Celebrate National Agriculture Week March 23-29, 2014!
by Sandra L. Wick, Agriculture and Natural Resources Agent
National Agriculture Week will be celebrated March 23-29, 2014 and was established to recognize American Agriculture and the abundance that our producers have provided for us. This will mark the 41st anniversary of this celebration with the theme: "Agriculture: 365 Sunrises and 7 Billion Mouths to Feed." The truth is that we owe a debt of gratitude to the hard working men and women who provide us – and much of the world – with a safe, reliable, affordable, and abundant food supply. Agriculture is responsible for one out of every 12 jobs in America. Thanks to decades of investment, hard work and innovation, American farmers and ranchers have succeeded in continuing their quality of production with enhancing technologies that lead to increasing yields.
What’s more, America’s farmers and ranchers are the most productive in the world, helping support the strength and prosperity of our nation as a whole. American families spend only 6 or 7 cents out of every dollar on food – less than almost any other nation and half as much as in Japan or Italy. That means we have more to spend on a nicer home, to save for retirement, or to fund our children’s college education.
America’s farmers have taken extraordinary steps to take care of our nation’s natural resources. In the last 30 years alone, USDA has worked to help producers reduce soil erosion by more than 40% and agriculture has gone from being the leading cause of wetland loss to leading the entire nation in wetland restoration efforts.
Let’s focus on the agriculture in our Post Rock Extension District in the counties of Jewell, Lincoln, Mitchell, Osborne and Smith. Our major farm commodities, not in any particularly order, are wheat, grain sorghum, corn, beef cattle, hay crops, and soybeans. The office of the Kansas Agricultural Statistics, in Topeka, provides acres and production data for the different commodities in each county. This is interesting information to see the total production numbers.
According to the most current Kansas Agricultural Statistics estimates, which are from the 2013 crop season, wheat and soybeans were the largest number of acres harvested in all five counties. There were over half million (634,000) acres of winter wheat harvested along with 273,000 acres of grain sorghum harvested. Yield averages were 38 bushels/acre for wheat and 87 bushels/acre for grain sorghum for the five counties of Jewell, Lincoln, Mitchell, Osborne and Smith. Soybean acres were at a close third ranking at 244,000 acres harvested in 2013 along with 67,000 acres of corn. Corn acres decreased significantly from 2012 to 2013 because of the dry conditions. Yield averages were 31 bushels/acre for soybeans for all 5 counties and 116 bushels/acre for corn with only Mitchell and Osborne counties reporting yield data. Beef cattle numbers (cow/calf) were at 165,000 for our five counties as of January 2013.
This information helps you understand the breakdown of the different farm commodities and their importance to the economy of the Post Rock Extension District.
For generations, America’s farmers and ranchers have helped our nation stay strong. Let’s use National Agriculture Week to recognize the important work our farmers and ranchers do for this country and the world and say, simply, “thank you”.
If you have additional questions, give me a call at 785-282-6823 or email swick@ksu.edu.
