Agvocacy at its best; AgChat Foundation

Nebraska farmers, and farmers around the United States and Canada are getting more involved with agriculture advocacy – online!

The weekly AgChat Twitter conversation was started for farmers and consumers alike as an open forum to answer questions about agriculture and food production. This new form of social media for those in agriculture has helped energize and inspire many farmers to engage online to agvocate for their industry using social networking tools like Twitter and Facebook.

Agriculture advocate and public speaker, Michele Payn-Knoper started AgChat one year ago, and this venue has led into a great resource for both farmers and foodies. Now it is bigger than ever.

This week, the AgChat Foundation was announced via Twitter as a way to connect people on both sides of the food plate.

This farmer led group “is designed to empower more farmers to leverage social media as a tool to tell agriculture’s story. The Foundation will educate and equip farmers and ranchers with the skill set needed to effectively engage on Twitter, Facebook, blogs, YouTube, Linkedin and other social media services. It will give them knowledge to unlock new tools to effectively tell their story. Research shows that social media is a growing opportunity for farmers to have a stronger voice in educating people about the business of growing food, fuel, feed and fiber.”

The Foundation will host a Board of Directors and an Advisory Board, both farmer led. Nebraskans Zach Hunnicutt, farmer from Giltner, and Brent Pohlman, Midwest Labs in Omaha, will be serving on the Advisory Board for the Foundation. To see the list of Board of Directors and Advisory Board, see this Agwired.com post.

Please read more about the AgChat Foundation and check out the Fan Page on Facebook.