ARCHIVED  March 1, 1997

Ag drives region’s economy

Most short-changed of industries will grow in importance

It’s easy to forget. So often, as we rightfully relish each new bit of news from the region’s high-tech industries, as we read almost daily of new retailers, restaurants, banks, and other commercial endeavors, we forget about the industry that drives all others: agribusiness.
In Larimer County, it’s especially easy, given the absorption of agricultural lands for commercial, residential and industrial purposes. What’s left of ag in Larimer? Not much, to Larimer’s
discredit.
And all too often, the business elite on the Fort Collins side of I-25 looks down on ag, ridiculing – or at least ignoring – its importance and translating that disdain to the communities of Weld County.
Such displays of bad manners seem trivial taken one at a time, but the slights become all the more perturbing when one realizes the full scope of agribusiness and its importance to this region, the nation and the world. Across I-25 and a little east sits one of the top five ag-producing counties in the entire nation. From beef to wheat to sugar beets and many other crops, Weld County helps feed the nation, even as ag accounts for a third or more of the county’s economy.
Locally, Con-Agra employs about 4,000 people, with thousands more local residents employed at feed lots, ag processing plants, biotechnology firms, wholesalers, farms, or some other ag-related industry. Ag pumps millions of dollars into not just the Weld County economy but also the entire Northern Colorado economy, with dollars spent on machinery, retail shops, suppliers, restaurants, housing, etc.
Ag’s importance was illustrated admirably during the Colorado Governor’s Ag Outlook Forum, conducted Feb. 20 at the Colorado Convention Center in Denver and co-sponsored by The Northern Colorado Business Report. Hundreds of attendees heard speakers on such issues as how the world can feed China’s burgeoning population, the role of biotechnology in feeding the world, the role of an agribusiness in the national and global economy and many other topics.
Dr. Will Carpenter, who boasts more than 30 years of working with Monsanto in markets and new-product development, noted that 70 percent to 80 percent of the U.S. population is three generations removed from agriculture and “have no idea how food gets on their table.”
Many people, he noted, owe their very existence and livelihood to ag, and probably don’t even know it. The reason is that U.S. residents spend far less on food than do their counterparts in Canada, Europe or virtually any other part of the world. That frees billions of dollars to be spent on recreational activities and consumer goods. Employees of ski resorts, sporting-goods stores, high-end car dealerships and others should “give prayers for and thanks to U.S. agriculture,” Carpenter noted.
For without cheap food, they wouldn’t have jobs.
At the same time, biotechnology stands to play an ever-increasing role in ensuring the viability of agricultural fields and the need for increasing yields to feed the world’s population. We are, Carpenter noted, “entering now the Model T era of biotechnology.” Much remains to be learned.
But, dangerously, research funding for biotechnology continues to decline, endangering future discoveries that could spur breakthroughs in food production. “We may not be killing the goose that laid the golden egg for agriculture, but we are causing it to suffer from malnutrition,” Carpenter said.
Let’s hope it doesn’t take a famine for every one of us to acknowledge the importance of ag.n n nOur newspaper has covered ag since we began publishing, but even we realize the need for constant improvement. That’s why you’re reading an Agribusiness section in this issue and why at least two more will be forthcoming this year.
Additionally, in April we launch a regular Agribusiness news column. We regard ag as one of this newspaper’s core beats of coverage, along with banking, health care, real estate and high technology. We welcome your ideas for how we can better cover this critical and fascinating industry. And if changes are occurring in your agribusiness, either through a merger, acquisition, expansion, etc., let us know.
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Most short-changed of industries will grow in importance

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It’s easy to forget. So often, as we rightfully relish each new bit of news from the region’s high-tech industries, as we read almost daily of new retailers, restaurants, banks, and other commercial endeavors, we forget about the industry that drives all others: agribusiness.
In Larimer County, it’s especially easy, given the absorption of agricultural lands for commercial, residential and industrial purposes. What’s left of ag in Larimer? Not much, to Larimer’s
discredit.
And all too often, the business elite on the Fort Collins side of I-25 looks down on ag, ridiculing –…

Christopher Wood
Christopher Wood is editor and publisher of BizWest, a regional business journal covering Boulder, Broomfield, Larimer and Weld counties. Wood co-founded the Northern Colorado Business Report in 1995 and served as publisher of the Boulder County Business Report until the two publications were merged to form BizWest in 2014. From 1990 to 1995, Wood served as reporter and managing editor of the Denver Business Journal. He is a Marine Corps veteran and a graduate of the University of Colorado Boulder. He has won numerous awards from the Colorado Press Association, Society of Professional Journalists and the Alliance of Area Business Publishers.
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