman, is currently the State Secretary of the Oklahoma FFA. He will be representing Oklahoma at the National FFA Convention in Louisville, Kentucky, at the end of October, not only as a state officer, but also in the National Prepared Public Speaking Contest. He recently spoke with me about the convention and his plans for the future. He will also join me on this weekend's "In the Field" segment on News 9 about 6:40 a.m. Saturday. 

Schnaithman has been an outstanding public speaker and has won several FFA speech titles. In competing at the national convention, he made the choice to enter the prepared speaking category as opposed to extemporaneous. He also elected to deliver his speech in the area of plant science as opposed to foreign trade. Schnaithman said the decision to speak about the current GMO debate wasn't that hard to make.

In talking about his speech, Tyler tells us "Coming from a farming background, it discusses organic versus conventional farming and the GM labeling issues. I just feel like with question I can relate a little bit easier coming from a farming background rather than my other speech which was foreign trade. I felt like this was a good issue to talk about and something that I could definitely relate to."

He said the emotions surrounding the issue of genetically modified crops are getting in the way of facts.

Click here to listen to more of our conversation or to read more of this story.

 

Rancher Starts Heifers for South Dakota Project to Help Ranchers Rebuild Herds

A blizzard two weeks ago killed thousands of head of cattle in parts of South Dakota, putting the future of many ranchers in jeopardy. As clean-up efforts continue, people outside the region are asking how they might help.

Montana rancher Ty Linger has come up with a project to help called Heifers for South Dakota. He joins me for the latest Beef Buzz and says he wanted to be able to provide quality-bred females or heifers to any rancher who was seriously affected by the storm.

"We're wanting to reach out to young ranching couples or individuals just getting started. We wanted to donate cattle to people saying, 'You know what? We made it through the storm and we're going to keep going.'"

For those who would like to help in this herd rebuilding project, Linger set up a website: http://helpforsouthdakota.com/

He says there are currently several ways that people can help, with a number of groups collecting money and holding auctions to raise funds for distribution to those hit hardest by the storm. He says Heifers for South Dakota is doing something a little more unique: they are collecting cattle. 

You can listen to the latest Beef Buzz or read more by clicking here.  

Animal Agriculture Alliance Finds Glaring Discrepancies In 'Meatless Monday' Campaign

After weeks of investigation, the Animal Agriculture Alliance has concluded that the Meatless Monday Campaign is grossly misrepresenting the campaign's enrollment and prevalence among schools, restaurants, hospitals and colleges. Since the inception of the Meatless Monday campaign, the Alliance has closely monitored the campaign's progress and tried to correct its misinformation about the healthfulness of meat consumption and environmental impact of livestock production.

In anticipation of the Meatless Monday campaign's 10thanniversary, the Alliance analyzed the overall effects of the campaign and gauged its effectiveness by individually surveying every participant listed on the Meatless Monday website. The Alliance found that the campaign has not been as popular as the Meatless Monday movement claimed. Most notably:

-- Out of the 236 kindergarten through twelfth grade schools listed as participating, more than 51% no longer or never participated in the program.

You can read more about these discrepancies by clicking here. 
 

This N That- Cattle on Feed Postponed- But We Have Pre Report Numbers Anyway,  Blackjack and Friends Sale Tomorrow and Fingers Crossed on Walk Around Weather 

We mentioned earlier that the USDA announced yesterday morning that they have not totally cancelled the Cattle on Feed report for this month- originally set to be released this afternoon.  

Well, while the USDA has not been counting steers and heifers to release a report today- Rich Nelson and the folks at Allendale have.  Rich tells us in an email earlier this week that  "September Placements are expected to 1.2% lower than last year. This number is actually artificially high simply because it is being compared with September 2012, the lowest September of any year since the data series began in 1996. September 2012 was a full 17% below that year's five year average. September placements are marketed from February through June.  

"Allendale anticipates a Marketing total 3.0% higher than September of 2012. There was one more weekday but one less Saturday in September 2013 than in 2012 which gave an artificial increase.

"Total Cattle on Feed as of October 1 will be 7.6% smaller than last year. This would be smaller than the September 1 survey which showed 7.2% fewer cattle."

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The Blackjack and Guests Annual Female Production Sale will be held tomorrow, Saturday, October 19, 2013 at 12:30 PM, with the sale to be held at at Blackjack Farms, Seminole, Oklahoma

The Grissoms will be Selling- 75 Angus and Simangus Lots

The other cattle operations that are a part of this sale tomorrow includes Dismukes Ranch, McFerran Farms, Pfeiffer Angus Farms and Sawoaks.

Click here for our Auction listing which includes the link for the catalog that can be found on the National Cattle Services website.  

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Finally- it's homecoming weekend at OSU- and I know many of you that read this email daily will be in Stillwater this afternoon, evening and perhaps in the morning for the festivities surrounding this weekend's football game.  

Unfortunately for the Walk Around this PM- things don't sound so good- the latest word from the National Weather Service for Stillwater is "Showers likely, mainly after 1pm. Mostly cloudy, with a high near 55. Northeast wind 8 to 11 mph. Chance of precipitation is 70%." Some hour by hour weather forecasts I have seen are not that optimistic on the temperature- one shows a falling temperature from 50 down to 45 between 1 pm and 6 pm.   

So- Dress warm and expect rain to be part of your parade.