Tuesday, April 10, 2012

World Pork Expo tours to showcase Midwest agriculture


    The National Pork Producers Council has announced three tours for people who want to experience Midwestern agriculture before the World Pork Expo opens in Des Moines, Iowa, on June 6. Pork producers can choose a two-day tour highlighting livestock, crops and agribusinesses, or single-day excursions featuring different agricultural destinations near Des Moines.
    “These tours are a perfect way for Expo attendees to fully experience the diversity of agriculture here in the nation’s breadbasket,” said Bryan Humphreys, director of Legislative Education Action Development Resource for the National Pork Producers Council. “Tour participants will have direct access to farm managers and agribusiness experts as they get to know fellow producers. And once the tours are finished, they will enjoy free admission to World Pork Expo.”
    The Midwest Agriculture Highlights Tour is a two-day tour on June 4–5 that will take participants to see the locks-and-dams system that enables agricultural products to traverse the Mississippi River to the rest of the world. The group also will visit Cinnamon Ridge Farms, which feature 4,000 acres of corn and soybeans, wean-to-finish swine facilities, a beef operation and a dairy, and the John Deere Pavilion museum.
    The one-day tours include a Monday Iowa agriculture tour of food distribution companies, a feed mill and the College of Veterinary Medicine at Iowa State University; and a Tuesday Iowa agribusiness tour of Swine Genetic's International's boar reproduction facility and Pioneer Hi-Bred.
    To register for any of these tours, all of which include free admission to World Pork Expo, go to www.worldpork.org.
    The World Pork Expo takes place June 6–8 at the Iowa State Fairgrounds in Des Moines. More than 450 commercial exhibits will be on display from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Wednesday, June 6, and Thursday, June 7, as well as from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Friday, June 8. Breeding stock sales will continue on Saturday, June 9, from 8 a.m. until they’re completed (at approximately noon).

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