Food Price Press Conference

Updated with recorded video

Today at 1pm eastern time, RFA is hosting a press conference at the National Press Club. In attendance will be:

The Honorable John Block, former Secretary of Agriculture
Tom Buis, President, National Farmers Union (NFA)
Bob Dinneen, President of the Renewable Fuels Association (RFA)
Rick Tolman, CEO, National Corn Growers Association (NCGA)

The topic will be: “Farmers and Ethanol Industry to Present the Facts On Food Price Increases.”

We are working to try and stream the press conference live on on UStream.tv using the player below. At the time of the conference, you should be able to click on the player and see the live stream. This is an experiment, so we will see how it works. Regardless, we are recording the conference and will have a full update available here afterward.

Update: The live stream worked! Here is a recording of the first 20 minutes or so:

This was the first time we used this new streaming service. It recorded in segments so here’s another segment which takes you through all the opening statements.

Huge FEW Expo

Some 700 exhibitors filled the floor of the America’s Center trade show arena this week for the 23rd Annual Fuel Ethanol Workshop, representing everything from industry organizations like RFA, to plants, design/builders, materials suppliers, consultants, and much more. As the expo was winding down on Wednesday evening, I did a walk-through with Kathy Bryan, who is the president and co-founder of BBI International, the company responsible for FEW.

“The people who are coming don’t come just to see the ethanol producers,” Bryan told me. “They come to meet the other vendors so they can team up and work together for a client.”

Bryan says the expo portion of the show is was started in 1996. “When the Fuel Ethanol Workshop started 23 years ago, we just had the workshop. There was no trade show, no exhibitors, nothing like that. And there were probably between 25 and 40 people who came to the first few years.”

This year there were over 5,000 in attendance at the FEW, an increase of over 60 percent just compared to last year.

Watch the video walk-through of the expo, which is posted on YouTube, here:

Or you can listen to the just the audio portion of the interview with Kathy here: Kathy Bryan (5 min MP3)

The Second Amendments Perform

They call themselves the Second Amendments and they played for us here at the Tuesday evening reception.

The Second Amendments is a band made up of a number of our Congressional representatives in Washington, DC. Only two of them were able to appear for us here. They were Reps. Collin Peterson (D-Minn.) on lead vocals and Kenny Hulshof (R-Mo.) on drums. They had excellent stand-ins to make up for the missing members.

Both of these Representatives will be taking part in today’s sessions so I’m sure we’ll hear more from them later.

You can also use this link to visit the video on YouTube itself if you’d like to see a larger version.

Test Driving a Saab

General Motors is sponsoring a display of flex fuel vehicles here at the conference as we’ve mentioned previously.

This afternoon I had a chance to go on a test drive with Bob Dinneen at the helm and with him was Coleman Jones, Biofuels Implementation Manager, GM Powertrain.

We took a short drive around the complex and fortunately there were no tickets and we made it back safely.

In this video I asked Coleman about the vehicle we’re in as well as the others they have on display.

Ladies & Gentlemen Start Your Engines

Before all the business kicks into high gear a lot of the people attending the Conference are out on the golf course. I’m sure they’re all talking business too.

I know we’ll have some more pictures and highlights, including awards from the golf tournament later. Remember to check out the 2007 National Ethanol Conference Photo Album too.