Farm Bureau AgLead plans for future
Anderson Office Manager Judy LeFlore received an award in recognition of her 25-years of service to GCFB. Known by her GCFB family as someone who loves to travel, they presented her with a stylish travel bag.
The Grimes County Farm Bureau (GCFB) welcomed another full house to its 59th annual meeting Thursday, Oct. 27, at the Knights of Columbus Hall in Anderson. Attendees enjoyed the traditional steak dinner, received door prizes or meat packages. The program was provided by GCFB Vice-President Tim Akers who shared his experiences as a participant in the Texas Farm Bureau (TFB) AgLead Program as well as some counterpoints for the current anti-cattle rhetoric.
GCFB year in review
After the Anderson-Shiro FFA called the meeting to order, President Gary Moriarty introduced the board of directors, agency and office staff and recapped activities of the last 12 months. Those included attendance at the TFB State Convention, the annual meeting in Washington, D.C., the Summer Leadership Conference, President’s Conference, the Policy Development Meeting in Bellville and the District Caucus. Moriarty noted that board members attending the three-day Summer Conference received a wealth of information about upcoming regulations.
The GCFB continued its support of the Youth Fair with an expenditure of $15,000-plus. Six scholarships totaling $5,000 were also awarded to local youth, $1,800 was donated to the county’s volunteer fire departments, donations were made to county food pantries and GCFB handed out toothpaste at Anderson’s Trunk or Treat.
After approval of the minutes and treasurer’s report, Carol Garnett, Hunter Harrington, Jason Marek, Cole Price, Ashley Skinner and Michael Walkoviak were elected to the GCFB board of directors. This was followed by approval of Cole Price’s proposed Resolution to encourage the TFB to continue to support Ag in classroom activities.
Anderson office manager, Judy LeFlore received a surprise when her 25-years of employment with the GCFB was recognized with an award and a travel bag.
The farm legacy and business savvy
Ayes’ presentation included slides from his coast-to-coast travel as a participant in the TFB AgLead program which prepares participants to be agriculture’s advocates from the county to the national level. The two-year leadership development program for TFB members ages 25 and above takes participants across Texas, the country and the world to discover agriculture and leadership from a new perspective.
Shifting gears to what Ayers calls “fake meat” and “fake milk,” he busted anti-beef myths such as that cattle ranching harms the environment, it renders the land useless, beef provides an inferior diet and cattle are full of hormones and antibiotics.
Ayres pointed out that the U.S. provides 18% of the world’s beef with 8% of the world’s cattle. As for added hormones, they are measured in nanograms with each nanogram equivalent to one blade of grass. Akers contrasted the 1.9 nanograms, or two blades of grass, in beef to that of humans which ranged from 480,000 nanograms produced by females daily to 41.5 in prepubescent males. According to Akers, a 12 ounce mug of beer contains 15 nanograms, cabbage 2,025, and soybean oil 28,000 nanograms.
Addressing antibiotic claims, Akers said, “Pound for pound, humans and their pets – Fluffy and Fido, account for 10 times the amount of antibiotics that’s used in all of animal agriculture.”