U.S. Soybean Farmers Show Their Products at Fairs

Checkoff Partners with State, County Fairs to Promote Soy Products

This summer, at some prominent state and county fairs from Kansas to New York, the restrooms will be painted with soy-based paint, the parking lots will be treated with soy-based dust suppressant and the rides will run on soy biodiesel.

Through the soybean checkoff’s Green Ribbon Fairs program, U.S. soybean farmers will introduce some of their products to a combined 2.6 million people at 11 state, county and regional fairs.

The United Soybean Board (USB) and soybean checkoff will reimburse the fairs for using beneficial and sustainable soy-based products as part of fair operations, activities or facilities improvements. They’ll use a variety of soy-based products, including soy biodiesel, cleaning products, dust suppressants, hand sanitizer, ink, insulation, maintenance products, paint and more. The fairs will promote the use of these products as green alternatives to petroleum-based products to attendees.

USB Vice Chair Vanessa Kummer, a soybean farmer from Colfax, N.D., says this partnership offers an opportunity to educate fairgoers on soy products and the farmers who grow them and provided the funding to help develop many new uses for U.S. soybeans.

“It’s a very exciting opportunity to show what U.S. soybean farmers and the soybean checkoff have been doing to help create new, sustainable uses for soy and make them available for use by consumers,” Kummer says. “Soy is such a miracle crop – it can be used to make food for people and feed for animals as well as everyday consumer products.”

The 11 fairs, spread across nine states, include:

• Heart of Illinois Fair, Peoria, Ill., July 8-16
• Delaware County Fair, Manchester, Iowa, July 11-17
• Michigan Soybean Festival and Fowler County Fair, Fowlerville, Mich., July 25-30 (fair) and Sept. 10-11 (festival)
• Ohio State Fair, Columbus, Ohio, July 27-Aug. 7
• Ozark Empire Fair, Springfield, Mo., July 27-Aug. 7
• Finney County Fair, Garden City, Kan., July 28-30
• Schoharie County Sunshine Fair, Cobleskill, N.Y., July 29-Aug. 6
• Missouri State Fair, Sedalia, Mo., Aug. 11-21
• Dutchess County Fair, Rhinebeck, N.Y., Aug. 23-28
• Maryland State Fair, Timonium, Md., Aug. 25- Sept. 5
• Dyer County Fair, Dyersburg, Tenn., Sept. 5-10

The checkoff funds research and development of soy-based products, including supporting many products on the market today. Thanks in part to this funding, more than 1 billion pounds of U.S. soybean oil could go to industrial uses this year. Soy products represent renewable, U.S.-grown alternatives that, in some cases, outperform their petrochemical-based counterparts.

For more information on soy-based products or to search for products in the online Soy Products Guide, visit www.soynewuses.org.