Mainstreaming Cover Crops: Training Opportunities for Crop Consultants and Extension Educators

Mainstreaming Cover Crops: Training Opportunities for Crop Consultants and Extension Educators

Summary

Practical Farmers of Iowa and the American Society of Agronomy, together, created and delivered three, one hour webinars on cover crop production practices.  Their target audience included Certified Crop Advisers (CCA), Certified Professional Agronomists (CPAg), Certified Professional Soil Scientists (CPSS), Ag Retail personnel, Cooperative Extension personnel along with farmers.  The purpose of these educational webinars was to increase the agricultural advisers’ knowledge level of cover crop production practices and enable said advisers to positively influence their farmer clients adoption rate of cover crops.  These professionals are effective conduits to educate producers and targeting them with additional educational programs about cover crops was identified as a real way to increase implementation.

The webinars were created and delivered in the first quarter of 2016 to over 4,500 participants with 96% stating that they found the information somewhat valuable or valuable.  A survey was conducted in August of the webinar participants to evaluate knowledge level, usefulness of the information and recommendations for future webinars.

A second, three webinar series is planned for the first quarter of 2017 on more advanced topics related to cover crop production and identified by the participants of the 2016 series.

Objectives/Performance Targets

Six, one-hour webinars created and delivered to 2,500 CCAs and 1,500 Ag Professionals about cover crops in the mid-west USA with three webinars concurrently supplementing three in-person events in 2016 and 2017 with the potential to reach 200,000 farmers.

Accomplishments/Milestones

ASA cover crops report March 4 2016 Luther Smith –

2015 – advisory team was established with CCAs, ASA members (academia with cover crops focus) and farmers utilizing cover crops.  The 2016 webinar topics and speakers were identified along with delivery dates.

2016 – promotional materials were developed and delivered; three, one-hour webinars were created and delivered to over 4,500 CCAs, Ag Professionals and farmers in the first quarter; webinars were placed in the ASA online library as self-paced learning modules with a three year life; power point slides were made available; and an online survey was developed and conducted of those who participated in at least one of the webinars to gage knowledge level and adoption. 

The 2017 webinar series with the concurrent in-person educational events were planned with the advisory team and staff.

Impacts and Contributions/Outcomes

Cover Crops for Ag Professionals Survey Responses with Charts

Our goal was to reach 2,500 CCAs, CPAgs, CPSS; 1,000 members of ASA, CSSA and SSSA whom include extension, university researchers and government personnel; and 500 innovative farmers over the two year life of the grant.

Webinars:

Feb 4:  Managing for Cover Crops – don’t forget the agronomic basics, attendance 1,414

Feb 11:  So why do you want to grow cover crops?, 1,497

Feb 19:  Show me the money! Can cover crops pay?, 1,657

Webinars were placed in the ASA online educational library and will have a three year life as self-paced learning.

Survey:

August 2016:  Survey was developed and delivered online to webinar participants.  227 completed and returned the survey.  97% stated that they found the webinars somewhat valuable or valuable, 62% of the participants were CCAs and 50% were from the North Central Region, 87% said it added to their agronomy knowledge.  For each webinar, average knowledge level before the webinar was a 3/5 and after the webinar it was 4/5.  About 70% of those who learned a new practice would recommend it to their clients or implement it themselves if farming.

Survey data was used to develop the 2017 series by the advisory team and staff.

Collaborators: