2013 ASGA Annual Meeting :: Staff report
Sugarbeet Industry
Riding High
Growers Urged to Get Involved for Challenges Ahead
The sugarbeet industry has been surfing along on waves of optimism, so a San Diego
seaside hotel seemed like the perfect place to
hold the 2013 American Sugarbeet Growers
Association annual meeting on Feb. 3���5.
With a record 2012 crop, the one-year
extension of the Farm Bill Sugar Policy, and a
victory in the Roundup Ready sugarbeet litigation, moods were high at the conference. Even
calls to get involved politically in the coming year and what challenges may lie ahead,
couldn���t tamper the optimistic climate.
The fact that Roundup Ready will still be a
tool in growers��� toolboxes may be the biggest
reason for high spirits, but precision ag will be
an ever-increasing tool for growers. Due to biotech and other yield/precision developments,
���You are going to see a big pick-up in yields in
the latter part of this decade,��� said Jim Wiesmeyer of Informa Economics, referring to corn
28��� Sugar Producer��� MARCH 2013
Luther Markwart, standing, ASGA executive vice president, gets questions from growers during the meeting.
