“Making a Plan: Planning for a Profitable Estate Transition” is a workshop designed to help current and future agriculture producers, as well as professionals, understand the need for succession planning, while providing the latest tools to start the process. The 2012 workshop is Dec. 10 in Casper, Wyoming, at the Parkway Plaza and is open to agriculture producers and professionals of all ages.

The supply side of the supply-demand economic environment will continue to support cattle prices. U.S. calf crops have been shrinking in recent years; the 2012 crop is likely 800,000 to 850,000 smaller than 2011's. And the 2013 calf crop will be even smaller. Besides the smaller calf crop, in the next few years two additional factors will contribute to lower-trending U.S. cattle slaughter: 1) smaller cattle imports; 2) increased hold-back of U.S. heifers and cows for breeding herds. The discussion below focuses on why U.S. cattle imports are expected to drop.

As Congress continues to debate the quickly approaching "fiscal cliff," many farmers and ranchers across the U.S. are watching anxiously as the threat of an increased tax burden looms for many. Tax packages passed during the George W. Bush administration, and extended in 2010, set the current estate tax exemption at $5 million per person with a tax rate of 35 percent. If the "fiscal cliff" situation is left unsolved on Jan. 1, 2013, the estate tax exemptions will drop to only $1 million per person, with no spousal transfers allowed, and tax rates will rise to 55 percent.

Form-A-Feed introduces the PerFourMax product line for young beef and dairy calves. PerFourMax incorporates four areas of nutrition for young calves: milk replacers, calf feeds, heifer feeds and dairy-beef feeds. The company states that research and field trials have shown that using the PerFourMax product line, which supplies nutrients above young calves’ requirements, results in a more productive lifetime performance.

The first annual American Akaushi Association Convention was held Nov. 9-11, 2012. More than 200 members attended the event, traveling to Bastrop, Texas, from states including California and Florida and from countries such as Canada and Brazil.

While December is often a popular time to attend statewide cattlemen’s conventions, many of today’s leaders in the beef industry are making a round-trip to Lexington, Kentucky, to explore the latest advances in nutritional technologies and share ideas for keeping their operations efficient, profitable and sustainable.

It was Christmas of 1914, just months after the chain of events that plunged Europe into the bloody conflict of World War I. A confrontation some leaders had predicted would be a quick and decisive contest between nation-states had evolved into a prolonged war defined by ruthless weaponry and trench warfare. Historian Stanley Weintraub said the carnage of this war was best embodied in the trenches that scarred the landscape, filled with “lice, rats, barbed wire, fleas, shells, bombs, underground caves, corpses, blood, liquor, mice, cats, artillery, filth, bullets, mortars, fire, steel: That’s what war is. It is the work of the devil.”

Let’s begin by comparing owner/managers of two businesses. Our first business is a fast-food franchise that sells products specified by the parent firm to a largely unchanging clientele. Our second business is an upscale independent restaurant in an ever-changing retail location. The businesses are similar in volume of sales and net income. Let’s now compare the roles of the two managers. The first manager works in the business; manages employee hiring, scheduling and performance management; and develops, monitors, and improves all of the processes required to produce a consistent quality food product. He is primarily a working manager.