Join Minnesota Crop Production Retailers and the University of Minnesota Extension for a crop pest management short course.
The three-day Minnesota Crop Pest Management Short Course program & Minnesota Crop Production Retailers Trade Show starts Tuesday, Dec. 12 and continues through Thursday, Dec. 14. The Crop Pest Management Short Course educational program starts on Wednesday, Dec. 13 from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. and continues on Thursday, Dec. 14 from 8 a.m. to 12 p.m.
The trade show and educational sessions will take place at the downtown Minneapolis Hilton Hotel. All the program details, including registration and hotel information for the 2023 Crop Pest Management Short Course & MCPR Trade Show can be found on the Minnesota Crop Production Retailers website.
Schedule Highlights
Tuesday, December 12, 2023
MCPR Plenary Sessions (1 p.m. to 3 p.m.) with speakers:
Fertilizer Market Overview
Josh Linville, StoneX
While the worst of the Black Swan/record high fertilizer price period appears to be behind us, there remains PLENTY of reasons to believe that volatility will remain the only constant in an ever changing fertilizer world. Josh Linville, Vice President – Fertilizer for StoneX, will give an updated look at how the market came to be as well as what is being watched going forward.
High Impact Meteorology in Production Agriculture
Eric Snodgrass, Nutrien Ag Solutions Sr
Weather risk in production agriculture is ubiquitous and the successful execution of a crop plan requires accurate weather forecasting and analysis. We plan our operations based on weather averages and our experiences over recent growing seasons, but each year presents a new set of weather challenges. In this talk we will focus on how to use the abundance of weather data to stay ahead to disruptive weather events. We will talk about the limits of predictability for weather events and learn about the resources available to monitor changes in the longer range forecasts. We will review the major lessons from the 2023 growing season and talk about the high impact events like widespread hail damage, Midwest and Southern U.S. Drought, and the hurricane season. We will talk about the big seasonal drivers like El Niño and La Niña and discuss the outlook for the next 3-9 months. We will finish with a discussion about the 2023-24 growing season in South America, which competes directly with major U.S. commodity crops.
Information Technical Service Provider (TSP) recertification program from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.
This training will present the latest information from the USDA-Natural Resources Conservation Service (USDA-NRCS) on nutrient and pest management to TSPs certified in these categories in Minnesota. This session will focus on the latest tips for documentation that is needed for Nutrient Management (590) and Pest Management Conservation System (595) in the EQIP and CSP programs. The session will also include a segment on various Conservation Plan Activities (CPAs), Design and Implementation Activities (DIAs), and Conservation Evaluation and Monitoring Activities (CEMAs) associated with nutrient and pest management. Hear the latest information along with other updates on the TSP website, certification and recertification.
Trade Show
The trade show will be open on Tuesday from 3 p.m. to 6:30 p.m.
Wednesday, December 13
General Session
This year’s theme is "There is No Back to the Future" - While Marty McFly was able to correct his past mishaps by traveling back in time in the iconic DeLorean, the reality of undoing the past is fraught with challenges. New discoveries and technologies often take much longer to reach the field than we think, plan, or hope for. Meanwhile, changes in societal attitudes and, as a consequence, regulatory frameworks compound the technical challenges. This year’s program focuses on extending the effectiveness of the tools we have left and the adoption of tactics that go beyond crop protection inputs to head off a further escalation so that producers can maintain their productivity and profitability.
The program will be from 8 a.m. to 11 a.m. with a great lineup of keynote speakers including:
There’s No Easy Button
Janet Hou, BASF
There’s no doubt about it – farming is an incredibly rewarding but hard job. It’d be great if some aspects of farming were just easier. Unfortunately, bringing effective crop protection solutions isn’t one of them. This talk will go over just why aren’t manufacturers bringing more new active ingredients and modes of action to the market at the pace we’ve experienced decades ago. We’ll also talk about what challenges the current regulatory environment in the states and at the national level bring to new innovations and how chemical manufacturers are responding and adapting.
The Conservation Agronomy Nexus
Peter Mead, The Nature Conservancy and Amy Robak, CentraSota Cooperative
There is a growing movement in agribusinesses, government, and non-profit organizations recognizing the value of private-public partnerships when it comes to maintaining farm profitability and achieving environmental outcomes. At the same time, Minnesota is awash with unprecedented state and federal funding for conservation practices such as cover crops, reduced till, strip-till, no-till, nutrient management, conservation crop rotations, and more.
Amy and Peter will discuss one example of a private-public service-based model delivering technical and financial assistance to grower customers and the value to each partner, provide an overview of the services and resources available, and discuss opportunities for building similar programs and partnerships across Minnesota.
How To Not Lose A War Against Pests: A Strategy In 3 Parts
Joshua Stamper, Minnesota Department of Agriculture
- Don’t run out of ammunition
- Don’t fight a ground war against an insurgency
- Public opinion matters
Concurrent Sessions
Concurrent educational sessions from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. will continue the strong educational program with a wealth of pest, crop and fertilizer management topics including: Weed management strategies, Kernza challenges and opportunities, fungicide resistance management, corn pest management, modernizing fertilizer guidelines, revisions to Minnesota’s nutrient reduction strategy, managing Tar Spot and other leaf diseases in corn, soybean stress and yield accrual.
Trade Show
Wednesday the trade show will be open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Thursday, December 14, 2023
Concurrent Sessions
Concurrent educational sessions will continue from 8 a.m. to noon and will detail a number of important agronomic topics including: climate and agriculture in Minnesota, understanding and using Minnesota future climate projections, gene/genome editing overview, sensible soil health, making the most of manure, weed management and cover crops, Dicamba lessons learned, managing insecticide resistant soybean aphids.
Trade Show
On Thursday, the trade show continues in the morning from 9 a.m. to 11 a.m.