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Nebraska farmer is big into social media
When it comes to using social media to tell agriculture’s story, you could call Ryan Weeks of Juniata, Nebraska one of the “early adopters.”
Weeks began sending ag-related Twitter messages three years ago, and now has over one-thousand followers. “And they’re not people that I know—I mean these are people that are just following me,” says Weeks. “I know there are some traders from the Board of Trade that follow to see what’s going on with the crops. I’ve got foreign followers that are just trying to keep up with what’s going on with ag in the U.S.”
And “consumers” are receiving Week’s messages as well.
“There’s a lot of people that live in the city and they’re part of this new ‘foodie movement’, where they want to buy local food—and they have such a different opinion than us,” continues Weeks, “but I think we’ve been able to connect with those people and make them realize that ag is not (the movie) ‘Food Inc.’ That’s one thing that gets referenced a lot is ‘Food Inc.’, and I think it’s allowed people to have a personal connection to the farm—and I think that’s what people need in order to understand what we’re doing and why we do it.”
Weeks says his Twitter message give followers a snapshot of farming on an everyday basis. “I’ve got a Smartphone and a lot of times I’ll take a picture, whether we’re irrigating or whether we’re doing some fieldwork,” he says. “Sometimes in the summer we’ll take some pictures of the pivots and post them—what we’re putting on—talk about how we conserve resources.
In addition to Twitter, Weeks uses Facebook and Buzz and recently started writing his own blog.
“I think people just generally want a connection to their food,” Weeks says, “and maybe this is a way to do it.”
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