This week is National Ag Week. Yesterday, March 15th specifically was National Ag Day. It’s a day to recognize and celebrate the abundance provided by agriculture. Every year, producers, agricultural associations, corporations, universities, government agencies and countless other across America join together to recognize the contributions of agriculture.

Agriculture provides almost everything we eat, use and wear on a daily basis. But too few people truly understand this contribution. This is particularly the case in our schools, where students may only be exposed to agriculture if they enroll in related vocational training. Each American farmer feeds more than 144 people ... a dramatic increase from 25 people in the 1960s. Quite simply, American agriculture is doing more - and doing it better. As the world population soars, there is an even greater demand for the food and fiber produced in the United States.

March 24th is the deadline for the Carroll County Farm Bureau scholarship applications. The applications can be found on our website at www.carrollcfb.org or at our office.

Carroll, Ogle, and Winnebago County Farm Bureaus are sponsoring a bus trip to the Case IH plant in Racine, WI on Friday, April 8th. The bus will leave the Winnebago County Farm Bureau at 7 a.m. and return approximately 4 p.m. Cost is $27 which includes transportation, the tour, and your lunch. Contact our office at for more information. The Racine Plant Produces the Case IH Magnum and the New Holland T8000 Series tractor. The 2 1/2 hour tour will take you through tractor & transmission assembly lines and the machining area.

The Carroll County Farm Bureau Action Team will be sponsoring an informational meeting on the Facilities Sales Tax that will be on the April ballot. The meeting will be held on Thursday, March 24 at 7 p.m. here at the Farm Bureau office in the Naaman Diehl Auditorium. Brenda Matherly, Assistant Director of Local Government with the Illinois Farm Bureau, will be presenting. Come learn more about this important tax that will be on the ballot in April. Come learn how this proposed tax will effect you.

These past few weeks have been quite busy as you can see. On March 5th, the Quality of Life Action Team sponsored an Ag Rescue class through the Illinois Fire Service Institute. There were 34 Fire/EMS/EMT personnel in attendance for the 8 hour class. A big thank you goes out to Brent and Denny Asay for bringing in their equipment for visuals. I also need to thank Irv’s Repair in Chadwick for bringing a corn head to the class for demonstration purposes. I also had great help serving lunch that day so a huge thank you to Joan & Keith Schriner and Francis Snider.

If you didn’t make it to our Hawaii preview meeting for the trip set for January 8-17, 2012, we have the itinerary on our website at www.carrollcfb.org or you can call our office for a copy of it.