Trade Talk: Orwick Tells Industry’s Story
by Judy Malone
Peter Orwick, executive director of ASI, chatted it up with the farm broadcasters during Trade Talk 2014, the main event of the National Association of Farm Broadcaster’s National Convention.
Orwick covered topics from the positive lamb and wool markets to the upcoming 150th celebration of ASI, the nation’s oldest livestock association, in Reno, Nev., in January.
Other issues discussed during the more than six-hour event included the industries flock expansion program; the perceived disease transmission between domestic and bighorn sheep and its impact on public-lands grazing; and the proposed closure of the nation’s only research station dedicated to sheep research.
Trade Talk is an opportunity for agriculture groups to provide news stories to the nation’s farm broadcasters to help keep rural communities informed on current events within the various industries. It has been estimated that 2,500 interviews are given during Trade Talk and that those interviews have a collective air-time value among member stations and networks of more than $550,000.