Farmer uses his animals to become Internet hit

12 January 2004

BILBAO – Farmer Aitor Solozabal has used the animals on his farm to become an unlikely hit on the Internet, it was reported Monday.
 
Solozobal, 41, has used webcams to film his cows, pigs and hens 24-hours a day for a webpage which has received 31,000 ‘hits’ from around the world.

Solozabal started using the webcams in July last year and set up a web page which has attracted visitors from France, Japan, and the United Status.

The page has even been recommended by the department of education in the State of Georgia in the U.S.

On his 27-hectare farm, five cameras work 24-hours-a-day to film his herd of cows, 120 pigs and hens.

The animals can be observed permanently either in  the meadow or the stables of the farm, which is outside Elorrio, near Bilbao in north-west Spain.

They are reared in a free-range way, with a diet of  wheat, barley and beans.

Solozabal said his fondness for the Internet as well as his desire to show off his farm to friends and family made him create a web page.

He said: ”On Saturdays and Sundays, there were always many people coming to our stables to see the animals.

“The story of the Internet always seemed to me interesting, so we thought that we could show it off outside.”

“Many farmers from the U.S. have web pages about their farms but I don’t know any who have used webcams,” he claimed.

Solozabal, a father- of-two, was surprised by the success of his initiative  which, according to him, had required an investment “slightly less than the cost of a new tractor”.

Now he is studying the possibility of  talking advertisements on his web page.

Solozabal worked as a truck driver until he bought his first cow 19 years ago and went into farming.

www.granjafamiliar.com

[Copyright EFE with Expatica]

Subject: Spanish news