SARE 1996 Highlights

Resource Managers Tap Info Frontier

More than 15,000 extension staff, ranchers and other ag-related professionals throughout the U.S. and the Tropics learned about sustainable land-management practices from satellite broadcasts and videos last year. With funding from a Western SARE professional development grant, an eight-state educational project led by the Cooperative Extension Service in Wyoming and Colorado succeeded in reaching an even wider audience than expected. A live satellite broadcast to 159 sites nationwide in early 1995 gave participants a chance to phone in questions to a panel of experts during half of the program. Another 90-minute telecast in April that used taped footage emphasized case studies. Examples included improved grazing management near streambanks, scheduling calving for better forage use and increased income in Montana, crop rotation for soil-nutrient management in Colorado and niche-market development for alternative crops on rangeland. Viewers from as far away as Guam and Hawaii benefited from the programs. State Extension services, collaborating universities, ag-related agencies and crop management associations publicized the free broadcasts via newsletters, the Internet, direct mail and other media. All sponsors and dozens of other groups received video copies for rebroadcast or for film libraries. Impressed with results, project organizers obtained an additional SARE grant for a 30-minute "infomercial" to promote sustainable agriculture in the western U.S. For copies of the first two videos at $15 each, call (307) 766-5478. (Western Region project EW94-18)

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