NCBA Urges Senate to Repeal COOL, Before Retaliation Starts 

Some agricultural groups believe Congress shouldn't be so quick to repeal the U.S. Country-of-Origin Labeling (COOL) law and rather wait for arbitration to work its way through. National Cattlemen's Beef Association Vice President of Government Affairs Colin Woodall responded by saying that's not a good idea. He believes COOL needs to be repealed this year, before those arbitration numbers are set.


"If we don't get it done this year, than we can expect retaliation anywhere from two to five years, while the WTO looks at what action Congress may take in the future," Woodall said.


If Congress can act before retaliation starts, then Woodall said there is a very good chance that Canadians and Mexico will drop this case and the U.S. will be able to maintain trade relations with both of these countries. However, if retaliation takes place first, then Congress acts, then it's a different situation. Woodall said that means the U.S. will have to go through the entire World Trade Organization (WTO) dispute settlement process, which could take two to five years.


"During that process, we will be retaliated against, so we are going to be harmed economically as a country," Woodall said. "Not just as the beef industry, but from all industries that are on the list."


The U.S. House has already passed legislation to repeal COOL. This week, the U.S. Senate Ag Committee held a hearing on COOL, so Woodall said NCBA is trying to make their message known about what's at stake, if Congress doesn't act quickly because there are financial implications on the horizon. He said retaliation would stay in place while the WTO is deliberating any changes Congress makes.  


I featured Woodall on our latest Beef Buzz, as heard on great radio stations across the southern great plains. Click or tap here to listen to this feature. 

Oklahoma Horse Owners Should Take Precautions Against West Nile Virus

The Oklahoma Department of Agriculture, Food, and Forestry is encouraging horse owners to take precautions and vaccinate their animals to protect against the West Nile Virus (WNV) and Eastern Equine Encephalitis (EEE). In the recent past, there have been more than 40 cases per year in Oklahoma where horses have been positively diagnosed as infected with mosquito-carried diseases. The bird population serves as the reservoir for the viruses, and it is then spread by mosquitos to horses and humans.


The mosquitos most likely to transmit WNV and EEE lay eggs in small pools of standing water. Adult mosquitoes can hatch in 10 days during the warmest months of the summer. Mosquitoes can become infected with both WNV and EEE after feeding on an infected host; such as birds carrying the virus. Within 10 to 14 days, the mosquito can transmit the virus to both humans and horses.


"Signs of West Nile Virus include weakness, fever, incoordination, seizures, blindness and difficulty getting up," said Assistant State Veterinarian Michael Herrin, D.V.M. "There are several vaccines available, and we are encouraging horse owners to visit with their veterinarians and determine the vaccination protocol that will best fit their operations."

Click here to read more ways everyone can prevent West Nile and Eastern Equine Encephalitis.  

Rain Saves Oklahoma Canola Crop, Harvest Shows Few Acres Abandoned

The late season rains saved Oklahoma's canola crop. After a dry fall and winter, farmers were concerned it would another disastrous year, like 2014. Great Plains Canola Association Executive Director Ron Sholar said the million dollar rain in May saved the crop and helped all of the fields produce better than expected earlier in the spring.


The record May rainfall turned into too much rain, as farmers began harvesting. There were a lot of delays and there were concerns with shattering, as the crop matured. As usual, he said yields have been all over the board ranging from 1,000 pounds per acre up to 4,000 pounds per acre. Sholar said the canola industry needed a good year after the severe drought took out the crop in 2014, which resulted in fewer acres being planted last fall.


One of the positive aspects of the 2015 canola crop has to be the number of acres harvested. In the past, Sholar said there was a lot of canola left in the field due to bad conditions. He estimates 150 - thousand acres of canola will be harvested this year in Oklahoma. While some acres were lost to winter kill, he expects almost all of those acres planted to be harvested this year.


As of Friday, Sholar said 95 percent of the state's canola crop has been harvested. The remaining five percent of the crop waits to be direct harvested. Most Oklahoma farmers have chosen to swath the crop versus using the direct harvesting method. Sholar said today's varieties are better suited for swathing, but he is confident researchers will continue to work to develop new varieties that will work better for direct harvesting. This will provide farmers with more options and will become another tool in the toolbox. 

I also talked with Sholar about new varieties and a pair of regional Winter Canola Conferences taking place in July that are scheduled for July 14 in Enid, Oklahoma and July 15 in Vernon, Texas.  Click or tap here to read or to listen to our full conversation.  

In addition, Dr. Sholar was our Saturday morning guest during our In the Field segment seen on News9 in Oklahoma City. Click here for a chance to see our segment aired this past Saturday morning.  

Two longtime Oklahoma State University extension educators and researchers have been promoted into new roles.  

As we mentioned this past week in our daily email, OSU Cooperative Extension small grains specialist Jeff Edwards has been named the new head of OSU's department of plant and soil sciences.  The action was officially approved by the Board of Regents for the Oklahoma Agricultural and Mechanical Colleges during the board's June meeting. Edwards began serving as interim head on June 1. His effective appointment date as department head begins Aug. 3.  Click here to read more about Dr. Edward's new leadership role.

OSU horticultural educator and researcher Janet Cole stepped into a new role this May, taking over as head of the department of horticulture and landscape architecture.  An OSU faculty member since August of 1988, Cole had been serving as director of the OSU Division of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources' accredited landscape management program.  Click here to read more about Dr. Cole's new position.   

Farm, Development Groups Call for Coordinated Effort to Meet Global Food Security Needs

A coalition of farm and international development organizations and agriculture-related foundations sent a letter on June 18 to congressional committees calling for a coordinated approach from the federal government to meeting global food security needs.


In their letter, the groups stated that international agricultural development is essential to meeting the urgent goal of feeding the world's growing population, expected to rise from 7.2 to 9.1 billion by 2050. Global demand for food will increase by 60 percent during the same period.


"The American Soybean Association has a long history of improving access to food and building markets through the work of the World Initiative for Soy in Human Health. ASA is eager to continue that legacy by being a part of the solution to address global food security issues through agricultural development," said Wade Cowan, the association's president and a soybean farmer from Brownfield, Texas. "Training and engaging in technology transfers with people in least-developed countries helps to alleviate hunger and increase economic opportunities for local people, and provides long-term market growth for U.S. agricultural products abroad." 

Click here to read more about how the Department of Agriculture, the U.S. land grant university system, farm organizations and agribusiness should coordinate work and leverage resources to address this global challenge.

Award winning broadcast journalist Jerry Bohnen has spent years learning and understanding how to cover the energy business here in the southern plains- Click here to subscribe to his daily update of top Energy News.

Climate Corporation Announces Record Adoption of Digital Agronomic Services Platform

The Climate Corporation, a division of Monsanto Company (NYSE: MON), announced that farmers have mapped more than 75 million row crop acres in their digital agriculture platform, up from 50 million acres in 2014. This significant acre adoption represents nearly 45 percent of all corn and soybean acres planted in the U.S. The company's digital agriculture platform includes Climate Basic™, Climate Pro™ and FieldView® from Precision Planting. The company also announced Climate Pro, their premium web and mobile product offering, has grown considerably from its initial launch from 1 million acres last year to more than 5 million acres this year across the U.S.


Together these tools provide one account with multiple product offerings and access points. The farmer can log in on a tablet from his tractor, on a mobile phone as he scouts his fields, or on his desktop computer.


The company emphasized the importance of farmer adoption to the future success of this emerging platform. "The interest we've seen from farmers this year in our digital platform reinforces the impact these tools ultimately can have on our industry," said Mike Stern, President and Chief Operating Officer for The Climate Corporation. "We want to be the digital platform of choice for farmers, and our growth this year is evidence that we're well on that path," said Stern. 

Click here to read more about the Climate Technology Platform.  

This N That- Hog Numbers Rebound, Wheat Harvest Edges Closer to Completion and Feral Swine Forum Tuesday

US and Oklahoma hog numbers showed a nice rebound from June of a year ago in this past Friday's US Hogs and Pigs Inventory report.  The nine percent increase in the size of the hog herd suggests that  the US Pork Industry seems to be bouncing back from the deadly baby pig disease- PEDV. 

The Oklahoma pork industry continues to be a pig producing industry that sees many of the baby pigs that are born in the state being shipped closer to feed grain supplies in the US Corn Belt to be finished. The breeding herd in the state totals 440,000 head as of June first- up two percent from a year ago and the fifth largest sow herd in the US. The need to feed pigs to be processed by the Seaboard plant in Guymon means that Oklahoma has a June first market hog inventory of 1.79 million hogs- up 23% from a year ago and the ninth largest market hog population in the US. Total hog numbers are back above two million head in the state at 2.23 million head- 18% more than June first 2014 and the ninth largest total swine population in the US.

Click here for a look at the national numbers and a link over to the complete USDA report that was released on Friday afternoon.

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It's likely that when the USDA releases their weekly crop progress numbers that around 90% of the Oklahoma wheat harvest will be declared done. According to this past Friday's Oklahoma Wheat Commission harvest report- available here- large hunks of geography in the state's wheat belt is done- or close to it.  

"Wheat harvest continues to move forward with harvest completed in most parts of Southwest Oklahoma and South Central Oklahoma. Most locations in Northwest Oklahoma from Enid north and west to Helena, Goltry, Cherokee, Alva and Burlington, are claiming to be 95% complete. East of Enid around Garber, Covington, Blackwell, Ponca City and Tonkawa, locations are reporting to be 75% to 85% complete."

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The Oklahoma Board of Agriculture is hosting a Feral Swine Forum tomorrow afternoon at the OKC Langston facility on North Lincoln- just up from the state capitol. The 1:00 PM meeting is to review the size and the impact of the feral swine problem in the state- and things that the government- working with the private sector- can do to battle the growing population of wild hogs in the state.

Details of the session are available here.  The public is welcome.