Thank you, Gary, this is certainly one of the aims of the organization and one that hits home for me personally. Nate hit on some excellent points today many of which we have discussed over the past 2 years. Great insight! On Wed, Oct 18, 2023 at 4:11 PM Gary Wietgrefe via Collab < collab@lists.millets2023.space> wrote:
Another fantastic NAMA webinar today. Both Dr. Hazra and Nate Blum discussed the need for local users/processors of millet and sorghums. How to develop them appears too complex. I shouldn't be.
Nate mentioned South Dakota sorghum production is higher than Nebraska because South Dakota has local users for sorghum in birdseed. While on the call, I looked up today's local cash prices at the largest grain elevator in SD. Local cash corn is 7.53 cents/lb., sorghum is 8.25 cents/lb., and proso millet is 7.75 cents/lb. Nationwide, sorghum normally sells at about 95% the value of corn. How are our local prices possible? Nate nailed it--local production, local buyers, local processors/packagers. How was that market created?
In response to disastrously low commodity prices, SD legislature in 1978 created a Marketing Division in the SD Dept. of Agriculture to increase ag prices by promoting what South Dakota produced. I was one of six people hired in that new Division. My responsibilities were mainly grains, seeds, and transportation. We received many calls and letters from growers seeking help. For example, in the fall of 1978 several calls came in from proso millet producers who said they could not get a price. Yes, $0.00 for their proso!
Action: First, I figured out who were the local proso buyers. I connected them with a Canadian exporter who shipped proso through the Great Lakes to Europe (replacing Argentine yellow plata) in the spring of 1979. Secondly, I realized the biggest potential U.S. users of proso were bridseed packagers. With the help of a local sketch artist, Jim Pollock, and my administrative assistant, Deenie Frederick (who by the way introduced me to my wife of 39 years), helped me make a mailer of "*Birdfoods of South Dakota*" (attached photo you may have noticed on my bookshelf in today's Zoom). Mr. Pollock drew sketches of birds, I collected birdseeds we grew, and Deenie and I cut 2x2" slide holders, filled them with birdseeds, glued them to yellow cardstock with bird sketches, then laminated it. We made 100 and mailed them to all the birdseed packagers, distributors, and SD buyers...and had a few left over including the attached.
Not only did we establish a 40+-year birdseed market for proso, foxtail (I labeled "Red Finch), and sorghum (which at the time had only about three seed sellers in our state), our project converted the U.S. sunflower birdseed from 100% confection (which SD grew hardly any) to 100% black oil sunflowers now sold nationwide. My farming grandson produces sunflowers, sometimes sorghum, and proso which I help combine each fall.
Local farmers, like my grandson, sell to those "local birseed buyers", (Nate Blum mentioned) are all small businesses, none of which have over 10 employees.
In 1978-1982, without Internet, we established a nationwide network using local farmers and businesses. As an ag-businessman and economist, it seems logical to me that Sorghum United, NAMA, or similar organization could put together an on-line directory of millet producers, local buyers, millet users, millet processors, millet shippers, millet exporters, millet product developers/packagers, and etc. to replicate what three of did over four decades ago.....Gary Wietgrefe
On Mon, Oct 16, 2023 at 6:04 AM <collab-request@lists.millets2023.space> wrote:
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Today's Topics:
1. 10th Millets Webinar, Wed. 2023/10/18: Millets in community & economic development (Don Osborn)
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Message: 1 Date: Sun, 15 Oct 2023 11:26:12 -0400 From: Don Osborn <don@milletsalliance.org> To: collab@lists.millets2023.space Subject: [Collab] 10th Millets Webinar, Wed. 2023/10/18: Millets in community & economic development Message-ID: < CA+RHibUfscKwDL8wr8eHcjE6W-28rKocsSJnoZTO_1H26vx3Pw@mail.gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
The 10th in our monthly Millets Webinar Series is coming up this Wednesday, 18 Oct. at 5 pm EDT! It has as its theme, "More than small change: Millets in community and economic development," and will feature presentations by two experts, followed by Q&A:
* Dr. Amrita Hazra, Assoc. prof. of chemistry and biology at Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER), Pune, India. She was a co-founder of the UC-Berkeley based Millet Project, a ground-breaking initiative to promote millets with local producers and processors in northern California. Amrita will present on "Millets: A small grain to confront big challenges."
* Nate Blum, CEO of Sorghum United and former director of the Nebraska Grain Sorghum Board, has worked with communities of growers and researchers in several contexts. He has also launched a comic book series promoting sorghum called "Sorgho Squad." Nate will present on the role of sorghum and millets in reshaping global food & agriculture paradigms.
Most of the focus in discussing millets is naturally on their performance in fields, their qualities as nutritious foods (and drinks), and how we get them from harvest to table. In this edition of the Millets Webinars, we shift the focus to some socio-economic dimensions. What does promotion (or preservation) of millets as crops and food bring to community and livelihood? This is another vast topic, but we think you'll find these two perspectives enlightening and thought-provoking. (Special thanks to Claire Smith of Teffola for having suggested this topic earlier this year.)
If you are not already registered for the Millets Webinar Series, you may sign up here:
https://umsystem.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJctduutrTgoGNLZnrkxtUw614DEjAT3Sg...
For past editions of our Millets Webinar, please see: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLy7IvZCKUBap-6AaoCjPSFTMMq772t_Yb
The Millets Webinar Series is being organized during the International Year of Millets (2023) by the North American Millets Alliance (NAMA) and the Food Engineering and Sustainable Technologies (FEAST) Lab at the University of Missouri, with additional support from the Center for Regenerative Agriculture, also at the University of Missouri.
Don Osborn, PhD (East Lansing, MI, US) North American Millets Alliance