Farm Bureau, Agri-Culture Garner National Awards

The Santa Cruz County Farm Bureau and the organization Agri-Culture were presented with a national award for . The award was presented at the American Farm Bureau Federation Annual Meeting in Honolulu earlier this month.

A delegation of Jane Nelsen, Agri-Culture board member; Nita Gizdich and Cynthia Mathiesen, Farm Bureau board members represented the two organizations. Last year, they were honored for the Focus Agriculture program. There are 3,140 county farm bureaus in the United States. Very few ever receive a national award and it is even rarer for a county to receive awards two years in a row.

The video/DVD was selected because of the manner in which it was developed and promoted. The video/DVD was directed and narrated by Cristina King, who was an NBC anchor in Missouri before settling in Santa Cruz County. The cinematography was done by acclaimed artist Damon Meyer. The movie stars are local growers. The script was written and edited by local agriculture experts Ron Tyler, Dave Moeller and Bill Ringe. The executive producer was Jess Brown.

In Hawaii a booth was set up to recreate the unique "red carpet" premiere. The booth included played the video and the delegation dressed as local produce greeting the 12,000-plus conference attendees.