Celebrating its 10^th anniversary, NAMA Boot Camp kicked off with the MoKan Ag Tour on August 14, in Kansas City, Mo. The group visited two operations in Garden City, Mo., focused on seed production, swine production and meat market retail.

The day began at NeCo Seed Farms, which opened in 1978 and is family-owned. Michael Marconett, NeCo Seeds, discussed the variety of corn and soybean seed options available to growers, including GMO, organic and nonGMO seed. During the tour, attendees observed the seed cleaning process, where the seeds go through multiple cleaning processes to ensure uniform seed size and quality.

Following the tour at NeCo Seeds, the group toured Kurzweils’ Farms and Kurzweils’ Country Meats. On the farm tour, Dennis Kurzweil explained the family is involved in row crop, swine and cattle production.  The group viewed the swine facilities and learned the feed ration is made up from the harvested corn crop. After the farm tour, the group spent time at the meat market. Chris Kurzweil showed everyone how to make bratwurst, one of their top products.  Kurzweil said they have 39 bratwurst flavors and he described how they develop different flavors. The tours concluded with a smoked pork chop lunch at Kurzweils’.