04/30/08 Beef Challenge & Standing Together

Beef Challenge & Standing Together plus Food Forethought. I'm Greg Martin with today's Northwest Report. USDA recently challenged the Cattlemen's Beef Board officers to develop and recommend changes to the Beef Promotion and Research Act and Order. The Chairman of the CBB, Dave Bateman from Oregon, Illinois, says this is  a function of being a Beef Board officer  a continual process in meeting the needs of today's producers. Over the coming months, the Beef Board will request suggested improvements from more than 100 national industry organizations, state beef councils, certified nominating organizations and national breed associations. Bateman says it's a big information gathering process  but, many players have a stake in the beef industry and we want to hear from them. Their findings will be submitted to the Secretary of Agriculture for further action. It seems everywhere you turn today someone is taking a poke at the renewable fuels industry. But the renewable fuels industry is banding together to counter the false claims about ethanol in an initiative called Renewable Fuels Now according to Ethanol Promotion and Information Council Executive Director Toni Nuernberg. NUERNBERG: It isn't just EPIC. It's EPIC, it's RFA, it's ACE, it's the corn growers, it's a number of our members; EPIC members, ethanol plants working together to combat some of this. Now with today's Food Forethought, here's Lacy Gray. Sweet dreams are made of cheese, who am I to disagree. Nope, not a new song by the Eurythmics, but a study carried out by the British Cheese Board. Yes, there has in fact been a study done on the effects of eating cheese before bedtime and the types of dreams that different cheeses may induce. Remember the old wives tale that ingesting cheese before you go to bed will cause nightmares? Well, that appears to be poppycock. That's British for ridiculous. In a week long study of 200 volunteers who ate cheese half an hour before sleeping, 72% slept quite well each night and 67% recalled their dreams without a nightmare among them. In fact, it appears that an amino acid in cheese, tryptophan, can actually reduce stress and aid in a good night's sleep. They also concluded in the study that different types of cheeses will invite uniquely oriented dreams; such as eating Cheddar can bring about dreams of celebrities. Yawn, I think it's time for bed. Pass me the Cheddar please and good night Cary Grant, I'll see you in my dreams. Thanks Lacy. That's today's Northwest Report. I'm Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.