New agriculture center at Lincoln Land Community College

Lincoln Land Community College unveiled its new Kreher Agriculture Center, funded in part by an $18 million donation from the Kreher Trust, formed by Charles and Irene Kreher, given in 2018.

The new center is home to classrooms, laboratories and common areas for students, designed for hands-on learning and group activities. The facility also offers a technology arena, animal science pavilion and simulation lab where students can operate equipment such as drones and a combine simulator.

Various organizations will also use the center to host meetings, conferences and contests.

Don Wienhoff, Kreher Trust representative, says the idea behind these funds was to support students and agriculture. LLCC has used the funds to expand its agriculture program with research, scholarships and the new agriculture center.

Ken Elmore, chair of the LLCC board, says the goal of the center is to show students the many careers within agriculture while also preparing them for those roles.

Beef conference opportunities

Beef enthusiasts won’t want to miss two summer conferences from the Illinois Beef Association and National Cattlemen’s Beef Association.

To be held June 8-9, the two-day IBA event will begin in Peoria with a policy update, workshops and awards dinner. Workshops will include topics such as nutrition planning, marketing beef to consumers and making your cows work with the resources you have. On the second day, participants will tour Raber Packing Plant, Cross Creek Farm and Kress Corp.

The NCBA conference will be held Aug. 10-12 in Nashville, Tenn. Registration for the event opens June 1. The event will include a trade show with a wide range of exhibitors in sectors of the industry including animal health, nutrition and marketing. Cattlemen’s College is also a part of the convention that includes topics such as risk management, selecting heifers by utilizing genomic tools and vaccination strategies.  

For more information regarding the conferences, visit the IBA and NCBA websites.

Deadline extended for precision ag course

The University of Illinois has extended the deadline for its free, online course for students considering a career in precision agriculture. Applications are now due June 4. Participants eligible for this two-week course are high school students ages 16 and over, and incoming freshmen at U of I.

The program, which takes place July 26 to Aug. 6, will cover essential precision agriculture topics such as robotics, remote sensing and signal processing.

This program, two new precision ag courses and a precision agriculture club at U of I have been made possible due to a $195,000 donation from the CHS Foundation.

Interested students should visit the Center for Digital Agriculture website.

China’s need for corn continues

At this point in 2020, consumers were worrying about stocking up on items. Now, supply companies have this concern.

University of Illinois ag economists report that these companies are purchasing extra supplies to make sure they can keep up. Global supplies of corn, soybeans, copper and steel are low, which could cause prices to increase.

Food prices are taking a hike, partially due to China’s continuous rise in buying corn. China’s corn imports are at 26 million tons for 2021-22, which is up from 7.6 million tons last year and 4.5 million tons the year before. This purchasing is an example of the current supply shortage.

Livestock producers in China are being encouraged to use other feedstuffs besides corn and soybeans to help control the low supply of these products.

Read the entire Farmdoc analysis here.

County fairs awarded facility improvement grants

This year, Compeer Financial’s Fund for Rural America awarded $175,000 to 59 county fairs in Illinois, Minnesota and Wisconsin as part of the County Fair Facility Upgrade Grant Program. The grants are intended to aid fairs in enhancing facilities.

Karen Schieler, senior corporate giving specialist at Compeer Financial, says the company wants to help fairs offer the best experiences for their communities through necessary facility renovations.

The 13 fairs and organizations in Illinois that received grants are:

The Compeer Financial Fund for Rural America established the County Fair Facility Upgrade Program in 2018 and has provided over $700,224 in grants to 240 fairs and organizations. Fairs in need of facility improvements should consider applying for the grant in March 2022.

To learn more about the program and the fund, visit the Compeer Financial website.