TITLE OF ACTIVITY: Dairy Grazing NUMBER OF MEMBERS IN COUNTY: 682 NUMBER OF MEMBERS INVOLVED IN THE PLANNING AND IMPLEMENTING THE PROJECT: 13 PLEASE PROVIDE A BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE ACTIVITY: (Not to exceed 80 words) A UNIQUE PROGRAM TO ASSIST SMALL, FAMILY DAIRY OPERATIONS IN THE IMPROVEMENT OF THEIR PASTURES AND CATTLE GRAZING PRACTICES TO INCREASE CATTLE HEALTH AND MILK QUALITY AND TO IMPROVE MARKETS FOR MILK FROM GRASS FED CATTLE TO ENHANCE THE WHOLESALE PRICES RECEIVED BY THESE FARM FAMILIES. PLEASE PROVIDE A BRIEF RESPONSE FOR EACH OF THE FOLLOWING: 1. Briefly state the need and objectives for this activity. (20%) a. Our County, a small, sparsely populated county is home to more dairy farms than any other county in our state because many of them are Amish family farms milking very few cows. b. These farms are at a competitive disadvantage to many dairies because they have limited access to milk transports, milk processors, and retailers. c. Almost all of the milk from farms such as these is processed into cheeses by processors that also retail their products. Since the processor assumes so many direct costs (farmgate transport, processing, packaging, retailing) the hundredweight price paid to the farmer is minimized. d. Providing an educational program on cow nourishment through the establishment of better pastures increases butterfat and other bonus qualities improving the price paid for milk. Continuing that educational process with cow care and parlor cleanliness improves somatic cell counts to favorably affect milk prices. e. Increase the market potential for local dairy farms by creating competition in-state and multi-state for our raw milk. 2. Describe the program planning process for your county activity. (20%) a. Our county board is blessed to have four representatives with strong ties to the Amish community and to English family farmers also marketing to local cheese houses. Two of our board members are veterinarians serving that community; one is closely involved through community organizations such as Red Cross that is serving that community; and one is an Amish farmer (not dairy). b. Our O.D. has previous business experience in helping small businesses and has connection with our local economic development offices. c. Our veterinarians worked with educators from Ohio State Extension on nutrient qualities of various pasture grasses to produce milk with more bonus qualities. d. Educational programming had to be planned that could be presented in locations without electricity using manual charts, etc. e. Regular farm visits needed to be planned to check pasture progress and help schedule herd rotation so that grasses would not be over-grazed. f. Meetings were scheduled with potential high volume end-use customers to create price competition that could not be resolved by the addition of just a few more cows.
3. Explain how you implemented the activity. (20%) Members of our committee met with small dairy farmers in venues (churches, schools, homes, etc.) throughout the county and explained to them that we wanted to work with them on pasture improvement, herd health, milk quality, etc. They knew we would be bringing in experts from OSU Extension and other groups to add to the expertise. They knew we were not a co-op and that they did not have to market any commodities through us (independence is very important to many of them). While volunteers with Amish connections were meeting with farmers, our O.D. and other volunteers were meeting with representatives from the Chambers of Commerce and regional economic development organizations to research markets and local potential for processing. One major hurdle to overcome was that raw milk would have to be cold stored at the farm gate cans and spring houses could no longer be used. This required our volunteers from the Amish community to meet with local bishops to obtain permission for such a change. Other volunteers made frequent farm visits to check on the progress by each farmer and to bring back concerns and questions. 4. What makes your activity unique or brings a new focus your county Farm Bureau s work? (10%) Our Farm Bureau is one of the oldest county Farm Bureaus in the state and, in all those years, we have not had much success in getting our Amish farmers to be involved. We came to the conclusion that we had not done our grassroots job in finding out how we might help our Amish neighbors with their concerns. With wholesale milk prices plummeting, the market afforded us the opportunity to meet with them and help them. We did not require their immediate participation as members until we could demonstrate to them that we could help. 5. What were the results of the activity, including the impact and benefit to Farm Bureau and/or your local farming community? (30%) The results of our efforts have been phenomenal! There are very few can dairies left in our county, only one strict sect will not change. The electric for storage tanks must be generated on site by diesel generators, but that is acceptable by the processors. Pastures are fenced for herd rotation and pasture grasses continue to improve. Rolling herd averages have increased and bonuses are improving based on fat content, etc. Our regional economic development council secured a connection for us with Chipotle Restaurants and our area now supplies the milk to process their cheeses for their east coast region. A local dairy processing company sets aside one afternoon each week for processing the cheese for Chipotle. The price received at the farmgate for milk has improved tremendously (about 50%)! We would like to take credit for that completely but that would not be fair. Just the change of farm storage from cans and spring house to refrigerated storage tanks changed the milk from Grade B to Grade A and that is the biggest part of the difference. We continue to research potential markets wishing to advertise made from milk from grazing cows to create competitive demand because that will keep prices up. Our county Farm Bureau now has about 18% of its active membership from the Amish community.
TITLE OF ACTIVITY: AMISH SAFETY DAY NUMBER OF MEMBERS IN COUNTY: 682 NUMBER OF MEMBERS INVOLVED IN THE PLANNING AND IMPLEMENTING THE PROJECT: 26 PLEASE PROVIDE A BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE ACTIVITY: (Not to exceed 80 words) SPECIAL DAY DEVOTED TO TEACHING THE AMISH ABOUT SAFE FARMING PRACTICES, USE OF PUBLIC ROADS WITH SLOW MOVING VEHICLES, SAFE HANDLING OF MEDICINES, HOUSEHOLD CHEMICALS AND OTHER ITEMS, WEATHER DANGERS, ETC. PLEASE PROVIDE A BRIEF RESPONSE FOR EACH OF THE FOLLOWING: 1. Briefly state the need and objectives for this activity. (20%) a. Our county is home to the largest Amish population in North America. Due to their traditional lifestyle many families are not familiar with the dangers related to sharing their lives with the English. b. Host a special day with representatives from many agencies who are trained in safe handling of equipment, chemicals, machinery, vehicles and other modern conveniences and who are also familiar with the Amish to impart information and techniques to attendees. c. Host the event in a venue that can accommodate large groups and yet is both familiar to the Amish and accessible to them. d. Offer various types of health screening for attendees. e. Advertise the event to achieve a goal of 500+ attendees. 2. Describe the program planning process for your county activity. (20%) a. Form a committee to include Farm Bureau, OSU Extension, Red Cross, Emergency Management Agency, Keim Lumber (venue and tool safety speakers), Ohio Highway Patrol, SWCD, Workers Comp, and others. b. Develop a schedule of speakers and rooms for presentations. c. Schedule stories and ads in local papers (The Shopper, The Daily Record Hub, The Budget) and organizational newsletters including Farm Bureau, SWCD, FSA, Red Cross, and others. d. Line up vendors for morning coffee and doughnuts, lunch time sandwiches and others foods. e. Recruit vendor displays to offset some of the costs related to the day. f. Make certain speakers and others have sufficient quantity of materials for distribution.
3. Explain how you implemented the activity. (20%) Our initial committee analyzed the types of equipment, chemicals, machinery, tools, vehicles, and other implements being utilized by Amish families in performing their farm chores. We also took into account that Amish tend to start their children into certain farm chores at younger ages. Once we had inventoried the many things we recruited speakers and trainers from Farm Bureau, equipment dealers, SWCD, co-ops, Red Cross, OSU Extension, and Amish church groups. Then we scheduled the venue at an Amish lumber company with sufficient meeting space and audio-visual connections to meet our needs. We fortunately got a lot of safety booklets with caricatures of Amish families from Penn State Extension. Recruit vendors from farm machinery and others to offset some of our related costs. Finally we advertised the event in local papers, The Budget (Amish newspaper), and through the various church groups to ensure attendance. We also secured a large inventory of give-away items to entice farmers to bring their children so we might reach them with our messages. 4. What makes your activity unique or brings a new focus your county Farm Bureau s work? (10%) Through various efforts over the last two years, including this one, we have been very successful in recruiting Amish members into our county Farm Bureau. Amish now account for nearly 25% of our active member numbers. This day basically served as a major effort to show the community that we can serve them with meaningful programming at the county level in addition to the public policy that we stress in recruitment. 5. What were the results of the activity, including the impact and benefit to Farm Bureau and/or your local farming community? (30%) The day s attendance exceeded our wildest expectations. We were not able to request RSVP s with this kind of promotion so we just hoped for a good showing. We had assumed around 500 but our numbers were closer to 1,000. Fortunately the food vendors that the lumber company had recruited were able to handle the additional demand. Our speakers just spoke to larger groups in their respective sessions. The host lumber company helped us with extra copies of materials. We recruited sufficient vendors to cover all of our duplicating costs from both the office and the lumber company. Our county Farm Bureau (with the help of core funding) handled the advertising costs and speaker expenses and give-aways. The day was a rousing success and we have received many compliments from the Amish churches and the businesses that participated. We know the demand will be there to repeat again this coming year. We didn t secure many memberships that day just 6 but we feel it will go a long way for acceptance when our volunteers approach individual farmers this winter.
TITLE OF ACTIVITY: COUNTRY CHRISTMAS NUMBER OF MEMBERS IN COUNTY: 537 NUMBER OF MEMBERS INVOLVED IN THE PLANNING AND IMPLEMENTING THE PROJECT: 25 PLEASE PROVIDE A BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE ACTIVITY: (Not to exceed 80 words) Our community hosts a Christmas parade the Friday after Thanksgiving. Farm Bureau uses this opportunity of already having a large crowd in town to host County Christmas after the parade. We set up the community Building and provide hot dogs, cookies, and hot drinks. We have a membership drive, Santa, make-and-take crafts, a canned food drive, Nationwide displays as well as several other agricultural displays. PLEASE PROVIDE A BRIEF RESPONSE FOR EACH OF THE FOLLOWING: 1. Briefly state the need and objectives for this activity. (20%) We are always looking for ways to reach out to our community. By hosting Country Christmas we are capitalizing on a community event that is already happening, and adding a Farm Bureau outreach event to it. This helps us reach our goal of community involvement, membership awareness and also give us a lot of positive promotion. We will offer an early membership incentive of a $5 discount since they will be renewing before the billings go out. We will also try to recruit new members to join. Our goal is to have at least 300 people attend the event and sign at least 30 renewal memberships. This event also allows us to collaborate with Nationwide and several other agricultural organizations. 2. Describe the program planning process for your county activity. (20%) We delegate a committee to plan and organize this event. The committee is responsible for requesting the use of the building, getting all the food donated, and inviting other organizations to have a display. The members of the committee work with local businesses and the community councils for the food donations. The councils provide all of the cookies. Local farmers will donate the hot dogs and cider as well. We will make contacts with OSUE, SWCD, Nationwide and a couple other local organizations and ask them to have displays during the event. One of our members has dressed up as Santa for children to get their pictures taken with, while another provides horse drawn wagon rides. We plan to invite the local FFA Chapter to help with our make-it and take-it crafts. We will have two crafts for the children to make and the FFA students will help supervise this activity. Then other volunteers will work the membership table and talk to people about Farm Bureau. It is important that we publicize this event in the paper and to our membership, so that they plan to attend. Our committee does a great job or organizing and executing this event.
3. Explain how you implemented the activity. (20%) We had a committee that met and worked together to reserve the building and organize all of the food as well as line up the displays. They reached out to OSU Extension, SWCD, Nationwide, the food pantry, and the Animal Shelter and had then each set up a display at Country Christmas. A couple of the community councils provided desserts and some of our members helped by providing other food supplies. We have a member who enjoys being Santa Claus so we asked him to come. We also bought crafts and worked with our local FFA Chapter and had them assist the children with making the crafts. 4. What makes your activity unique or brings a new focus your county Farm Bureau s work? (10%) We have realized how hard it is to get people to come to events anymore, so we decided that this is a perfect opportunity to capture a large audience when they are in the area for the town parade. This allows us to draw members and non-members and be able to promote Farm Bureau as well as some of the other local organizations. Everyone is always looking to warm up on some good food and hot chocolate. We can tell them about the benefits of being a member and we get current members to renew. We offer them a $5 discount because this event happens the end of November before any of our billing go out so then we save on the money for the renewal notices. 5. What were the results of the activity, including the impact and benefit to Farm Bureau and/or your local farming community? (30%) We were very pleased with the event. We had over 250 people come through the building. There were 100 children who made crafts. By reaching out to councils and other members for food donation, we include them and they like to have a part in the event. We signed 24 renewal members which is a jumpstart on about 5% of our membership. The organizations who attended like being in front of the large audience as well to promote their businesses and upcoming activities. We collected three huge boxes of food donations for the local food pantry. The biggest success of the event is that the local newspaper gave us nearly an entire page of coverage of the event and had great pictures of all the different activities. This gives Farm Bureau a positive perception to those who are members and makes them aware of our community involvement.
TITLE OF ACTIVITY: Kids Dream Day NUMBER OF MEMBERS IN COUNTY: 496 NUMBER OF MEMBERS INVOLVED IN THE PLANNING AND IMPLEMENTING THE PROJECT: 20 PLEASE PROVIDE A BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE ACTIVITY: (Not to exceed 80 words) Kids of all ages are able to come and drive a full size tractor around the track at the county fairgrounds. The inside of each tractor has a buddy seat and a farmer for safety reasons, this also gives Farm Bureau the opportunity to educate each participant about Farm Safety and agriculture in general. This is also used as a member benefit allowing members to participate for free and charging non members $5 per kid or $10 for a family. PLEASE PROVIDE A BRIEF RESPONSE FOR EACH OF THE FOLLOWING: 1. Briefly state the need and objectives for this activity. (20%) The need for agriculture education on the local level is necessary and many children dream of the opportunity to drive one of the tractors they see farmers operating in the fields. We also see a need to educate adults about the difficulties in driving large equipment down the road so they might have a better understanding on how to properly share the road with area farmers. The program gives the Farm Bureau the opportunity to also get a significant amount of one on one time with each child to help educate them about farm safety and the importance of agriculture. We have the following goals for the Kids Dream Day Event: 1. Expand member contribution and engagement opportunities 2. Partner to create excellent agricultural education programs Success will be measured by the number of people that participate in the activity and the number of conversations had by participants and how many non members decided to join Farm Bureau due to the event. We also hope that we can measure success by the overall awareness level about agriculture increasing throughout the county. 2. Describe the program planning process for your county activity. (20%) We started off by setting a goal of bringing consumers and farmers together in a setting where kids and adults were having their dreams come true by giving them the opportunity to drive a big tractor. Keeping that goal in mind, we wanted to be able to educate participants about farm safety and show adults just how difficult it is to for a farmer driving an implement down the road. The event was budgeted for in a variety of ways; we had committees set aside funds to cover estimated costs and we had several partners join us to help donate goods/services to help cut down on those costs. Based on feedback from prior years, we have continued to improve upon the event to make it more kid friendly and to work to bring in additional participants. The main focus of the event is to educate all participants on safety; how to drive and walk around tractors and equipment safely and to help them understand what goes into being a farmer by bringing in the combine simulator that was put together by Ohio Farm Bureau and utilized the Xbox Virtual Farming game.
3. Explain how you implemented the activity. (20%) This was the 4 th year of the event and joint partnership between two local county Farm Bureau s. Our county had originally planned to also have our own Kid s Dream Day event, during the last day of the county fair, but weather intervened and it ended up being too wet to hold the event on the track at the fairgrounds. We did though continue to partner with our neighbor county and held the joint event at their county fair in September. It took the committee 4 months and several meetings to make sure all of the working parts were in order for the 3 days that we held the event. We partnered with local farmers and with several different implement dealers to get 5 tractors donated for the event. As a thank you gift/reminder of the event we also had t-shirts made with the event logo on them and all of the sponsors names written on the back and were able to buy 1/64 scale toy tractors from the local implement dealers at cost to give to the participants after they were done. The event requires the help of many of our affiliate organizations and also needs our volunteer member s assistance. We had 12 different businesses and 40 volunteers assist with this 3 day event. 4. What makes your activity unique or brings a new focus to your county Farm Bureau s work? (10%) This activity was a hands on activity for people of all ages, we had participants ranging in age from 2 to adults. It allows the farmer to have a one on one conversation with each participant while they sit in the driver s seat and take the tractor for a spin around the track at the fairgrounds. The best kind of teachable moment is the one that is given while having the experience at the same time. The adult participants were all given a recent copy of the Our Ohio magazine and a membership brochure to learn more about joining the Farm Bureau in their home county. 5. What were the results of the activity, including the impact and benefit to Farm Bureau and/or your local farming community? (30%) We had over 100 participants drive a tractor over the course of the 3 day event, over ½ of these participants were non Farm Bureau members and we had the opportunity to speak with each one individually. Our volunteers included volunteers from FFA chapters in the two organizing counties. Our county personally tried to expand the activity from prior years and hold another event on our own, but had to cancel due to the weather. We are hoping to try again at our county fair in 2016 and bring this great event to our home county as well.
TITLE OF ACTIVITY: Farm Safety on the Roadway NUMBER OF MEMBERS IN COUNTY: 942 NUMBER OF MEMBERS INVOLVED IN THE PLANNING AND IMPLEMENTING THE PROJECT: 20-25 PLEASE PROVIDE A BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE ACTIVITY: (Not to exceed 80 words) Public Education: Work with the local Sheriff s office to produce a public service announcement and billboards pertaining to road safety during the planting and harvest season. According to the Ohio Dept of Public Safety, over 1,870 farm-related highway accidents have occurred in the last 5 years with 304 people injured and 15 killed. Farmers depend on our roadways while they grow our food and fiber. The reflective orange triangle sign stands for slow-moving vehicles on farm equipment that are operating at speeds of 25 mph or less. Properly marked farm equipment has the right-of-way. Slow down, pass with caution, allow ample room, and watch for sudden turns. Most farmers will pull over to allow traffic to pass them when they have available safe space. Mailboxes and guardrails can create hazards too. REMEMBER, YOU MAY NOT ALWAYS BE VISIBLE TO THE FARM EQUIPMENT OPERATOR. Above all, be patient. Be kind. Stay behind. PLEASE PROVIDE A BRIEF RESPONSE FOR EACH OF THE FOLLOWING: 1. Briefly state the need and objectives for this activity. (20%) Placing a stamp on the County Farm Bureau is the goal. The overall program is to create awareness to the member and the community that Farm Bureau exists and is in the community working hard for them. By the promotion of this safety program and others like it, we are lifting up policy and safety procedures within agriculture and creating awareness to the general public. We are working with the local Sheriff s department and township groups to educate on roadway safety measures that can save lives. 2. Describe the program planning process for your county activity. (20%) Planning was a bit of a challenge on the side of the budget. Our county has been operating on a limited budget for some time, so plans had to be made for events that were relatively low cost or supported by members own dollars. Combining resources into a multicounty office has eased the budget somewhat. With the partnership from the Sheriff, we should be able to pull this campaign off with success. We will host several meetings with the Sheriff and staff to determine the design and theme for this year. Committee chairs will reach out to the billboard companies for costs and reserve the locations for the campaign. The board and the Sheriff will need to approve the design. We will look into ways to complement this program to increase awareness in the county.
3. Explain how you implemented the activity. (20%) During a planning meeting, road way safety throughout the farming season became a big priority. Several accidents involving farm equipment and cars occurred through the past year. The CFB felt a need to educate the public about SMV signs and the importance to slow down. National statistics show that about 70% of crashes involving farm equipment occur in rural zip code areas, while 30% occur in urban areas. Crashes are much more likely to occur on high speed roads (over 50MPH speed limits), roads that have high traffic density, farm to market routes, and roads with smaller lanes and smaller road widths. Ideas were to create 150 caution equipment safety signs, which were purchased. Member volunteers throughout the county committed to placing signs that caution drivers to watch out for farm equipment on the roadways near their property and community. The signs will be placed during harvest and replaced in the spring for planting season. These visible promotions emphasize an important message to our increasing urban growth and traffic in our rural areas. Local townships and village employees even assisted and promoted the program. 4. What makes your activity unique or brings a new focus your county Farm Bureau s work? (10%) As it turns out, the uniqueness of this program, were the partnerships that the CFB gained. Working and being supported by the County Sheriff was great. However, it did not end there. Township trustees and county commissioners jumped in to support the campaign. We were thrilled to get more than our contracted time from the billboard company as well. 5. What were the results of the activity, including the impact and benefit to Farm Bureau and/or your local farming community? (30%) The road safety caution signs gathered a lot of interest and positive comments from members who saw them. An article was published on the county website, Facebook, as well as the Registered Herald. Farm with Reason billboard Another project undertaken during the policy year was to partner with the local Sheriff to promote road safety during planting season. Three billboards were sponsored along heavily traveled roadways in different parts of the county to encourage the public to slow down. The campaign slogan was I may be a wide load but we both have to share the road. This gathered enough interest and support to possibly be done again, if the budget allows. Roadway and Farm Equipment Safety Campaign s goal of this activity was to encourage farmers to have their farm equipment up to code to operate on the roadways as well as to slow down, be careful and prevent farm accidents. Success is measured by the appreciation from our farmer members with our concern that they are legal on the roadways with their equipment which helps prevent accidents, and our concern that they use caution during the busy seasons where being is a hurry and exhaustion can sometimes cloud their judgment. Preventing accidents is the true measure of success and feedback of appreciation from our members which gave the program value.