14pgs, The unjust distribution of poor health outcomes produced via current United States food systems indicates the need for inclusive and innovative policymaking at the local level. Public health and environmental organizers are seeking to improve food environments from the ground up with locally driven policy initiatives but since 2010 have increasingly met resistance via state-government preemption of local policymaking power. This analysis seeks to understand how political actors on both sides of preemption debates use rhetorical argumentation. In doing so, we offer insights to the meaning-making process specific to food systems. We argue that advocates for local food-system innovations are forwarding understandings of food and community that contradict the policy goals they seek. We offer suggestions for local food and environmental advocates for adjusting their arguments.
19 pages., via online journal article, Best management practices (BMPs) are suggested practices that help agricultural producers optimize production while reducing pollution, soil erosion, and other environmental impacts. Many audiences, including scientists and policy makers, have expressed disappointment at the current level of BMP use. Elaboration likelihood model (ELM) is used to understand how people process messages. ELM states that people can process messages either centrally or peripherally. This study sought to understand how producers processed information related to BMP adoption in grazing systems. Researchers conducted qualitative, in-depth interviews with 42 beef-cattle producers in Kansas and Oklahoma. It was found producers process information both centrally and peripherally, more specifically through past experiences and visual observations. This study suggests that when promoting BMPs, communicators should use visual cues to help producers process information. More importantly communicators should utilize strategies that encourage producers to reflect on past experiences to promote central processing.
19 pages., Via online journal., This project’s primary purpose was to identify and describe the leadership styles and skills emphases of current Kansas agricultural organization chief executive officers. Twenty-three current CEOs participated and were described in terms of their leadership styles, leadership-skills emphases, and demographics. Overall, they appeared to be rather “middle of the road” on each of the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire’s nine leadership scales. Leadership styles were not significantly affected by demographics, with the exception of formal leadership training affecting transactional leadership and education level, organizational category, and staff size affecting passive-avoidant leadership. Participants generally rated the 50 leadership skills as important. Leadership styles did not significantly affect the skill emphases. In evaluating CEO candidates, an agricultural organization should design its process to gauge leadership styles and skills separately because, according to this project, they do not predict each other. Once a new CEO is hired, a formal leadership-training program should emphasize the transformational style over the transactional and, more so, passive-avoidant while still maintaining an appropriate balance between transformational and transactional.
James F. Evans Collection; See C04120 for original, The study at the University of Wisconsin-Madison seeks to determine how much a farmer will actually use his/her computer after purchase. The introductory study looked broadly at the farmers' background, environment, and personality. It set out to discover what focuses in farm life enhance or diminish a farmer's computer use. The variables suggested include: Complexity of Farm, Degree of External Support, Age, Views on Management, Time, Experience, network, Availability of Information, and Personality and Approach to Learning. Several implications are suggested by these preliminary findings that might facilitate the use of computers.
McCarthy, David A. (author), Williams, David L. (author), and Williams: Department Chairperson, Agricultural Education, Iowa State University; McCarthy: Discipline Leader, Mechanized Agriculture, University of Minnesota, Waseca, MN
Format:
Journal article
Publication Date:
1985
Published:
USA: [Columbus, OH : Ohio State University, Department of Agricultural Education.]
Location:
Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Box: 84 Document Number: C05216
