V 01.47 No. 12 James and Shirley Hershey are both lifetime farmers. The couple farms 350 acres and has a 3,400-head hog finishing unit and 120,000 broilers. With them is their dog, Pebbles. Read more about their operation in Corn Talk this issue. Photo by Michelle Kunjappu Va. Farm Show Scheduled In The Heart Of ShemStthah galley GAY BROWNLEE Virginia Correspondent ■ FISHERSVILLE (Augusta County, Va.) On Jan. 22-23 at Expoland, the 2002 Virginia Farm Show is set in the heart of the Shenandoah Valley, in prox imity to much* of the state’s di verse farming operations, primarily poultry, beef, sheep, dairy, and horses. The event also attracts atten dance from producers in- sur rounding states. “We did the show in Rich mond several years and it was a good crop show,” said Ken Maring, trade show manager for Lee Publications which owns and operates the show. “But we couldn’t draw farm ers from the Shenandoah Valley Md. Teen Crowned Miss American Angus MICHELLE KUNJAPPU Lancaster Farming Staff SYKESVILLE, Md. Nov. 12 will always be an anniversary day for Cortney Hill-Dukehart. A sort of a second birthday, a day that marked a major event in her life. On the last day of the North American International Live stock Exposition (NAILE), she was given the national title of Miss American Angus in Louis ville, Ky. A freshman at Howard Com munity College, Cortney, 18, is the daughter of Robert Hill and Marlene Dukehart, owners of 18-acre Sunrise Sunset Farm, Sykesville, Md. www.iancasterfarming.com because it was a 2‘/2-houf tfrivf. On request from said, “we moved the show to the Shenandoah Valley. It is a great location. The show encompasses all agriculture in Virginia.” The relocation means an ad vantage for eager famers who are anticipating the opportunity to make comparisons between products that will run the gamut from machinery and equipment to heating and irrigation sys tems to recycling, chemicals, genetics, fertilizers, seeds, and so on. On tap, also, will be a skid steer rodeo. “The new technology will get their brains going,” commented Steve Saufley. Saufley repre sents six counties in the Virginia “So far I’ve met so many people. I want to represent the Angus breed the best way 1 can,” said Cortney. To Compete She began her quest for the crown by filling out a scholar ship application. “You can only apply your graduating year of high school,” she said. “You apply at your state auxiliary and then the winners are sent to the national auxiliary. From there, the top five scholarships are chosen and those five compete for Miss American Angus.” To compete in the contest, the three girls, applicants who had first won at state level, came Five Sections Farm Bureau Association ana hopes the farmers will allow the concepts they see to enlarge the scope of ideas they hold about running their operations. Speaking of new ideas, Mike and Susan Philips from outside Broadway in Rockingham County will beigelding questions about a product they recently became with and are using called Ber mudagrass. . ? Susan said they are well aware it will take a lot of con vincing for Bermudagrass to catch on. Since the couple stepped out in faith to plant Ber mudagrass (it does well in hot weather), they hope to prove something in the rotational (Turn to Pago A 39) Saturday and filled in a three page fill-in-the-biank and essay test about the Angus industry. The auxiliary had previously sent the girls a large packet of information for them to study, said Cortney. A few weeks before the con test the girls received the topic for their five-to-seven minute public speech. The speech was followed by a 20-minute interview with judge, and then an impromptu ques tion in front of the public, where the girls answered why they would want to be Miss Angus America. The American Angus Auxili (Turn to Page A 37) Saturday, January 19,2002 Survey Reveals Consumers Don’t Understand Biotech N.J. Vegetable Meeting Unveils Surprising Results ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. Less than half only 41 percent of Americans are aware that foods with biotech ingredients are on supermarket shelves, ac cording to a recent survey. And 75 percent of those polled rated their understanding of food production as “excel lent,” while only 5 percent rate their understanding as “poor,” said Dr. William Hallman. Hallman, associate director of the Food Policy Institute at Rutgers/Cook College, spoke about the public perception of ag biotechnology in the U.S. in 2001. Hallman spoke to about 100 growers and agri-industry repre sentatives Wednesday at the New Jersey Annual Vegetable Meeting at the Trump Taj Mahal in Atlantic City. The survey, conducted in April last year through the insti tute, included 1,200 adults in a carefully constructed phone in terview that addressed many biotech issues. What they found: the Ameri can public is woefully unin formed about exactly what biotechnology means and its impact on how food is produced. Hallman said of those inter viewed (made up of half male and half female respondents), “Many people have a poor grasp of basic ecological and environ mental concepts,” he noted. Re sults pointed out: only half of those interviewed even heard Newly-crowned Miss American Angus Cortney Hill- Dukehart, Sykesville, Md., stands at the halter of Savan nah, one of her show ring heifers. Photo by Michelle Kunjappu $34.00 Per Year ANDY ANDREWS Editor 75c Per Copy about traditional crossbreeding methods. In the educational section of the testing, only 40 percent of Americans got seven or more out of nine questions to pass the test. One of the questions was: if a person eats genetically modi fied (GM) fruit, will they also be modified? The correct answer, false, was answered correctly by two-thirds of those polled. Yet on a similar question conducted in 2000 in Europe, only 40 per cent answered correctly. The answers from the true or false questions were “off the cuff,” and typically showed the analysts, according to Hallman, that the respondents’ opinions are “not well thought out, not strongly held, subject to change, and are heavily influenced by the wording of the question.” For those in the U.S., Hall man said, biotechnology is “an abstract concept for many. It’s not high on the agenda, and they are not focused to make per sonal decisions about it.” Hallman noted one question, “for tomatoes genetically modi fied with the catfish gene, would they taste fishy?” The answer clearly is false, yet “one-third of the Americans were not sure if it was false,” said Hallman. The terms “GM,” “biotech nology,” and “genetic engineer ing” all refer to the effort to use technological methods to speed up traditional crossbreeding techniques to promote value added or enhanced ag products. (Turn to Page A3B)
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers