Event provides learning experience for Youth

After another year of hard work, farmers and dairymen across the world gathered together for the 2016 World Ag Expo in Tulare, CA. This year marked the 49th consecutive year that the popular farming event has been held. According to The Business Journal, this year’s expo drew a record crowd of 106, 349 people, breaking last year’s record of 102,867 attendees. The event also featured over 1,500 exhibits.

The entrance into the Ag Expo was congested with traffic. Numerous children with boots and cowboy hats clung to their parents with wide eyes as they looked upon the countless tractors and booths of the show. People were calling out to cousins, acquaintances or former classmates. Although the streets of the expo were flooded with thousands of people from different backgrounds and cultures, the event still had the feel of a community gathering.

The Ag Expo also is an event that encourages youth to become involved in agriculture. Mothers and fathers lifted their sons and daughters onto John Deere tractors or ATVs. It is these children who will most likely become the future farmers of our nation, and they are getting an early start.

I teach dairymen how to save money and to benchmark their results with the averages of others. I am trying to get our co-operatives to improve the milk pricing and marketing. We are also getting farmers to spend more time learning how to get more for their milk, instead of spending so much time trying to save a few bucks here and there. –Gary Genske

John DeRuiter, the senior vice president of Rabobank in Fresno, had a booth at the expo displaying his company’s ideas. DeRuiter say there is great  importance  in the introduction of youth to agriculture.

“At Rabobank we recognize that we need to constantly hire more people, including younger people,” DeRuiter said. “We have established a strong intern program with some of the ag schools such as Cal Poly and Fresno State. Every summer we have anywhere from fifteen to twenty interns that have the opportunity to learn what ag lending is. We believe in the future, not only of ag, but of ag lending and banking.”

[fusion_soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/247398186″ params=”auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false&visual=true” width=”100%” height=”150″ iframe=”true” /]

But it is not only the youth who have taken a liking to visiting the World Ag Expo. For many, traveling to the expo is a tradition that they have kept for decades. Virgil Ryals, from Chowchilla, CA, has attended all but five of the “farm shows” during its 49 year history.

Ryals was sitting in the shade, watching the traffic of people walk by in his overalls and Vietnam veterans hat when we began to talk with him.

“I am a spectator, that’s all,” Ryals said. “I have only missed five of these shows. I missed the first three, then skipped two more sometime after that, but I have made the rest. My favorite part about coming here is all of it. I normally take back some nice ideas or some equipment that I can use around the house.”

Not everyone who visits the expo is there simply to enjoy themselves. Everywhere I looked I saw farmers inquiring about the prices of machinery or asking what the benefits a certain product would have on their crops.

My personal favorite part of the show was the dairy pavilion. Although dust hung in the air of the warm and crowded building, I still enjoyed seeing anything that related to the dairy industry. In 1991, the Farm Credit Dairy Center was built in order to house the many dairy displays that are presented at the expo. 

Gary Genske, of Genske, Mulder and Company, had his booth displayed in the dairy pavilion. Genske represents about six hundred large dairies across the United States, which produce over 10% of the milk in the nation.

“I teach dairymen how to save money and to benchmark their results with the averages of others,” Genske said, “I am trying to get our co-operatives to improve the milk pricing and marketing. We are also getting farmers to spend more time learning how to get more for their milk, instead of spending so much time trying to save a few bucks here and there.”

Whether you prefer viewing the tractors or the animals, the World Ag Expo provides plenty of opportunities to get a glimpse of the “latest and greatest” in farming technology. The community feel of the show has not seemed to dim in it’s lengthy 49 year history, and luckily for us, it appears to be a tradition that will be kept for years to come.

This author can be reached via Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.