Committee Hires New Veal Student Ag Day At Merchandiser CHICAGO. 111. V. Russell Woodward has joined the Veal Committee as veal merchandiser. In this position. Woodward will work with retail and foodservice operators in selected target cities to implement veal promotion and merchandising programs. He will regularly visit with meat directors, meat merchandisers and advertis ing departments of major retail and wholesale headquarters, as well as packers, foodservice oper ators, distributors and purveyors. Much of Woodward’s work will focus on encouraging veal marketers to participate in the new “Veal. Discover The Special Choice” campaign, launched last fall by the Veal Committee. Previously, Woodward was a, purchasing/raw products manager at Keystone Foods Corporation in Bala Cynwyd, Pa. He has also worked on the resource staff of the Texas 4-H Center and as a lab assistant at Texas A&M Universi ty, where he received his bache- FARGO, N.D. The primary objective of national agricultural policy must be to revitalize the family farm system of agriculture and to enhance farm income so that farmers can continue to pro vide a reliable supply of food and fiber while serving as stewards of the nation’s land and water resour ces, according to the National Far mers Union. In policy adoption recently, del egates to the farm organization’s 92nd anniversary convention said the basic issue facing rural Ameri ca is the control of American agriculture. “National farm policy must pro vide direction and emphasis to ensure that control of agriculture is vested within the family farm. The decline in the number of farms must be reversed. Programs Workshop Set On Rural Income Opportunities KEEDYSVILLE. Md. Farmers and other rural landown ers can explore opportunities to produce additional income from their property at a workshop on “Income Opportunities For Rural Areas Utilizing Your Natural Re sources.” Sponsored by the Cooperative Extension Service in Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and West Virginia and the Small Business Development Center, the work shop will be held Saturday, April 16, at the Center for Career and Technical Education in Cresap town, Md., five miles south of Cumberland on Rt. 220. “Response to this very popular workshop in past years has been extremely encouraging,” said Jonathan toys, a natural resource specialist with the Maryland Co operative Extension Service. “Par- ticipants at past workshops have • Agritourism: fee fishing, bed made it clear that private land- & breakfasts, and guns, grit and owners are interested in using glory. SUY. SELL. TRADE OB BENT THBOUt PHONE: 717-626-1164 or 717-394-3047 V. Russell lor’s degree in technology. Farmers Union Recommends Targeting which encourage sustainable agri culture and diversified production, while discouraging capital inten sive and hight input fanning, can be keys to reversing this trend,” delegates said in the adopted poli cy statement. The farm group said the current farm law has placed this nation’s system of family farm agriculture into “continuing economic jeopar dy, leaving farmers at the mercy of a marketplace which is increas ingly dominated by vertically integrated, multi-national grain and food conglomerates.” The Farmers Union called for new directions in the development of the 1995 farm law to prevent family farmers from becoming an “endangered economic species.” It urged federal farm program benefits be targeted to the produc- their natural resources to meet re creational demands and provide non-traditional products and ser vices.” Kays believes that continuing concerns for the environment, es pecially as regards water quality and long-term land stewardship, will only increase interest in alter native income-producing enter prises. The workshop will help pros pective entrepreneurs and produc ers looking to diversify get started by providing them with informa tion on how to produce, market, and finance a variety of non-tradi tional products and services. The morning program will ex plore various opportunities, exam ine legal and liability issues, and discuss enterprise budgeting and marketing. After lunch there will be three breakout sessions: COLLEGE PARK, Md. “Agriculture: Learning today to care for tomorrow” will be the theme for this year’s Student Ag Day on the University of Mary land campus at College Park. The 69th annual event is .sche duled April 30 in the livestock bams area behind the Animal £ci ences/Agricultural Engineering Building. Activities will run from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. There is no admis sion charge, and the public is in vited. Typical of country fairs, Ag Day will feature student competi tion in fitting and showing dairy cattle, beef cattle, swine, horses, and sheep. The program booklet again will be dedicated to a Col lege of Agriculture faculty or staff member who has rendered out standing support to students and student activities. By 2:30 p.m. the winners in each livestock class will be ex changing animals to determine who deserves the honor of being selected grand champion show man. Woodward food science and tion levels of family farms in order to reduce government costs and to further the sustainability of family farms and rural communities. The farm organization histori cally has favored supply management programs and con tinues to do so; however, it ack nowledged that “current farm law and trade policy directions lessen this nation’s ability to manage the agricultural supply-demand and pricing situation on behalf of its producers.” The result is that future farm policy seems limited to a choice between continued decoupling or the targeting of farm program ben efits, according to the Farmers Union. “Decoupling so far has provided artificial competitive advantages to the largest farms while collapsing the very safety * Environmental horticulture: greenhouse crops, marketing spe cialty products and maple syrup production. • Forestry and natural re sources: dollars from woodlots, mushroom and ginseng produc tion and kiln drying opportunities. A $l2 registration fee includes lunch, morning coffee and donuts, break beverages, and information al materials. Preregistration is re quired by April 8 and is being handled by the Alleghany County office of the Maryland Coopera tive Extension Service. Call this office at (301) 724-3320 to re quest a brochure or to register by phone. Your local cooperative ex tension service office in Mary land, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and West Virginia also have workshop brochures. For more information, contact Steve Bogash or Jonathan Kays, (301) 791-2298. THE UvK' VS.’' - , | *s.’* tVS M % Mil Urtcjmr Finn>ifl,~smwiiy, mreti a. wwn Prior to the final student com petition around 2 p.m. Col lege of Agriculture faculty mem bers (with little or no previous ex perience) will compete in a humor-filled swine showmanship contest. Contestants are encourag ed to dress in funny or outlandish costumes. Ag Day is sponsored each year by the Agriculture Student Coun cil at the University of Maryland with support from 12 College of Agriculture student clubs. Many of the clubs will operate conces sion booths, selling barbecued beef sandwiches, hot dogs, soft drinks, and other food items. Bedding plants and vegetable transplants also will be on sale. The Collegiate FFA group and an Anne Arundel County 4-H club will be selling craft items. Barnyard babies will be includ ed in a farm animal petting zoo. Woodsy Owl and Molly the pink cow characters will be on hand, too. net that was originally established for family farmers,” the Farmers Union policy declared. The organization explained that the nation’s largest farm opera tions have continued to receive their full entitlements, while the across-the-board cuts through the triple-base system have put the burden of the budget cuts on the backs of the small and mid-sized farm families. The Farmers Union policy said the organization would adamantly oppose further decoupling. It said targeting farm program benefits is the “most viable policy alternative available today to respond to the crisis facing family farm agriculture. “Targeting must establish a basis that provides cost-of produc tion returns and a reasonable livelihood from the basic output of Books Provide Latest Tillage, Soil Management Information MOLINE, 111. Farm owners, farm managers, and anyone else who seeks the latest information about profitable, site-specific till age practices and effective soil management strategies can find it in two books, entitled ‘Tillage” and “Soil Management.” The books are published by Deere Si Company’s Service Publications Department ‘Tillage,” a completely revised edition, replaces a book of the same title in Deere’s Fundament als of Machine Operation (FMO) series. “Soil Management” is pan of the company’s Farm & Busi ness Management series. “Both series are used extensive ly by educators and make excel lent reference material for those associated with production agri culture,” said John Kuhar, senior editor with Deere’s publication department. The 164-page tillage book, complete \yith more than 300 il lustrations, presents up-to-date in- Maryland In conjunction with this year’s Ag Day, an 11 a.m. dedication ceremony will commemorate the new Agricultural Engineering wings of the Animal Sciences- Agricultural Engineering Building at the University of Maryland. A major speaker at the dedica tion will be Norman R. Scott, vice president for research and advanc ed studies at Cornell University. Ithaca, N.Y. Dr. Scott is national president of the American Society of Agricultural Engineers. Sheri L. Jardine of Bowie (Prince George’s County), an ani mal science pre-vetcrinary senior, is president of the ag student coun cil, the sponsoring organization for Ag Day. Jardine said that the goals of Ag Day are to make the public and the campus community more aware of Maryland agriculture and to give College of Agriculture students an opportunity to participate in all aspects of a scaled-down county fair. a family farm,” the farm group said. Tiered marketing quotas, set asides, and price supports, together with overall, per program and volume (bushel) based com modity loan and deficiency pay ment limitations were endorsed as effective targeting tools. In addition to targeting efforts, the Farmers Union endorsed defining farmers eligible for prog ram benefits as “farm operators who rely on farm income for their livelihood.” The organization said farm operators who have supple mental off-farm jobs should con tinue to be eligible for farm prog ram benefits, but those persons or entities which have extraordinary annual net incomes from unre lated, non-farm sources of more than $lOO,OOO should not be eligible. formation on primary and secon dary tillage systems and provides practical strategies for conserva tion planning and working with higher levels of crop residue. Other topics include dryland till age practices, tillage at seeding, managing soil compaction, and equipment adjustments. The soil management book con tains 140 pages of practical infor mation about subjects such as soil fertility, erosion control, soil com paction and its management, fac tors affecting crop yield, and con servative planning. The topics are illustrated with more than 200 photographs, charts, and draw ings, and many are in color. “Tillage” and “Soil Manage ment” are priced at $29.95 and $24.95 respectively. For ordering information, write Lori Lees, Deere & Company, Service Publications Dept., John Deere Rd., Moline, 111. 61265-8098, (309) 765-4516.