13 pages, Agricultural fairs provide one of the last frontiers, and largest stages, for showcasing livestock agriculture to the public. However, public funding, attendance revenue, animal biosecurity, and public health concerns are all aspects worthy of conversation and increased research attention given the interaction between livestock animals and the general public in fair and festival settings. A prominent social media listening and data analytics platform was used to quantify online and social media chatter concerning agricultural fairs during a 27-mo period. A general search for online media referencing agricultural fair keywords was designed; social and online media mentions of agricultural fairs (n = 2,091,350 mentions) were further queried according to their reference to livestock, fair food, or the major agricultural product producing species of dairy and beef cattle (n = 68,900), poultry (n = 39,600), and swine (n = 31,250). Numbers of search results were found to be seasonal and Twitter was the single largest domain for all fair-related results; in contrast, the majority of livestock-related media was generated by news sources rather than from Twitter. On a weekly basis, the percentage of fair livestock mentions with species-specific reference was highly variable ranging from 0% to 86.8% for cattle, 0% to 85.7% for poultry, and 0% to 76.9% for swine. In addition to quantifying total search hits or mentions, the positivity/negativity of the search results was analyzed using natural language processing capabilities. The net sentiment quantified is the total percentage of positive posts minus the percentage of negative posts, which results in a necessarily bounded net sentiment between −100% and +100%. Overall net sentiment associated with mentions of agricultural fairs was positive; the topics garnering the highest positive sentiments were fair food and cattle (both 98% positive). Online discussion pertaining to agricultural fairs and swine was overall positive despite references to swine flu outbreaks. In conclusion, livestock and animal products had positive net sentiment over the time period studied, but there are multiple aspects of agricultural fairs worthy of further investigation and continued vigilance, including zoonotic disease risk and public perceptions of livestock industries.
18 pages., Article 6, Via online journal., The discovery of the antibiotic Aureomycin as a growth promotor for the livestock industry was viewed as revolutionary in 1950. The use of antibiotics as growth promoters in livestock, however, has been questioned by health professionals concerned with the role this use might play in the development of antibiotic resistant bacteria. As a public health issue, newspapers have covered this topic since its discovery. Media, such as newspapers, have used frames to discuss the topic over time as new discoveries have occurred, policy changes have been implemented, and food animal production has changed. The purpose of this study was to determine the frames and sources used by national U.S. newspapers when discussing the topic of antibiotic use in livestock and antibiotic resistance. A quantitative content analysis was conducted on three national U.S. newspapers from 1996 – 2017 and found three primary frames were used when discussing antibiotic use in livestock and antibiotic resistance. The content analysis also indicated that over 90% of the news articles contained a scientific source when communicating about this scientific topic. Based on the frames identified some readers are being ill-informed about this topic and could be using this information in their decision making without having all of the facts. Science communicators should prioritize the inclusion of scientific sources in their writing as they communicate about complex, controversial topics.
Clay, D.E. (author), Ren, C. (author), Reese, C. (author), Waskom, R. (author), Bauder, J. (author), Mesner, N. (author), Paige, G. (author), Reddy, K. (author), Neibauer, M. (author), and Mahler, R. (author)
Format:
Journal article
Publication Date:
2004
Published:
USA
Location:
Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Document Number: C27112
10 pages., Via online journal., In 18 East German municipalities, nine of them with a planned pig production site and the other nine with an existing pig production site, a survey was carried out on the factors influencing the acceptance of pig production. The influencing factors examined were the personal attitude on particular aspects of pig production, socio-demographic characteristics, the personal involvement in local decision-making, the size of livestock and the production technology. As a result, existing production sites are perceived more positively than planned sites, without any influence of size and production technology. The difference may be explained by the fact that planned sites are evaluated in respect to economic arguments as jobs and income (market goods), while existing sites are rather evaluated in respect to environmental factors (public goods). For new investments the results lead to the recommendation to emphasize its economic aspects, to integrate the investor socially in the rural community and to apply technology that prevents pollution for the neighborhood. More importantly, the results show the shortcomings of a “top down” approach and the indispensability of endogenous resources in regional development.
16 pages, After years of debates and opposition from pharmaceutical companies, the Final rule of the Veterinary Feed Directive (VFD) went into effect in January 2017 requiring antibiotics used for both humans and animals for the purpose of growth promotion to be discontinued. This study sought to determine the effects framing content regarding antibiotic use in livestock and antibiotic resistance had on public opinion. Using a between-subjects experimental survey research design, 297 respondents indicated their perceptions of antibiotic use in livestock and the development of antibiotic resistant bacteria before being randomly assigned to one of three conditions. Each condition was a mock Twitter account framed differently based on findings from previous studies. After reading their assigned mock Twitter page, respondents indicated their trust of the information contained in the account, their information seeking behavior, demographics, and their support for antibiotic use in livestock. Using an ANCOVA, results indicated the frame influenced trust of information (F = 8.7, p < .05) and information seeking behavior (F = 4.48, p = .01) while support was not significant (F = 2.7, p = .07). Results suggest the blame frame has the greatest influence on shaping public opinion of antibiotic use in livestock and the development of antibiotic resistance.
