ACDC Newsletter – Page 20 – Funk Library

ACDC News – Issue 10-13

Posted on July 15, 2010 by Nicholas Ferraz de Oliveira

“The largest Last Supper.” That’s how researchers B. Wansink and C. S. Wansink titled their recent journal article about research that revealed how the trend toward larger portion sizes of foods is nothing new. They analyzed the relative size of servings portrayed in 52 of the best known paintings of the Last Supper over the last millennium (1000-2000 AD/CE). Relative sizes of the main dish, the bread and the plate used in history’s most famous meal increased linearly.

You can read their International Journal of Obesity article here .

Simple information technologies BUT complex interaction and adoption. Tapan Parikh emphasized that dilemma in a 2009 article, “Engineering rural development.” Writing for readers interested in computing equipment, Parikh emphasized that the engineering process needs to involve social and human dimensions such as:

Understanding of local users and their objectives
User studies and ethnography used for decades to study human-computer interaction
Rich learning from field tests and pilot deployment of varying scale and duration

Note: Thousands of documents in the ACDC collection reinforce this call for close collaboration between science/technology and the human and social dimensions of rural progress and wellbeing.

You can read the article here .

How to fail in using mobile phones for rural development . For more than five years, staff members at MobileActive.org have covered information technologies for development. “We have seen our share of failures,” they explain in a recent report we have added to the ACDC collection. “For every great project that changes how a community benefits from technology to improve the lives of its people, there seem to be twice at many projects that fail, and end up wasting time, money and maybe worst, goodwill.”

MobileActive.org staffers offer 10 suggestions in their “definitive guide to failure.” You can learn more about them here .

Country-city antagonisms revealed in country music . “A common theme prevails in country music that explores the antagonistic relationship between the country and the city,” John F. Stanislawski reports in a thesis we have added to the ACDC collection. A master’s degree candidate at the University of Illinois, Stanislawski analyzed songs from the subgenre of honky-tonk in terms of lyrical content, style and sound to learn how the rural-urban dichotomy has evolved. They included:

“Oh, how I want to go home”
“I sold the farm to take my woman where she longed to be”
“It ain’t nothin’ but a concrete jungle”
“Big city turn me loose and set me free”
“I’m going back to a better class of losers”
“Shuttin’ Detroit down”

The author observed that the current rural-versus-urban theme often tends to reflect an increasingly modern and urbanized world. “The larger implications of these analyses ultimately help us to understand what the ‘country’ is and stands for to country music culture.”

Read this thesis here via Illinois Digital Environment for Access to Learning and Scholarship (IDEALS).

Retail food marketers scrambling to serve shoppers using smartphones. How can a consumer roaming the supermarket aisles use her/his smartphone to check on products, prices, locations and other matters of interest within that store? Food marketers are scrambling to find ways to answer that question, according to a report we have added from Food Systems Insider. The report cites these findings from a recent survey by PriceGrabber.com among online customers:

53 percent own a smartphone
22 percent are using their phones to check prices
21 percent are using them to research products

You can read the news item, “Got milk?” here .

Congratulations to TEEAL at the 10th Anniversary . The Essential Electronic Agricultural Library (TEEAL) is observing 10 years of providing quality scientific content to support agricultural development in countries where it would not otherwise be affordable. This digital “agricultural library in a box,” provided through a program coordinated at Cornell University, is available to public sector and not-for-profit educational and research organizations in 100 of the lowest income countries.

Content includes about 2.5 million pages of full-text articles from more than 140 journals. They are stored on a 500 gigabyte external hard drive for use either in a stand-alone computer or local area network, with a searchable database of citations. Subscriptions are available at a fraction of the cost of individual subscriptions and include annual updates. TEEAL serves a special need because internet and broadband access often is limited in these countries.

You can learn more about the agricultural information services of TEEAL here .

Communicator activities approaching

August 26-29, 2010
Annual Conference of the National Market News Association in Portland, Oregon USA.
Information: Tiffany.Smit@ams.usda.gov

September 1-3, 2010
Annual Conference of the Association of Food Journalists in Santa Fe, New Mexico USA.
Information: http://www.afjonline.com

September 30-October 2, 2010
“Big land. Big sky. Big business.” Annual conference of the Canadian Farm Writers’ Federation in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan.
Information: http://www.saskfarmwriters.ca

Reporting on impressive snake tracks. We close this issue of ACDC News with a J. Frank Dobie story that might impress any sharp-eyed agricultural journalist. Van Sickle appeared two hours late for a court summons, explaining to the judge that he was delayed by the track of a rattlesnake. “Your honor,” he insisted, “it is the most enormous track a man ever laid eyes on. The sight of it held me spellbound. I followed it in hopes of getting a glimpse of the snake that made it.”

“Ridiculous,” the judge replied in assessing a fine. But a lawyer and two other men expressed interest in seeing this enormous track. Van Sickle was delighted to take them several miles out of town to a sandy hillside near Ferber’s Branch. “Look at that,” he exclaimed. They weren’t impressed. “Why, that snake track is not wider than lots of snake tracks we have seen.”

“That may be true,” Van Sickle replied, “but, great goodness, look how long it is!”

Best regards and good searching. Please pass along your reactions, suggestions and ideas for the Agricultural Communications Documentation Center. Feel free to invite our help as you search for information. And please suggest (or send) agricultural communications documents we might add to this unique collection. We welcome them in hard copy (sent to Ag Com Documentation Center, 510 LIAC, 1101 S. Goodwin Avenue, Urbana, IL 61801) or in electronic format sent to docctr@library.uiuc.edu .

Get in touch with us when you see interesting items in the ACDC collection and can’t gain full-text access through information in the citation, or through online searching. We will help you gain access.

ACDC News – Issue 10-12

Posted on July 1, 2010 by Nicholas Ferraz de Oliveira

“Suddenly, we dig farming” is the title of a lively commentary we added recently to the ACDC collection. Writing in the Los Angeles Times , Meghan Daum surveyed current public passions such as:

organic farmers as rock stars and heroes
favorite farmer contests
Internet social games such as Farmville, causing lost sleep over virtual crop rotation
“Farmer wants a wife” reality dating show

Read it here .

PR not enough in a food recall. Most companies in the food supply chain have a Plan A for recalls, according to an executive cited in an article we entered recently from Food Logistics . That is, they assume they will never have a recall. Some companies have plans to “focus on preventive measures and on public relations approaches for brands under siege.” Few get around to what recall planning actually requires:

Creating a detailed, written recall protocol plan
Staging regular mock recalls to give everyone involved in a recall a chance to practice their rules

This article by Carol Casper reviews information technology systems that permit a company – presented with a single piece of data such as a purchase order – to identify the location or disposition of every affected product within minutes if not seconds. That’s a vital key to protecting consumers, and their trust, when recalls occur.

You can read the article here .

Mobile phones give voice to those the media seldom cover . A recent survey in India revealed that an estimated 2 percent of space in mainstream media involved rural people and activities. Access to Internet and private television is low there, as well. However, mobile penetration is high, and growing. So mobile telephones are helping rural residents talk to each other, and the outside world, about matters important to them, according to a BBC report we added recently to the ACDC collection. The report describes a platform by CGnet Swara that works like this:

A “reporter” or “citizen journalist” listens to a local conversation about a topic of interest (e.g., issues in construction of a dam-like structure on a nearby river)
The reporter calls a Bangalore number to upload a report of that discussion
A text message goes out to all phone numbers on a contact list
Anyone who wants to hear the news report calls in to the same number and listens to it, individually or in a group (by amplified phone setting).

You can read the report here .

“Industry lobbying keeps public in the dark about broadband,” reads the headline of a March report from the Investigative Reporting Workshop of American University. The report by John Dunbar says that since 1999 the largest broadband and wireless providers and their trade associations have spent $873 million lobbying. Part of that effort focuses on conflicting views about providing “public data that could help the nation determine the width and depth of the so-called digital divide.” Concerns involve deployment of broadband services to rural America and low-income areas.

Read the report here .

On creative media: Smell of barbecued steak – from a billboard . Bloom food stores, located in several states of the southeastern U.S., are using scented air technologies to “jump out and really grab the consumers’ attention.” A billboard along the highway features a juicy steak while a big fan blows pepper and charcoal smells toward the road to add a hickory barbecue smell to what the passersby see.

You can read several news reports about this food advertising experiment, including some reactions from consumers.

” Steak-scented billboard ”

” Billboard sells with smells ”

” Billboard emits smell of cooking steak ”

Encouraging employment outlook. Encouraging word for agricultural communicators comes from a new U. S. Department of Agriculture report on employment opportunities between 2010-2015. More than 6,200 annual job openings are expected in communications, education and governmental operations involved with agricultural and food systems, renewable resources and the environment. Among the priority occupations cited:

Science communicators
Food safety information specialists
Ecotourism specialists
Distance education specialists
Computer graphics technicians

“Graduates who are highly skilled in using electronic media and have experiences in multimedia operations will be most competitive.”

Opportunities for public relations specialists in these areas of agriculture are expected to increase 24 percent during the coming five years while opportunities for technical writers are expected to increase 18 percent.

You can read the report here .

Hosting a Nuffield Scholar . We in ACDC were pleased to host 2010 Nuffield Scholar Caroline Stocks of the Farmers Weekly ( UK) during part of last week. The international Nuffield Scholar Program recognizes excellence and develops leadership in agriculture. Caroline is deputy news editor of Farmers Weekly . She is using her scholarship experience to learn how media and organizations around the world communicate with their farmers. Her current travels involve research in Canada and the U.S. Later, she plans to gather information in Australia, India and the Netherlands. This week, she scouted the ACDC collection for research and other information of interest. She also met with some agricultural journalists and producers in east-central Illinois.

Visitors welcomed. We are always pleased to host professionals, students, faculty members and others interested in agricultural journalism and communications. Let us know if ACDC can be a “home base” and “research center” when you or your associates are looking for new skills, case examples, perspectives and background resources about effective agricultural journalism and communications.

Communicator activities approaching

July 24-28, 2010
“Rolling on the River, AMS Style.” Ag Media Summit in St. Paul, Minnesota USA.
Information: http://www.agmediasummit.com

August 26-29, 2010
Annual Conference of the National Market News Association in Portland, Oregon USA.
Information: Tiffany.Smit@ams.usda.gov

September 1-3, 2010
Annual Conference of the Association of Food Journalists in Santa Fe, New Mexico USA.
Information: http://www.afjonline.com

ACDC News – Issue 10-11

Posted on June 15, 2010 by Nicholas Ferraz de Oliveira

How to build trust in agri-food chains. Christian Fischer of Massey University, New Zealand, recently reported that communications came into the spotlight through surveys in six European countries. Reporting at the 2009 International Association of Agricultural Economists Conference in China, Fischer said he found that effective communications and a positive collaborative experience can significantly improve trust throughout those agri-food chains. Communications “seems to have an immediate impact on trust formation. Moreover, it has been found to be a powerful mediator…”

Personal bonds did not show an impact on trust levels in all situations he observed, Fischer reported. However, they are important when dealing with farmers.

Read this research paper here .

Oh, for the marketer to know the emotions of potential customers . Are these prospective buyers in a social frame of mind? A sentimental frame of mind? Do they want to sustain local agriculture? Do they feel respected? It can make a big difference in what the marketer might say to them, of course. Evidence appeared in results of a recent study reported in the journal, Psychology and Marketing . Researchers at the Universidad Publica de Navarra, Spain, investigated this matter in the wine market.

“…suppliers need to give much greater consideration to consumers’ self-awareness,” they concluded.

Citation title: Using emotional benefits as a differentiation strategy
Contact the publisher at cs-journals@wiley.com or get in touch with us at docctr@library.uiuc.edu for help in gaining access.

Rural radio “squealing into town.” A 2005 article in the San Francisco Chronicle came to our attention recently, featuring a radio station that is new to us. The logo for KPIG-FM, Freedom, California, features a pig wearing sunglasses and doffing a cowboy hat. Reporter Maria Alicia Gaura explained that “The Pig has been a cultural staple of Santa Cruz County since 1988, amusing its intensely loyal audience with a freewheeling format and an endless barrage of pig, pork and swine-themed puns.”

A Wikipedia account emphasizes the local approach of this station: local disc jockeys, sponsors, news and commentary, a free community call-in line for leaving recorded announcements, in-studio live music shows, music festivals and more. The format tends to be folk, country/folk, rock, blues, “and is largely self determined.”

You can read the Chronicle article here .

Why not talk about our failures? MobileActive.org, a global network of people using mobile technology for social impact, has been asking that question. In fact, during April it organized the first ever “FailFaire,” where several brave souls reported on failed efforts to use information technologies for development. Case examples included:

A project to recycle old cell phones and donate them to Africa
A project to help power low cost lighting to the rural poor
A UNICEF project to collect 5 million children’s stories

We have added Ian Thorpe’s report of the occasion to the ACDC collection. It describes the occasion, considers the importance of reviewing mistakes and offers six tips on organizing a learning-from-mistakes occasion.

You can read the report here .

New help for using the ACDC collection. You can now view three new tutorials that help you identify and gain access to information in the ACDC collection. Users often remark about how much information is in the collection when they dig into it. The breadth and depth of it often surprise users (and us). So during recent months ACDC Associate Karlie Elliott Bowman has produced three tutorials to help you “learn the ropes” in using the ACDC collection. They are now posted on the ACDC web site, linked from the home page.

Tutorial 1 – “Introduction” to finding useful information. What this unique collection includes, in terms of “agricultural communications.” (2:23)

Tutorial 2 – “Beginning your search.” How to use the “Search for a Document” system, with special emphasis on searching the collection by topic or subject. (8:17)

Tutorial 3 – “How to retrieve documents.” Some of the new documents are available from the Center in full-text digital format. Many are not, of course. This tutorial suggests ways to gain access to whatever document you identify through your search of the ACDC collection. (6:36)

Case example – translating technical language into public language. We have a suggestion if you want to see an example of rigor one can use in this process. The case report appears in an article published in Ecology and Society . Authors identified steps in developing common-language indicators, as related to technical environmental concepts. For instance, how can one translate an environmental indicator, such as “dendrochemistry” or “root ecology” into a common-language indicator?

You can see a fascinating and valuable process here .

Thanks and best wishes to Laura Huston , a graduating senior and part-time assistant in the Center during this school year. Laura was graduated last month with a major in agricultural communications, including an emphasis in advertising and informatics. A native of Roseville, Illinois, she earned her Associate in Arts degree (with honors) from John Wood Community College in 2007. Laura has seen plenty of agricultural communications literature while helping process documents into the ACDC collection. We are grateful for her dedication and assistance.

Communicator activities approaching

July 24-28, 2010
“Rolling on the River, AMS Style.” Ag Media Summit in St. Paul, Minnesota USA.
Information: http://www.agmediasummit.com

August 26-29, 2010
Annual Conference of the National Market News Association in Portland, Oregon USA.
Information: Tiffany.Smit@ams.usda.gov

September 1-3, 2010
Annual Conference of the Association of Food Journalists in Santa Fe, New Mexico USA.
Information: http://www.afjonline.com

Interesting word of the month . We close this issue of ACDC News with one of those “What’s this?” words. It caught our eye in a commentary by Diana Sheets about journalism in the age of the Internet. She concluded:

“At best, journalism provides us with an inspired narrative based on verifiable evidence that transforms our understanding of events or ideas. At worst, journalism degrades from news into gossip or propaganda or advertising, threatening to confer little more than the stench of our cultural detritus.”

It’s worth looking up in the dictionary or Wikipedia – and, yes, it has agricultural connections.

ACDC News – Issue 10-10

Posted on June 1, 2010 by Nicholas Ferraz de Oliveira

Winning Pulitzer Prizes on the agrifood beat . Food, land use and rural music were among the topics addressed by some of the 2010 Pulitzer Prize winning journalists who were recognized recently. Winners included:

Michael Moss and members of the New York Times staff for “relentless reporting on contaminated hamburger and other food safety issues that, in print and online, spotlighted defects in federal regulation and led to improved practices.” (explanatory reporting)
Bristol (VA) Herald Courier for the work of Daniel Gilbert in “illuminating the murky mismanagement of natural-gas royalties owed to thousands of land owners in southwest Virginia, spurring remedial action by state lawmakers.” (public service reporting)
Hank Williams, honored posthumously for his “craftsmanship as a songwriter who expressed universal feelings with a poignant simplicity and played a pivotal role in transforming country music into a major musical and cultural force in American life.” (special citation)

You can learn more about these and other Pulitzer Prize winners here .

Extension services and sticky knowledge. “In the context of providing extension services for farming communities, knowledge transfer is inherently ‘sticky’.” That is how authors put it in a 2009 issue of the Extension Farming Systems Journal . They said the stickiness was due to:

Number of stakeholders involved
Complexity of farming practices
Uncertainty relating to seasonal patterns and market signals

“Those involved in knowledge transfer processes require a highly competent understanding of not only the technical issues, but also the social processes involving multiple network stakeholders.”

You may have come across the term “sticky knowledge” in descriptions of moving information – and being aware of information – within organizations. It is used as a conceptual model based on integration of communication theory and knowledge transfer.

You can read an agricultural application of it here .

“Top Ten Tips” for entering agricultural communications. What does it take to find challenging work you feel passionate about doing as a professional communicator in agriculture? Lisa Cassady Jayne, senior account executive of Osborn & Barr Communications, shared her “Top Ten Tips” recently with agricultural communications students from the University of Illinois. These members of Agricultural Communicators of Tomorrow (ACT) visited the firm in St. Louis, Missouri, during April to learn more about the career field they are preparing to enter.

Thanks to Lisa for her thoughtful career suggestions. You can read them here .

Agricultural journalism has never been more relevant. Mike Wilson, president of the International Federation of Agricultural Journalists, emphasized that point during an interview with Chuck Zimmerman of ZimmComm New Media following the recent IFAJ Congress in Belgium. Reviewing the state of agricultural journalism around the world, he pointed to some of the driving forces for continued growth in this field, and in agricultural communications more broadly:

Food production needs to double, globally, in the next 40 years
More than half of that added production will come from “developing” countries
Effective journalism and communications will be central to success of the mission

At the same time, he said, the work of agricultural journalists, internationally, is challenged by a trend toward fewer countries that provide freedom of the press.

Gaining their MBAs (Masters of Beef Advocacy) . Cindy Zimmerman of ZimmComm New Media recently interviewed several University of Missouri students and their instructor who had earned these special MBAs. Some 50 students completed six learning modules through a consumer information initiative of the Missouri Beef Council.

You can listen to the interview (4:55) here .

Past the 35,000 mark . Graduate Assistant Anna Pederson passes along the good news that the ACDC collection now contains more 35,000 documents. Thanks to all who have generously contributed documents, leads and encouragement to make this milestone possible. Most exciting is the fact that we are only scratching the surface of literature about the communications aspects of agriculture.

Welcome to a new ACDC associate . We are delighted to welcome Professor Joyce Wright as the new head of the Center within the College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences Library. Her part-time appointment began on May 3. An Associate Professor of Library Administration, Joyce brings to the Center 25 years of experience in the University of Illinois Library. They include 13 years as head of the Undergraduate Library, assistant undergraduate librarian for Reference and Instructional Services and acting head of the Information Resource Retrieval Center and Library Advancement. All of these experiences will help her contribute to the global ACDC mission.

“I am excited about working in the field of agriculture,” Joyce reports, “and I look forward to introducing the Center to the academic and professional community through various outreach programs and services.”

Joyce Wright

Communicator activities approaching

June 17-19, 2010
40th Anniversary Seminar, American Horse Publications in Lexington, Kentucky USA.
Information: http://www.americanhorsepubs.org

June 22-26, 2010
60th Annual Conference of the International Communication Association in Singapore.
Information: http://www.icahdq.org

July 24-28, 2010
“Rolling on the River, AMS Style.” Ag Media Summit in St. Paul, Minnesota USA.
Information: http://www.agmediasummit.com

August 26-29, 2010
Annual Conference of the National Market News Association in Portland, Oregon USA.
Information: Tiffany.Smit@ams.usda.gov

September 1-3, 2010
Annual Conference of the Association of Food Journalists in Santa Fe, New Mexico USA.
Information: http://www.afjonline.com

Attention, writers with innovative ideas about food progress in Africa . The National Peace Corps Association (NPCA) and World Policy Journal have launched an essay contest with that goal in mind. They invite essays that help “identify the most innovative solutions to the problem of food insecurity in the rural regions of Africa.” Essays can focus on ideas for African governments, private organizations or individuals in the international community. Recognized entries will be featured in the Journal or on websites of these partnering organizations. Entries are due by July 31.

See further information at http://www.AfricaRuralConnect.org/EssayContest

ACDC News – Issue 10-09

Posted on May 15, 2010 by Nicholas Ferraz de Oliveira

International excellence in agricultural broadcasting . The International Federation of Agricultural Journalists recently presented the inaugural IFAJ Star Prize for Agricultural Broadcasting to Kerry Staight for her television feature aired on ABC-TV. Based in South Australia, this Australian Broadcasting Corporation journalist did an exceptional job of addressing the sensitive issue of succession planning by farm families. She drew upon the insights and experiences of families and consultants that cooperated with her.

You can view this Star Prize program, “All in the Family,” here .

Top radio honor. Click here to listen to the award-winning radio entry by Sarina Locke, an ABC rural journalist based in Canberra, Australia. “Surprising developments in West Timor, Indonesia” is the title of this program. You will find that it features an engaging topic, a strong human touch and especially effective use of functional sounds.

Powerful portfolio of water photos. World Water Day on March 22 inspired the Boston Globe to arrange for an online set of 43 remarkable images “all of water, here at home – Earth.” The National Geographic Society shared some of them.

You can review them here .

Digitizing agricultural weeklies . Something approaching 15,000 issues of 12 U. S. agricultural weeklies have been digitized to date by the History, Philosophy and Newspaper Library here at the University of Illinois. As a group, they involve a time span between 1841 and 1939 – and the project continues.

Anyone with access to the Internet can browse these farm papers by date or search by keyword across articles, advertisements and photo captions, according to an article we are adding to the ACDC collection. Access to the repository is free. “The University of Illinois Library houses one of the world’s premier collections of agricultural newspapers,” the article reported. “The collection is valuable not only for students and scholars researching the history of agriculture or agricultural economics, communications and technology, but also for historians of education, historical sociologists, environmental historians, and social and cultural historians.”

You can visit the “Farm, Field and Fireside” repository h ere .

Why care about small town newspapers? Professor Terry Besser of Iowa State University offered nearly a dozen reasons in a commentary we added recently to the ACDC collection. For example, he argued that small town papers can:

Reflect, affirm and help build a positive community atmosphere
Help local citizens define what it means to be a member of the local community
Remind communities of their history
Report the important events in common peoples’ lives
Identify local needs, highlight local talent and recognize local achievements
Reveal deviant and unacceptable behavior as well as exemplary behavior in the community
Create forums for discussion of local policies and issues; encourage participation
Dispel rumors

“Let people chuckle about the kind of news covered,” he concluded. “Perhaps [laughter] is another contribution of small town papers in community life.”

You can read the commentary here , via The Hometown Weekly.

Chinese farmers calling for more useful information. That is the theme of feedback from farmers who took part in a recent training course. Writing in the Rural21 journal, Wang Dehai of China Agricultural University reported challenges such as:

Information too theoretical and not adapted to producers’ local conditions
Extension personnel – few in number, limited qualifications, overloaded with administrative work
Commercial trainers – accessible, but seen as holding conflict of interest

“Training need assessment is a fundamental tool to improve rural training to suit Chinese farmers’ needs and change the trainers’ mentality, perceptions and capabilities,” the author concluded.

Read this brief journal article here .

Condolences to the families of Hal Taylor and Don Gomery. The recent passing of these two professional agricultural journalists/communicators holds special meaning for us in the Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, as for many others.

Hal was a long-time mentor, associate and friend through his activities as an effective, highly respected communications leader in the U. S. Department of Agriculture. During retirement he contributed valued documents to the ACDC collection, including materials from the influential National Project in Agricultural Communications (NPAC) during the 1950s and 1960s. Learn more about Hal’s career here .

Don associated with the Center during the past five years through his service on the executive committee of the International Federation of Agricultural Journalists. As chair of the IFAJ Professional Development and Education Committee, he helped establish a productive IFAJ/ACDC partnership. We valued his friendship and, with many others, respected his farm journalism career in the UK and 26-year service as honorary secretary of the Guild of Agricultural Journalists of Great Britain. Learn more about Don’s career here .

Communicator activities approaching

June 14-17, 2010
“Meet us in St. Louis.” Annual conference of the Association of Communication Excellence in Agriculture, Natural Resources, and Life and Human Sciences (ACE) in St. Louis, Missouri USA.
Information: http://www.aceweb.org/meetings/ace2010.html

June 22-26, 2010
60th Annual Conference of the International Communication Association in Singapore.
Information: http://www.icahdq.org

July 24-28, 2010
“Rolling on the River, AMS Style.” Ag Media Summit in St. Paul, Minnesota USA.
Information: http://www.agmediasummit.com

Yes, talkative hair . We close this issue of ACDC News with another “Sentence of the Week” from the University of Chicago Writing Program:

Head teacher Nigel Pott said the school had been trying to resolve the issue of Chloe’s hair since before Christmas. Despite liaising with Chloe and her parents, her hair had stayed a pink colour, Mr. Pott said.

ACDC News – Issue 10-08

Posted on May 1, 2010 by Nicholas Ferraz de Oliveira

A “hole rent in the fabric of the community.” That’s how Marc Haddock of the Deseret News described the demise of five community weekly newspapers in Utah during early 2009.

“The history of Utah’s cities and towns – as it has been written week after week in the pages of their hometown papers – captures the day-to-day life of the community in more depth and detail than could ever be compiled in a single book. It is an unparalleled record of births and deaths, weddings and funerals, major news events and small-town happenings. Anyone who has subscribed to one of Utah’s more than 50 weekly or biweekly newspapers will recognize the hole that will be rent in the fabric of the community when these papers cease to exist.”

You can read the article here .

Media training boosts confidence of producers. Evidence came recently from a study reported by agricultural communications researchers at Texas Tech University. Results of a one-day, interactive media workshop among Texas cotton producers revealed significant positive change between the pre-test and post-test in their:

attitude and perception toward the news media
confidence about presenting an accurate view of an agriculture-related topic
comfort level in being interviewed by media

You can read this research report here .

Development journalism – giving soul to media. “As issues facing the developing world grow ever more complex and difficult, the task of good journalism should be to throw light on them.” A recent feature by Sue George in The Guardian ( UK) addressed this challenge and included some “how to.”

Development journalism is especially complex – and under threat – because “international development is complex, slow, non-prescriptive and uncertain. It requires the reporter to appreciate and explore the interplay of diverse realms such as health, education, environment, governance, local and national economics, and culture.”
It is not “an entirely uncritical publicity vehicle for any organization or institution.”
It is not “making people into victims by treating them without dignity or sensationalizing their lives.”
“We are looking at big policies affecting developing countries,” a cited reporter explained, “and looking at how this relates on the ground to those who expect to be benefiting.” Another cited reporter put it this way: Development journalism “gives soul to media, it gives it a human face.”

You can read this article here .
Also, here is another perspective on development journalism that we added recently to the ACDC collection.

New Chickens magazine hits the newsstands. “How much more basic can you get than providing your family with food from right outside your backdoor?” asked Roger Sipe, editor of the new Chickens magazine, in a recent news release. We received word of it via the AgriMarketing weekly update. Published by BowTie, Inc., this periodical will focus on the common backyard chicken. It will feature products and services, breed profiles, poultry keeping tips and other information for the novice or experienced poultry keeper.

You can read the news release here .

Remarkable international portfolio of water photos. World Water Day on March 22 inspired the Boston Globe to arrange for an online set of 43 remarkable photos “all of water, here at home – Earth.” The National Geographic Society shared some of them.

You can review them here .

Here’s another response when friends ask, “Do you talk to animals?” You can affirm it – and explain that animals also are talking to you, using social media.

“Even cows are tweeting now,” announced reporter Sharon Hill in a recent issue of the Windsor Star ( Ontario, Canada). She was reporting on an innovative experiment by the Critical Media Lab, University of Waterloo. Staff members teamed up with the Buttermine Farms in Brant, Ontario, to make this possible. How?

The farm uses a volunteer milking system, in which cows “volunteer” when they wish to be milked
A robotic milker does the milking
Each cow wears a Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) tag that coordinates her activities with a computer
Staff members prepared a Twitter profile for 12 cows and created a “voice” for each.

So, for example, a Holstein cow named Frosty Lace tweets online:

“Thought I would sneak in for some good feed. No way.”
“All this milking makes me hungry. Ate 1254 kg.”
“Fastest teat is my left back which milked in 2:50 secs”

Want to read some of the reports about this project?

“About ‘teat tweet'”
“Tweets reveal an udder world”
“Teats and tweets”

Communicator activities approaching

May 4, 2010
Midwest Regional Design and Writing Workshop for members of the American Agricultural Editors’ Association (AAEA), Livestock Publications Council (LPC) and Agricultural Communicators of Tomorrow (ACT). Takes place in West Des Moines, Iowa USA.
Information: Jennifer Bremer at jbremer@hpj.com

May 5-6, 2010
“Desert Discoveries.” Annual meeting of the Turf and Ornamental Communicators Association (TOCA) in Tucson, Arizona USA.
Information: http://www.toca.org

July 24-28, 2010
“Rolling on the River, AMS Style.” Ag Media Summit in St. Paul, Minnesota USA.
Information: www.agmediasummit.com

Insight from Pootwattle, the Virtual Academic ™. We close this issue of ACDC news with a key communications insight. It falls outside our agricultural focus, but seems profound enough for us to think you will appreciate it. And we pass it along with thanks to the University of Chicago Writing Program for use of its random sentence generator. Virtual Academic uses words and phrases pervading academic journals these days. Here it is:

The sublimation of narrative communication is homologous with the teleology of unsituated knowledge.

Yes, you can create your own impressive insights through the Virtual Academic .

ACDC News – Issue 10-07

Posted on April 1, 2010 by Nicholas Ferraz de Oliveira

Eleven new agricultural communications research reports from SAAS. It’s a pleasure to call attention to 11 timely research studies that were reported during February at the Southern Association of Agricultural Scientists (SAAS) conference in Orlando, Florida. Here are the authors and titles of papers presented in the Agricultural Communications Section of the conference:

“Arkansas agritourism business operators: who they are, how they communicate, what they want to learn and how they want to learn it” by Jefferson D. Miller, Stacey W. McCullough, Daniel V. Rainey and Biswaranjan Das
“Students of tomorrow: agricultural students’ use of selected social media” by K. Jill Rucker, Traci L. Naile and Bryan K. Ray
“Pick me! Aligning students’ career needs with communication about academic programs and available careers” by Lauri M. Baker, Tracy Irani and Katie Abrams
“Animal rights vs. animal welfare: is society able to distinguish the difference and make informed decisions on animal care legislation?” by Joy Goodwin and Emily Rhoades
“Framing the U. S. Sugar buyout to restore the Florida everglades: a comparison of national versus state newspaper coverage” by Angie B. Lindsey
“Agricultural communication students’ perceptions, knowledge and identified sources of information about agritourism” by Katlin N. Amaral and Leslie D. Edgar
“Competencies needed by agricultural communication undergraduates: a focus group study” by A. Christian Morgan
“College students’ perceptions of rural America based on selected photographs” by Dru Glaze
“Social agriculture: adoption of social media by agricultural editors and broadcasters” by Emily Rhoades and Kelly Aue
“Relative effects of visualized and verbal presentation methods in communicating environmental information among stakeholders: Okavango Delta, Botswana” by Olekae T. Thakadu, Tracy Irani and Ricky Telg
“Readership habits and needs of a major beef cattle breed association publication” by Melinda Norton, Leslie D. Edgar and Don W. Edgar

You can view these papers here .

In the face of disasters: Communicative planners meet resilience thinkers. Have you had contact with scholarship in resilience? We have seen little of it in our searching for agricultural communications literature. So a 2009 journal article about it caught our eye. Author Bruce E. Goldstein reported on a symposium that explored ways to combine resilience concepts with communicative planning. What happens when your planning goes awry during an emergency – or when resilient responses lack direction during a disaster? The intent of the article was to examine how these two converging fields of practice might, in tandem, help provide rational decisions in the face of environmental threats and catastrophes. You will not find it a light, how-to piece. However, it may spark creative thinking about communicating effectively in emergency situations.

You can read the Ecology and Society article here .

Agricultural legislative interests outflanked on YouTube . A content analysis by agricultural communications researchers Joy Goodwin and Emily Rhoades revealed that agriculture had very little presence on YouTube during the recent California Proposition 2 campaign. California voters passed the proposition in 2008, banning the use of battery cages for laying hens, gestation crates for sows and veal crates for veal calves by 2015.

These researchers found, for example, that

69 percent of the 103 sample videos posted on YouTube were sponsored by animal rights organizations – only 1 percent by farming/commodity organizations
89 percent of the videos supported the proposition – 4 percent opposed it
Sponsors often used emotional appeals, such as guilt (58 percent)

“Agricultural communicators must be up to the challenge when campaigning against larger groups” in such campaigns, the authors observed.

You can read this research report here .

CowTime Shed Shake-up – a “timely,” innovative extension success story. Seventy-four percent of Australian dairy farms that took part in a program to reduce milking time made changes within 6-8 weeks. Here are key elements described by Darold Klindworth and Diana Carr in the Extension Farming Systems Journal :

A research project identified helpful practices.
Forty-four Shed Shake-up events (called “Shorter Milking Secrets”) provided tips via video, PowerPoint slides, verbal presentation and group discussion.
Producers received timers to take home to determine how long their slowest cows took to milk and how much time they spent milking their cows.
A random selection of producers was interviewed about six weeks later.

On average, the farms where changes were made saved 15-20 minutes per milking

You can read this journal article here .

Agricultural public relations entries invited. May 1 is the deadline for entries in the Golden ARC Award program, sponsored by the Agricultural Relations Council. Thirty-eight categories are available to recognize the work of members and nonmembers. These categories range from various types of campaigns to specific components ranging from traditional media releases to social media. ARC sponsors the program to recognize and promote excellence in agricultural public relations.

See further information here .

Communicator activities approaching

April 17-21, 2010
“Between passion & press ure” 54th Annual Congress, International Federation of Agricultural Journalists (IFAJ) hosted by the Belgian Association of Agricultural Journalists at Ostend, Belgium.
Information: http://www.ifaj2010.org

April 21-23, 2010
“From America’s Heartland to the Rest of the World.” 2010 Agri-Marketing Conference sponsored by the National Agri-Marketing Association (NAMA) in Kansas City, Missouri USA.
Information: www.nama.org

April 26-29, 2010
XIIIth World Congress of the International Association of Agricultural Information Specialists (IAALD) in Montpellier, France. Organized by Agropolis International.
Information: http://iaald2010.agropolis.fr

May 5-6, 2010
“Desert Discoveries.” Annual meeting of the Turf and Ornamental Communicators Association (TOCA) in Tucson, Arizona USA.
Information: http://www.toca.org

July 24-28, 2010
“Rolling on the River, AMS Style.” Ag Media Summit in St. Paul, Minnesota USA.
Information: www.agmediasummit.com

An ever-current insight about learning. We close this issue of ACDC News with a Chinese proverb that associate Paul Hixson brought to our attention recently.

Tell me and I forget.
Show me and I remember.
Involve me and I understand.

In sharing this ancient wisdom with us, Paul observed, “This particular saying surely would have resonated with those pioneer Extension workers who used the early field test demonstrations as one of their primary teaching methods, as well as those of us who’ve spent a career advocating more respect AND fuller, more active involvement for our students/audiences in the learning/discovery process.”

ACDC News – Issue 10-06

Posted on March 15, 2010 by Nicholas Ferraz de Oliveira

New reports about extension methods and results. Thanks to ACDC staff associate Liz Harfull in South Australia for alerting us to papers presented at a November 2009 conference of the Australasia-Pacific Extension Network (APEN). These interesting, useful papers are in the latest issue of Extension Farming Systems Journal , published by the Australasian Farm Business Management Network. A few of the topics included:

Extension tools preferred by growers, agronomists and consultants when searching for cropping information
Four discourse themes among producers and agricultural consultants concerning climate change
Using Web 2.0 techniques to enable practice change in Australian agriculture
Blogs about bugs: communicating with grains industry clients

You can read these reports, and others, here .

Taking time for non-change . With all the emphasis placed on change in agricultural science and technology, communicators may find it enlightening to think about the role and importance of non-change. We find little literature about this, so were especially interested recently in adding an article by Pascal Byé in the journal Science Technology and Society . Approaches commonly used to analyze change fall short, the author argues.

“They mask the role played by cultural heritage, organizations and representations in the progression of techniques. They minimize the fundamental role played by time. The most visible changes are often, paradoxically, the product of non-change, of permanence and of continuity.”

Check with us at docctr@library.uiuc.edu if you wish to read this article.

Stronger angles on understanding consumer concerns about food and health. Studies about such concerns commonly focus on location, gender, age and other demographic factors. A research report we added recently from Australia reveals the added value of understanding food concerns and personal values.

Researchers Anthony Worsley and Emma Lea surveyed 1,000 adults to identify concerns about 20 health and food issues. Results revealed four food concerns and six personal value factors. Researchers concluded that psychographic market segmentation approaches may be stronger predictors of consumers’ concerns than demographics. They recommended more use of psychographic information in communications planning that involves food and health.

Also, you can request it from the publisher here .

Add to the “safe, cheap food” narrative . That suggestion came from Professor Ed Pajor, University of Calgary ( Canada) during the 2010 Banff Pork Seminar. He said the pork industry needs to connect with a public that has growing interest in livestock production practices. The “safe, cheap food” narrative is strong, he said, and it needs to be supplemented with a narrative about “how animals are being cared for.”

You can hear a SwineCast audio report of his presentation via Truffle Media Networks here .

You may notice in the title a reference to “animal husbandry,” a care-oriented expression that the term “animal science” tended to replace during the past half century.

Creativity – not so rare, really. “Creative work is not as rare as had been assumed,” said Raymond Gozzi, Jr., in ETC: A Review of General Semantics . “In fact, everyday life is a creative product. Everywhere we look we see people being creative, if we only have eyes to see. …When we think about our creative processes as we speak, cook, strum guitars, exercise, etc., it helps us appreciate the creativity in what we are doing and how to refocus it to other parts of our lives.

“Science is good at describing trends from past events, but creativity is about stepping outside of those trends. … Let us see [creativity] clearly wherever it appears and try to nurture it in others.”

Read the commentary here .

Communicator activities approaching

May 5-6, 2010
“Desert Discoveries.” Annual meeting of the Turf and Ornamental Communicators Association (TOCA) in Tucson, Arizona USA.
Information: http://www.toca.org

July 24-28, 2010
“Rolling on the River, AMS Style.” Ag Media Summit in St. Paul, Minnesota USA.
Information: www.agmediasummit.com

“Sentence of the Week.” We close this issue of ACDC News with an agriculture-related “Sentence of the Week” from the University of Chicago Writing Program. We feel sure none of our readers created this sentence:

A cheap industrial chemical at the heart of a massive food recall in China following its detection in infant milk powder, the UK’s Food Standards Agency (FSA) announced that sweets containing melamine at levels of 11.25 mg/kg, 152 mg/kg and 80 mg/kg respectively had been detected on the shelves.

You can see it and other recent “Sentence of the Week” candidates here .

ACDC News – Issue 10-05

Posted on March 1, 2010 by Nicholas Ferraz de Oliveira

“Who is doing the investigative science stories?” Not mainly the known science reporters, Paul Raeburn observed recently in Knight Science Journalism Tracker. He based that observation on who wrote some top-ranked investigative pieces of 2009 in the U. S. (including a series on school lunch safety). “Why aren’t we writing the investigative pieces?” he asked in this commentary we have added to the ACDC collection.

You can read his report here , along with some responses and suggestions.

New media + old media = fresh means. These times are bringing not only a batch of new media, but also an explosion of opportunities to intermix new and old media in innovative, effective ways. John James of Queensland, Australia, sketched an example in an extension journal article we added recently to the ACDC collection.

The goal : Improve knowledge, skills and attitudes of beef producers concerning animal nutrition.
The traditional method : Provide a two-day workshop on cattle nutrition.
He asked : Why not use new media to engage the producers before, during and after the workshop? For example:

An eSurvey to determine the background of potential participants and their learning needs.
A targeted email or blog to share the organizer’s thoughts about running the workshop and to invite producers to offer thoughts and ideas.
Web conferences to engage industry representatives, suppliers and other extension officers in planning the content and support materials.
A wiki to help planners collate information and resources.
An eSurvey among participants after the workshop, plus continuing interactions by web conferences, blogs, podcasts, Second Life and other means.

You can read his article here .

Agriculture Leadership Summit 2009 urges improved communications in India. Key recommendations of the Summit in New Delhi included needed efforts to strengthen communications. Among them:

Educate farmers and stake-holders on the global market scenario and implications of the World Trade Organization.
Provide a more balanced crop protection policy and incentives to farmers for adopting an effective crop protection umbrella.
Help other developing countries in their research, extension, education and institution building, and thus earn money and goodwill.
Establish an exclusive DD (direct-to-home terrestrial network) channel on agriculture to focus on farmers’ issues and technology transfer.
Reorient the extension systems with effective participation of the private sector with the government sector.

M. J. Khan, chief editor of Agriculture Today , was a member and convener of the Summit.

Read the Summit report here .

Yes, a new poultry magazine . In an era of large-scale poultry production, it may seem surprising to see a new poultry magazine emerge. The premier issue of Chicken hit the news stands during late February. Published by BowTie, Inc., it focuses on the common backyard chicken. Editor Roger Sipe says it is designed to appeal to “a new generation of people who want to reclaim their attachment to nature and become more sustainable.”

You can learn more about the magazine here through a news release via AgriMarketing Update.

“Words that can hurt.” A matter of agricultural terminology caught our eye recently through the diversity committee of the Society of Professional Journalists. Television news coverage of a confrontation involving Latino migrant workers in California prompted this suggestion from a member of the committee:

“Using the highly-charged language of the Minutemen, the TV field reporter described the Latinos as ‘illegal aliens.’ A far better description would be to refer to them as ‘migrant farm workers,’ or possibly, ‘undocumented immigrants.’ These descriptions take the prejudicial sting out of the phrases.”

Citation: Words that can hurt Latinos
View the document online here .

Communicator activities approaching

May 5-6, 2010
“Desert Discoveries.” Annual meeting of the Turf and Ornamental Communicators Association (TOCA) in Tucson, Arizona USA.
Information: http://www.toca.org

July 24-28, 2010
“Rolling on the River, AMS Style.” Ag Media Summit in St. Paul, Minnesota USA.
Information: www.agmediasummit.com

Ode to agricultural advertising . We close this issue of ACDC News with an appreciated contribution from K. Robert Kern. “This isn’t an original bit of doggerel,” he explains, “but one I began to use in training sessions with county agents maybe 50 years ago.”

The cod fish lays a million eggs,
The little hen but one.
The cod fish doesn’t cackle
When her noble deed is done.

So we praise the artful hen.
The cod fish we despise,
Which clearly says to thinking ones:
It pays to advertise.

ACDC News – Issue 10-04

Posted on February 15, 2010 by Nicholas Ferraz de Oliveira

63 case studies feature innovative ICT projects. A report from the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa highlights 63 innovative farmer advisory services, using information and communication technologies. Featuring a wide range of agricultural topics, they fall into these categories:

Voice information delivery services
Radio broadcasts and dial-up services
Extension services based on mobile phone and database monitoring
E-learning for basic skills, including video-based approaches

View the report online here .

Farming scholar studies risk communications in six countries. We have added to the ACDC collection a recent report by David Cussons, a producer in Western Australia. He carried out this study through the Farming Scholars program of Nuffield Australia. His travels took him to Japan, England, Sweden, USA, Canada and New Zealand where he conferred with dozens of communicators and others. We were pleased to host him in the Center during his U.S. visits.

Case examples and insights highlighted in his report undergird his six recommendations about risk communications in agriculture. Among them:

Understand the demographics of the public
Improve the selection and training of agriculture spokespeople
Embrace the latest social media techniques
Use electronic traceability to promote agriculture

Read the report here .

$500,000 agricultural promotion campaign boosts incomes $2.9 million. We see relatively few research efforts that identify the economic impact of specific agriculture-related promotion efforts. That’s why a report from two Clemson University economists caught our eye recently. C. E. Carpio and O. Isengildina-Massa evaluated the impact of the South Carolina agricultural promotion campaign after its first season (2007). Analysis of the survey data revealed that consumer demand for state-grown produce increased by 3.4 percent, increasing producer surplus by an estimated $2.9 million.

Read the paper by visiting this web site , then searching on the title: “Measuring the potential economic impact of a regional agricultural promotion campaign”

“Make every Pakistani a blogger.” That was the advice of Ghazala Khan in a recent blog about the challenges that print and broadcast journalists face in covering rural and remote areas of that nation.

“Here mobile phone companies, NGOs and civil society should provide a platform to the locals to use texting and camera phone video to report from rural areas. … Citizen journalism is so easy to implement, and this would empower the people.”

Read the commentary here .

Winners honored in “Future of Family Farming” photo contest . Photos from the Philippines, Nigeria and Rwanda earned top recognition recently in a contest focused on sustainable agriculture. The contest was sponsored by ILEIA Centre for Learning on Sustainable Agriculture, based in the Netherlands. An independent organization, ILEIA aims to enhance knowledge on small-scale sustainable agriculture, particularly in developing countries.

View the winning photos here .

More than matters of science and emotions. A commentary we added recently from Drovers emphasized several dimensions to agriculture’s interactions with consumers about animal welfare and other issues. Writing after the passage of Proposition 2 in California, Suzanne Bopp said that producers across the country are likely to hear the call for more industry outreach and consumer education efforts. She emphasized:

“The case cannot be made with science alone – those arguments failed against Proposition 2. These judgments fall into the realm of ethics and values. Yet those things have not been much discussed of late. We’ve improved safety, efficiency and traceability, but not consumer trust.”

Read the commentary here .

New Student Photo Gallery on the ACDC web site. We are pleased to call attention to a new online gallery of photographs taken by students in an agricultural photography course here at the University of Illinois. Agricultural communications faculty member Bob Siebrecht teaches this popular course, which has been offered for about 40 years. It uses methods that uniquely help students learn to “see” in new ways, with special emphasis on revealing the diversity of agriculture and rural life.

The first photo featured in the Gallery was taken by L. Brian Stauffer. You can learn about the course and see Brian’s photo here .

Communicator activities approaching

May 5-6, 2010
“Desert Discoveries.” Annual meeting of the Turf and Ornamental Communicators Association (TOCA) in Tucson, Arizona USA.
Information: http://www.toca.org

Easier than ever these days. We close this issue of ACDC News with a remark offered at a recent communications research conference during discussion about new social media:

“It’s gotten easier to be stupid and evil in public.”

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