7-12 IAN Farmers and Social Media

 Farmers from even the most remote small towns are engaging life-long city dwellers in stories of their farm through social media sites like Twitter and Facebook. These conversations are at the core of building understanding of agriculture by the 98 percent of Americans not living on the farm. Improving individual effectiveness is the goal of the AgChat Foundation's first training session to help farmers be more effective in telling their personal story. The conference will be held August 30-31 in Chicago. Here’s social media expert and Idaho Farm Bureau News chief Jake Putnam: “One of the things that’s been lacking throughout the history of farming is that farmers have not been good at beating their own drum so there’s always been a lot of misinformation out there. With social networking, people can find out about their food and about farming right from the horse’s mouth. Social networking is invaluable, it’s long overdue and it’s one of the most exciting things going on in agriculture.”

The conference is being planned by volunteers who serve on the AgChat Foundation's board of directors, advisory board and committee members. The team includes farmers, professional communicators and trainers.