Our parent company, Meister Media Worldwide, produces more than publications such as American Fruit Grower and American Vegetable Grower. Meister is a player in the events world, hosting national and international agriculture conferences each year. Two events of interest to readers will occur during these first 10 weeks of the New Year. Launched in 2023, our second Women in Ag Tech meeting takes place Jan. 21-22 in Glendale, AZ, in conjunction with Meister’s annual VISION Conference. The event provides a platform for women in ag tech to connect, engage, and build a community.
On March 4-6 we move to Visalia, CA, for our ninth BioSolutions Conference and Expo. This annual event is the only production-focused event offering North American growers, advisers, and researchers the latest information and real-world guidance on implementing biological solutions and technology tools in specialty crop production.
Although I could promote each event, I will instead relay the words of Sara Villani, an Assistant Professor and Extension Specialist with North Carolina State University. While not affiliated with Meister or its events, Villani aptly intertwined the topics (and virtues) of women in agriculture and biological inputs while speaking at the Great Lakes Expo in Grand Rapids, MI.
LADIES FIRST
Villani and Kelly Liberator, Director of Technical Service with biologicals supplier AgBiome, headlined a women in ag discussion. Together, they described the advancements women have made in a historically male-dominated industry.
“More and more I’m seeing females come in and taking on the family farm,” Villani said. “It used to be, ‘My daddy did this, and my grand-daddy, and my great-grand-daddy.’ How cool is it to see females now?”
Liberator stressed the importance of women supporting women, saying there is “plenty of success out there for all of us,” and “we don’t have to keep that just for ourselves.” The industry has changed “immensely” in the time she has been a part of it, she said, starting with her first field role in Virginia.
“I was the only female on the East Coast. We had two other females in California and not a single female in-between for the field tech service,” she said. “The three of us had this bond and this relationship where we would share information, share insights, just to be that mutual support as we navigated our careers through the good and the bad and everything in-between. I fast-forward to today, and our organization looks vastly different. There are women all across the country.”
BRINGING ON THE BIO
Villani, who specializes in apple, grape, and ornamental plant pathology at NC State, momentarily broke from the theme of women in ag to emphasize the benefits of biological treatments.
“I finally jumped on the biological bandwagon. It took me forever, but there are reasons why,” she said. “Many of the biological companies, at least at the beginning, were introducing their products to us researchers and testing them mainly for organic programs. I am not a big proponent of organic programs in the Southeast. For the life of me, I don’t know how you grow an apple with just purely organic practices. But more recently companies in this industry, like AgBiome, have helped me see the light of an integrated management program and whether we can fit any of these biologicals into conventional programs. And the answer is, ‘Yes, yes we can.’”
Similar discussions are sure to take place at Meister’s Women in Ag Tech and BioSolutions events. We hope to see you there.