Ag Matters
Summer 2021
Get farm-fresh produce at local farmers’ markets Farmers’ markets have been a staple in Bureau County for years, as this photo taken at a prior year’s farmers’ market shows. With nice weather rolling in, farmers’ markets all over Bureau County are opening for the season. Spring Valley, Princeton, and Ladd all have farmers’ markets where you can stock up on fresh vegetables, fruits, herbs, and more. The Ladd farmers’ market is from 4 to 6 p.m. every Monday except Labor Day from June 14 to September at Ladd Memorial Park on Main Street. The Princeton farmers’ market is open from 8:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Saturdays through October at Soldiers and Sailors Park in Princeton. The Spring Valley farmers’ market will be from 4 to 6 p.m. on Wednesdays, from June 23 until Oct. 6, at the corner of Route 6 and Cornelia St. in Spring Valley.
A publication of
Pictured: Isaiah Detweiler, 8, of rural Tiskilwa helps work at a stand at the Princeton Farmer’s Market. His mom, Karla Detweiler (left), said it’s important for children to learn where food comes from, and, for her family, that means having her children help at a farmers’ market stand. PHOTO BY SHANNON SERPETTE
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Extension educator and crop science researcher Dennis Bowman is exploring aerial photography and drones.
Crop, pasture scouting goes aerial By Tom C. Doran AGRINEWS PUBLICATIONS
URBANA, Ill. — Drones have transitioned over the past several years from a curiosity to crop and livestock production tool. The benefits of using unmanned aerial vehicles on farms and ranches were the topic of an Illinois Nutrient Loss Reduction podcast hosted by Todd Gleason, University of Illinois Extension media communications specialist. Panelists were Dennis Bowman, U of I Extension, interim assistant dean for ag and natural resources program and commercial ag educator specializing in precision agriculture and technology; Scott Erickson, Knox County farmer; and Teresa Steckler, Extension commercial agriculture educator specializing in ruminant production. DENNIS BOWMAN How do you use drones in your current work? Bowman: Drones are just a really great tool to extend your reach and your vision in the time of year when
you can look at fields. One of the reasons I started investigating drones was to help out as a crop scouting tool, but also in my job as troubleshooting for crop problems, getting that big picture of a field, remote sensing imagery on demand any time you want it to collect the information and also to document things over time as things change throughout the season to get an idea where problems might be occurring and to develop a record of different things that could go on. One of the research projects I’m working on is using drones to collect information about soybean varieties where we’re looking at the maturities of hundreds of different soybean lines. As they approach maturity we fly the drone every week and catch minor changes in colors as those different lines start to move in to maturity and document the maturity ratings and when the appropriate harvest time might be.
get potholes in the field and a drone is really handy for mapping out those wet spots and keeping track of them and also for the erosion side of water management. With the size of farms, the operator may not actual operate a combine or a tractor in all of the farms that they’re farming and cover every acre every year. Using a bare soil drone flight before the crop is planted or in the fall after harvest you can look for those areas and you can see where erosion is starting to occur and how extensive it is and you might not be aware that. By taking a series of pictures as the drones fly over a field you can do a technique called photogrammetry. Even by just flying over a field and taking grids of pictures, computers can take those pictures and put them together into a three dimensional model. You can build an elevation model that shows the erosion, the depth of the gullies, how extensive they are, Are there conservation practices where and with certain software you can you find that drones are useful? actually map out the volume of soil Bowman: Water has such a huge im- that’s been removed by these gullies. pact on crops, both too little and too Or, if you’re going to do some conmuch. With too much water you can struction practices to try to correct
these things you can get an idea of how much fill might be needed to fix the problems.
Are there special licensing or rules related to using drones for agriculture purposes? Bowman: If you’re going to use a drone for your business you need an FAA pilot’s license for unmanned aerial vehicles in order to operate that. The license is good for two years. You have to pass a fairly extensive test. There are several online courses or weekend courses that you can take that can get you up to speed pretty quickly with enough knowledge to pass the exam. It’s not impossible to do yourself and there are a lot of free online sources you can use as well to get that information, but you do have to pass the exam, pay the fee, and every two years you have to take a recurrency exam to make sure you’re still up on all your knowledge. You need to be aware of what the laws are on how to use drones, where you can safely use them. If you’re near an airport, that causes some problems, but by going through
a little more of the bank with it every year and every couple of years we have to do some erosion control. It’s a lot easier to see that when the water is up and it’s definitely easier to see when I don’t have to wear mud boots and walk around trying to figure out where the water is coming out at. I’ve really like using the drone and it seems to help us out a lot.
SCOTT ERICKSON Erickson grows corn and soybeans — 90% rotation, 10% continuous corn — and has a farrow-to-finish hog operation on the family’s farm. The operation is primarily no-till with some light chisel plowing on the continuous corn ground along a creek that runs through the farm. Erickson: I bought my first drone four or five years ago for the same reason everybody does, just to see if I could take cool pictures around the farm. Now I use it a lot more for work than I anticipated. We can have flood issues where the creek runs through and I got a better drone because I want to be able to fly over the creek line to see where it’s holding water or where water is coming out and we need to do some erosion control, or this farm is going to need tile because it seems like it’s holding water longer than others. The creek has a deep bank creek and a lot of the farms are pattern-tiled, but there are some spots that you can tell when the water comes out it takes
Have you used it to see where wet areas might be in the spring to more easily locate the areas that may need tile? Erickson: I took the drone up to look at emergence to try to see where the trouble spots might be on a farm that I did some cover crop on last year. When I had the drone in the air I could see some spots that from the air almost looked like drowned-out spots, but they weren’t, they’re just a little wetter than the rest of the farm. I took some pictures of that farm and sent them to my tiling company and they’re going to put some tile in just those spots whenever they get back around this area. The biggest thing I use mine for is for farm ground that we rent or lease from a family member or landlord. I try to fly and take a picture every week once the corn is out of the ground, but I don’t always get it done. It will give you a pretty good idea of the progress of the farm and you don’t have to do that Sunday afternoon drive to see how things are doing on the farm.
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How do you use drones in your livestock research? Steckler: I am currently trying to recruit cattlemen who need assistance with their pastures. We’ve had very poor spring weather the last several years in southern Illinois. The wet and cold weather didn’t lend itself to the growth of the forages very well, and we’ve had some very dry falls. The culmination of all of this is a lot of overgrazing of our pastures. The
Tom C. Doran can be reached at 815-780-7894 or tdoran@ shawmedia.com. Follow him on Twitter at: @AgNews_Doran.
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pastures just haven’t had time to be rested and once you’ve had pastures that are over-grazed that lends itself to having invasive species or forages that are not very consumable for the livestock. You need to give these pastures time to recuperate and unfortunately a lot of these gentlemen just don’t have that option. One of the things that I’ve been trying to do is get cattlemen to do at least more of a rotational graze. That way the grasses have somewhere between three to five days, maybe seven days, to recover from being grazed, and also working with them to spot spray. One of the nice things the drones can do is instead of having to drive over the entire pasture we just fly over. It’s quicker, it’s easier and the cattlemen actually can get a whole different perspective and really target those areas and possibly set aside the really poor sections and work on those as far as spot spraying or bush hog. It also helps us figure out the lay of the land, where the creeks might be and how we can work with waters, whether we need to take a wagon wheel approach or just make squares out of it, but figure out what’s the best layout that’s the easiest for the cattlemen to implement these changes.
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What pointers do you have for farmers interested in using drones? Erickson: The biggest thing is the government regulations and getting your license. It’s not hard to do. It’s not a tough test. It’s pretty much all common sense stuff, but you do have to jump through some hoops just like anything. As for the actual flying of the drones, I had two of them. The first one was kind of a low dollar one, under $1,000. That’s still expensive, but it was hard to fly. It took some serious getting used to, to be able to do what I needed to do with. The one I purchased last year is more technologically advanced and more money, but it almost flies itself. It’s definitely not anything to be afraid of. I don’t want to spend $2,000 on something and then not be able to fly it. There’s not a very sharp learning curve on the newer, nicer stuff.
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the education to get the license you learn the rules of where you can fly and how to go about getting approval if you are near an airport. If you have fields within five miles of an airport that operates commercial then you’re going to have to go through some extra hoops of permissions. You learn all about that as you go through the study guides for the exam.
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Lessons learned on farm Coach uses ag background to build teams By Jeannine Otto
AGRINEWS PUBLICATIONS
CARTHAGE, Ill. — Growing up on his father Arnold Bielema’s farrow-to-finish pig farm in Whiteside County, Bret Bielema learned early to admire and respect the farm’s veterinarian, Dr. Sampson. That was among the many lessons Bielema learned during his years on the family farm near Prophetstown. Bielema, who played at nose guard for the University of Iowa Bielema Hawkeyes under Coach Hayden Fry, has been head coach at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he led the Bad-
gers to a 68-24 overall record and took the team to three consecutive Rose Bowl games. He was the head coach at the University of Arkansas, where he finished with a 29-34 record for the Razorbacks. Bielema worked as an assistant coach in the NFL, for the New England Patriots and the New York Giants. On Dec. 19, 2020, the University of Illinois announced Bielema’s hiring to replace Coach Lovie Smith. Bielema and his wife, Jen, have two daughters. He shared some lessons learned about life, death, adversity and what it takes to build strong teams, with Dr. Clayton Johnson of Carthage Veterinary Service during the Carthage Spring Symposium. AG EDUCATION “I grew up on a pig farm in Prophetstown, Illinois. I’ve always said the part I knew early on in life is that hard work pays off. My dad also ran a grain elevator during the course of the week. That’s when he had the labor of me, my brother and my other brother, very cheap labor, very, very efficient labor for him. I never
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really knew anything but work.”
VET TALK “Our doc was a guy by the name of Doc Sampson. Our vet was the coolest, absolutely the most awesome dude, a great sense of humor. Every once in a while we had to call the vet. Doc Sampson would come in his truck and he would always save the day. He was one of those guys who always made everything better. I grew up in an environment where there were different things that could really wipe out your farm in a single moment. “When I left for college, I really thought I was going to come back as a veterinarian. In my lifetime, that had been a guy who had heavily influenced me and had been a guy who I kind of wanted to be like.” WORLD VIEW “I also realized that there’s a whole world out there that I didn’t know. As I was exposed to more at the University of Iowa, that’s when I began to grow and I began to see people who were different from me, people who didn’t know my life,
people who didn’t have my experience and that’s when you truly begin to grow.”
COLLEGE DAZE “When you’re at college, it’s the first time no one knows it’s your birthday. It’s the first time no one knows that your grandmother passed. It’s the first time when nobody knows when your mom is diagnosed with cancer. It’s the first time no one knows that you are going through something. It affects your life. It was tough because I was away and I was very close to my grandma and no one knew about it, but I had to overcome that by myself. I just had to work my way through it, so I did, but it was a really, really hard moment because it was the first time you realize you’re all on your own.”
CINNAMON ROLLS AND SLURPEES In October 1990, Bielema was a sophomore at the University of Iowa. Fresh from the Hawkeyes’ victory over Michigan, Bielema was counting the games the Hawkeyes would need to win to get to the Rose
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at the University of Wisconsin, we’re like 9-1, 8-1. We’re good. We’re really, really good. I get a call on a Sunday morning that three of my players who were all from the same high school, a friend of theirs, the night before, he fell in a lake and didn’t come out, they didn’t know if he was alive or dead and they were looking for him. “We were right in the middle of football season. It’s a Sunday. We’ve got a big work day ahead of us. It was a big game that week. I said go, be with their families, and by the end of the day, it got back to me that they had found his body. “Monday afternoon, I get to my office and here’s a group of young men who have no guidance. They are great kids, they had never been through anything like this and they were emotional. I said, ‘Let me ask you something. You’ve got a lot of great memories about your friend. What was something he did that was a little bit funny, a little bit goofy,’ and they all started laughing. “I guess this kid was a Slurpee junkie. He would always get a Slurpee at the gas and sips. It made them all start laughing. I said, ‘Whenever you want to think of him or you see a Slurpee machine or an Icee machine, tell whoever you are with about your friend.’ That’s when I knew that pastor had told me something, 15 years before that.
I know it was bigger than that.” SMALL TOWNS “My girls are everything to me. One of the reasons I want to have such great success, I want to bring Illinois something they’ve never had before. But I also want to live in this town for a long time and let my girls live in this town because it’s such a great environment for them to live in. I’ve always kind of wanted to be in a small college town environment to raise my girls, so this is the most precious moment I could have. “As soon as they’re old enough, they are going to going to a farm for a week and find out what it’s like to be raised on a farm. I don’t think there’s anything that can give you a better perspective of what’s expected in life than a farm.” LOOK OUT “I’ve been around a lot of really smart people who have no awareness. I think about a lot of times, the positions I’ve been in, even when I was an assistant coach or a younger coach and I had awareness that we were in trouble, but the guys that I was working with or had to report to, sometimes they didn’t know it until it was too late. “I think awareness of adversity is huge, and to see it coming. I refer to it like a driver, to see it coming around the corner before it’s in front
of you. The more you can be proactive to adversity rather than reactive is a huge advantage. If you can understand it’s coming and have an idea of how you want to attack it, the first thing you have to do is be aware that it’s coming.” TWO WORDS “There are two words that I go back to all the time and I think are really hard to find in human society today and they are communication and consistency. Communication is a two-way street. You have to be able to speak, but more importantly, you have to be able to hear it. “Consistency in your approach — the one thing I always tell coaches when I hire them, I want to have a consistent person. I want to have the same person every day. “If you are consistent, then I can figure out what your strengths are and your weaknesses are. If you are consistent, I know what I need to help you with and what I can let you do by yourself. That is a very important thing.” PORK DENIAL “As I got in this profession and I went out to recruiting meals, this one buddy of mine would always order a pork chop, and he was like, ‘These are so good,’ and I would See Bielema page 6
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Bowl — and a chance for his older sister, Betsy, 27, who lived in Seattle, to come down and see him play in the Rose Bowl. Hours after the victory over Michigan, Bielema was informed that Betsy had been killed in a horseback riding accident. Four of his friends on the team drove him home. “I took my sister to her grave as a pallbearer. I was in a corner all by myself and I couldn’t catch my breath. The pastor came and put his arm around me. He thanked me and said, ‘There’s going to come a time in your life when you are going to realize what this moment means. I don’t know what it’s going to be, but at some point, you’ll know it.’ He said, ‘What did your sister do that made everybody happy? I heard she was a caring girl.’ “I said, ‘She used to make these cinnamon rolls that were as live as live gets. She would do it, surprise us, the whole place would smell like cinnamon rolls. She’d deliver them to Grandma and Grandpa, aunts and uncles. She could really make a mean cinnamon roll.’ “The pastor said, ‘For the rest of your life, anytime you see a cinnamon roll, smell a cinnamon roll, or bite a cinnamon roll, whoever you are with, tell them about your sister. It will always keep her alive in your memory.’ “So, my first year as head coach
couldn’t get reception on my phone. The only place we could get reception was at Casey’s. My wife — at the time she was my girlfriend — the first couple times I took her home, I would be like, ‘Hey, do you want to go to Casey’s?’ And she would say, ‘Yes.’ It was good to get the pizza, but it was also the only place where our phones would work.”
FROM PAGE 5
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have this big steak in front of me. I was in pork denial because I’d eaten so much pork in my life. I didn’t want to have it. But now, in the last 10 years or so, I find myself ordering more pork, a really good pork chop or a pork loin.” Jeannine Otto can be reached at 815223-2558, ext. 211, or jotto@shawmeRECEPTION dia.com. Follow her on Twitter at: @ “My hometown is so small I AgNews_Otto.
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Looking back at RFA’s challenges
By Tom C. Doran
AGRINEWS PUBLICATIONS
ELLISVILLE, Mo. — The Renewable Fuels Association is celebrating its 40th year of advocating for the ethanol industry and its early struggles were many. RFA’s roots began on the heels of the 1973 oil embargo and 1979 oil crisis, and Ron Miller, now president of Agresti Energy, was there during those early days when “gasohol” tried to gain traction in the marketplace. Miller reflected on his early career, RFA’s beginnings and the eventual passage of the Renewable Fuels Standard in a recent RFA podcast produced by AgNewsWire. This is the first of a series of RFA podcasts looking back on the organization’s history. Miller’s career started with Tex-
aco, a company where his father held various roles for 37 years, and led to his first job after college in sales and then on to logistics. “I was in Chicago and we had just gone through the second oil embargo and of all of the oil companies Texaco seemed to be the hardest hit by the embargoes. We had a big stake in Saudi Aramco, so when they shut us off we seemed to feel the Miller tightness more than anybody else,” Miller recalled. “Plus, we had not upgraded our refineries to handle the coming premium unleaded gasoline. We sold leaded gas and Amoco was the big player with their super lead-free Amoco premium in Chicago.”
In order to compete, Miller was part of a Texaco group that began introducing ethanol into Chicago area gasoline stations. “We had made an 88 octane unleaded that we could then add (10%) ethanol to and get to that magic 90 octane number that the sales guys wanted,” he said. Miller was promoted to head of the refined products group in the Chicago area and one of his duties was to buy ethanol from ADM. “At about the same time Texaco and Corn Products got together. Corn Products had a surplus facility in Pekin, Illinois, and they decided to produce ethanol there. That was in 1980 when they formed Pekin Energy Company, built the ethanol facility on the back end of the corn wet milling plant,” Miller said. “It was a joint venture with members of both Corn Products and
Texaco that headed it up and the president of Pekin Energy, who was Corn Products guy, asked if I’d lead their marketing department. I asked how many were in the department, and he said, ‘If we get you, we have one.’” EARLY CHALLENGES He began at Pekin Energy in 1981, the same year RFA was formed. One of the first challenges facing the ethanol industry of the early 1980s was when the oil crisis of the 1970s had been resolved; oil companies began to lose interest in the cornbased fuel. “Once the embargoes passed and the oil began flowing again there was a question if we really need ethanol. It was being marketed back in those days as lead-free gasohol actually See Ethanol page 8
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40 years of ethanol
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8 Ethanol FROM PAGE 7
and with the refinery side, and particularly Texaco, originally we were going to use ethanol across the nation,” Miller continued. “By the time we began operating Pekin Energy Company, the refinery group had pretty well solved their issues with lead-free. A lot of BTX (benzene, toluene and three xylene isomers) components were used back then until that became an environmental issue. MTBE (methyl tertiary butyl ether) was used later on and that became a problem. “Back in the early 1980s it was a real challenge to get (ethanol) in, particularly into the major oil companies. The independents embraced it because of the economics around it. It was mostly driven by the federal government tax credit which is worth 40 cents a gallon and a lot of states had state credits that kind of helped us develop a patchwork of markets to try to utilize all of the regulatory tax exemptions that were there back then.” The Carter administration in 1979 stared the exemption for 10% ethanol from the 4 cents a gallon federal excise tax and that was the driver.
Ethanol incentive programs varied in each state. Some offered rebates, Illinois had a benefit on the sales tax, and Iowa reduced their motor fuel tax. “It was just mishmash, but it was mainly a reduction of tax on 10% ethanol blends,” Miller said. There were only five renewable fuel companies in RFA’s early days. “ADM was by far the largest with a couple of plants. We were coming up with the second largest plant at Pekin. The South Point plant was almost the same size as ours. Then there was New Energy of Indiana and A.E. Staley had a plant in Tennessee that I think came up in 1982,” Miller said. “It was easy to get into (RFA) leadership. My predecessor (at Pekin) was chairman, and I think every one of the guys except for the ADM representative was chairman of RFA at one time or another. “I think our biggest concern starting out is what’s the burn rate this month, we have to make sure we’ve got enough money to keep the doors open. All we had for staff was a president and a secretary. Most of the organizations supplied support people for the lobbying effort.” Miller became involved in RFA when his predecessor started the organization’s Technical Committee of which Miller chaired.
“We had really great participation from all of the players. We were trying to deal with all of the problems that we were facing from a competitive standpoint where all the oil companies said this is really not a good product or we have a problem with ethanol and it really shouldn’t be part of the gasoline standard and all of that,” Miller noted. “So, we had to work really hard on the technical side to really find a place there and it took us a few years, but we were successful in that and it was an enjoyable experience with a lot of support. “I do believe that the RFA by far is the most technically-focused of the trade associations just because we had to be. We were the first out there. We had to make sure that consumers were happy with the product and so that meant making sure from start to finish we had all of the technical information we needed. And if we needed to make changes we would learn that and make sure the consumer experience was as positive as possible. “Very few people have an opportunity to see an industry grow from birth to success and by the 2000s we had worked our way into where we were now finally embraced by oil companies that could figure out how to best utilize ethanol.”
LEADERSHIP Miller would go on to chair RFA twice — 1997-2001 and 2006-2007 — making him the organization’s longest-serving chairman. “When you think of where we started in 1981, after the oil crisis was over, nobody really cared about it. So, being part of that whole effort and the RFA really did have and still today has a leadership role, it’s still very exciting. I just happened to be at the right place at the right time toB A get it started,” he continued. “It wasn’t going to be a long-term commitment for me, but I think g that’s one of the reasons I stayed,” b he said. “It was continuous growth all along and it’s just fun to be parta of that.” n Miller left Aventine, formerly Pekin Energy, in 2009 to becomet president of Agresti Energy. The In-i dianapolis-based company develops and operates facilities that convertp agricultural waste into energy using aY proprietary pressure hydrolysis processing technology that takes animale manure, plant waste and other cellu-p lose materials to produce a range ofo biogas and liquid biofuels. o A Tom C. Doran can be reached at d 815-780-7894 or tdoran@shawmedia. s com. Follow him on Twitter at: @Agd News_Doran. i
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AGRINEWS PUBLICATIONS
CHARLESTON, Ill. — Uniform emergence can influence corn yield outcomes by as much as 21%, according to Pioneer. An uneven stand will yield less than a relatively even stand with the same number of plants. For both corn and soybean fields, there are multiple methods for determining early stand counts. “A simple tape measure or measure phone app can do the trick,” said Paul Yoder, Pioneer field agronomist. “For both corn and soybeans, growers can measure off the distance appropriate for row width, count the number of live plants and multiply by 1,000 to obtain an estimate of plants per acre. And remember to take multiple, random samples to get an accurate representation of your field.” Growers also can utilize the Pioneer drone fleet, which provides stand counts in just a few minutes. “Pioneer has the largest drone fleet
Soybeans emerge from the soil. Uniform emergence helps farmers achieve consistent yields. in the world,” Yoder said. “With that, we have a stand count report that will actually fly a field of corn and give you a very nice report in a matter of minutes. Before the drone lands, we’ll be able to send you a finalized, detailed
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population of that field.” Pioneer agronomists use Corteva Flight, which delivers accurate stand counts for corn and gap analysis for soybeans, helping growers make better in-season management decisions.
Learn more at www.corteva.com. Erica Quinlan can be reached at 800-426-9438, ext. 193, or equinlan@ shawmedia.com. Follow her on Twitter at: @AgNews_Quinlan.
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AG MATTERS | Shaw Media/ June 2021
Uneven stands hurt yields
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John Deere counsel discusses key issues before U.S. Congress Broadband, renewable fuels on agenda By Martha Blum AGRINEWS PUBLICATIONS
WASHINGTON — The way in which the country reopens after the past 14 months of economic shutdown will impact how policy is shaped by the U.S. Congress. “It appears a lot more face-toface business is occurring now,” said John Rauber, director and counsel of Washington Affairs for
John Deere. “What happens to the unemployment rate, how businesses react to new policies and the reopening of the economy are important influences on how key issues before Congress will unfold over the next 18 months.” During the past 21 years that Rauber has been with the John Deere, he has never seen as ra- Rauber zor-thin margins in Congress as there are today. “In the Senate, the two independents caucus with the Democratic Party, which
means there is a 50-50 split and Vice President (Kamala) Harris holds the deciding vote,” said Rauber during a webinar hosted by the Illinois Agri-Women. “In the House the margin is six votes for the Democratic majority since there are three vacant seats because of deceased members,” he said. “When the special elections occur they will more than likely be Democratic seats which will make it a ninevote majority, so for any issue as few as five Democratic members can control the outcome if they decide to break ranks.” So far, there has been very little sign of the Democrats breaking ranks from leadership on key issues, Rauber said, al-
though he expects few bills to pass overwhelmingly. “In the Senate there’s a filibuster rule that requires 60 votes to stop a debate on an issue and move it to a vote,” he said. “There has been a lot of speculation the Senate Democrats will try to eliminate the filibuster rule, which serves as a check and a tool that the minority party in the Senate can use.”
PUMPED UP Renewable fuels are one of the many issues important to John Deere customers and dealers. This includes both the importance of corn ethanol to the agricultural sector, as well as the renewable fuels standard that re-
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lation last year to promote certi- such as exactly what methodolofication of higher ethanol blend gies are needed to measure how fuels.” much carbon is sequestered in the soil, how it can be verified GROUND CONTROL and who can do the certification In the area of climate change of a producer’s practices and and sustainability, Rauber said, contributions.” an important change has ocLegislation passed the Senate curred over the past couple of Ag Committee to give the EPA years. authority to set up a process “There has been a realization for defining metrics for carbon from policymakers of the role sequestration, how the metrics agriculture can play in seques- are verified and the certification tering carbon. required for a third party to par“This is really a positive op- ticipate in the process. portunity that producers need to be encouraged to participate DIGITAL DIVIDE in,” Rauber said. John Deere has spent a lot of Many of the agricultural time over the last several years groups are working through the stressing the importance of Food and Agricultural Climate broadband connectivity in rural Coalition to provide recommen- communities. dations to Congress and the U.S. “For the 2018 farm bill, we Department of Agriculture about worked with Congress to inhow to incentivize producers to clude a provision that created generate carbon credits through the Federal Communications practices such as planting cover Commission Precision Ag Concorps and better management of nectivity Task Force to identify inputs. how to get farmers connect“There’s a lot of complexity to ed with broadband not how this works,” Rauber said. just to the farm house, but into “Many things are unknown the field,” Rauber sa-id.
This task force will conclude at the end of 2021, and it is helping to inform the FCC as they map areas of the United States that are currently underserved for broadband connectivity. Part of President Joe Biden’s infrastructure plan includes $100 billion provision to build out broadband in unserved areas of the country. “The plan tends to lean heavily towards fiber or wired connections,” Rauber said. “But for many ag producers that leaves out the last mile of connection because you can get the fiber to the farm house, but you can’t get it out into the field.” Fiber connections are important, he said, however, they are not sufficient alone to support technology and broadband demand that is going to exist on farms. Martha Blum can be reached at 815-223-2558, ext. 117, or mblum@shawmedia.com. Follow her on Twitter at: @AgNews_Blum.
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quires gasoline refiners to blend a certain amount of ethanol into their gasoline. “We’ve seen a real turn in the last four to six months with a commitment to moving to an electrical vehicle transportation infrastructure,” Rauber said. “The president has visited Ford Motor Co. for the roll out of the new electric F150, and the administration is doing a lot to talk about electric vehicle opportunities.” This is both a concern and opeportunity for biofuels. “The demand for corn ethanol would be significantly impacted by a switch over from liquid transportation fuels to electric vehicles, but we also know the ytransition is going to happen over many decades,” Rauber said. “We’re trying to demonstrate the higher blend gasoline with ethanol is the cleanest burning .liquid transportation fuel available, so ethanol has a really important place in this discussion,” he said. “Congresswoman (Cheri) Bustos introduced legis-
Shaw Media/ June 2021
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