In the 90-minute ritual, she distributes buckets of grain and hay for the cows’ breakfast, scrapes away animal feces, fills the water trough bucket by bucket, milks the dairy cows, feeds the barnyard cats and new kittens, and shepherds sometimes recalcitrant cows out to pasture. Next, she replenishes feed and water for the chickens and lets them out into their area.

It’s a lot of work. “To be honest, I take a nap every single morning,” laughs Maffie, who is studying chemistry at Bates College. “But I’ve learned more about cows and chickens than I ever knew before.” She’s part of the Anne Saxelby Legacy Fund (ASLF), a unique month-long immersive farm apprenticeship program that provides farm internships and apprentice opportunities to students and career changers.

The ASLF was founded in 2022 by the family and friends of pioneering cheesemonger Anne Saxelby of Saxelby Cheesemongers after her sudden passing. Saxelby, a beloved figure in the cheese world, championed American farmstead cheese, leading to its rise in prominence. Working on farms was life changing for her and instilled a desire to support small producers and change our industrial food system.

“We need to educate this next generation of farmers” in order to bring about systemic change, says Susie Cover, the ASLF’s executive director. Those who enter farming-adjacent careers will also be better equipped to make change. Learning the art of affinage (the process of aging cheese), herd management like Maffie, or how to properly prune plants to encourage stem growth are experiences that students will “never get by learning in a classroom,” she says. “The hands-on part is the most important.”

“The hands-on part is the most important.”

Nearly 100 apprentices are working in 60 farms across the country; one is employed at London’s famed Neal’s Yard Dairy. Placements include produce, animal, hemp, and dairy farms, and cheesemaking and salumi operations in locations aligned with the fund’s mission and values of quality sustainable agriculture.

The program has doubled in size each year; 500 applications were received in 2024, a result of extensive outreach at agriculture, culinary, food studies, and trade programs, postings on job list serves, as well as word of mouth. However, no farm experience is required, stresses Cover, just the ability to handle the physical work and to take initiative. The ASLF is also working to become a college-accredited program.

Apprentices are paid an hourly wage of $20 for a 40-hour workweek and an expense stipend; the ASLF covers transportation and housing costs, removing barriers for prospective applicants and for farms to receive much-needed help.There are frequent check-ins with the apprentices and farms to ensure all is going smoothly.

For apprentices, not having to worry about costs is a huge relief. “To [be able to] put my all into it made me want to put more energy and effort into making the most of this program,” says Mona Ziabari, an apprentice at Fisheye Farms, a sustainably run urban farm in Detroit. A student with limited funds, she’s unsure if she could have applied.

Zibari is a food studies major at New York University and an accomplished cook who envisions a career in the culinary arts. “It is super important to learn about the food production side because I think a lot of people in our society are not educated on what it looks like,” she says.

Zibari had worked in restaurants, but she was taken aback by the physical stamina farming requires. Fisheye’s owners arranged to have a bicycle for Ziabari to bike to work from another urban farm where she is housed, and to stage at farm-to-table restaurants on her days off to broaden her understanding.

“We wouldn’t have been able to have apprentices if they weren’t paid for,” says Ryan McPherson, owner of Glidden Point Oyster Farms in Maine. The ASLF approached McPherson this year to include an aquaculture opportunity. It also added five urban farms to its roster.

McPherson was impressed by the caliber of the applicants, farms, and vetting process. He appreciates the opportunity to share knowledge, since farmed aquaculture is still a very young industry and its connection to and overlap with agriculture is not yet well explored. “It is important,” says McPherson, “to be in those conversations.” Since his farm’s two apprentices had prior terrestrial farming experience, he expects that they’re able to share insights into similarities and differences into the two types of farming. The apprentices have been grading out and redistributing seed, conducting farm maintenance, and washing and packing oysters for sale and shipping.

To Bliss Battle, an alumna of New York City’s Brooklyn Grange, the financial support signaled that “people wanted to see me succeed,” she says. Battle left art school to try farming because it “involved manual labor and being in nature.” She says she “came out way more confident in my skills, like how to use all the tools, and in production-level farming,” and developed an appreciation of growing food for mutual aid and not for profit. She was later hired at another farm by a former Grange supervisor.

Battle is now attending welding school so she can repair farm machinery. “I want to be an asset to my community,” she says. “And my sense of community has been more solidified through the work I’ve been doing as a farmhand.”

“I want to be an asset to my community.”

Ziabari’s eyes were also opened by a blend of practical knowledge and sociocultural perspectives. “I’ve been learning how culture and race intersect with food production,” she says, noting that “food deserts are prevalent” in the more diverse areas of Detroit, already a multi-racial and ethnic city.

Ziabari credits the city’s growing urban farm movement for improving food access for marginalized communities. The farms have a “progressive approach to incorporating culture,” she says, growing produce that is meaningful to residents in a nod to the city’s history.

“It’s just crazy how people don’t think about it in that way,” she says. “I’m one of them. You’re not forced to think about it unless you’re doing it, having conversations about it, or actually having to get on your knees and do the work.”

The experience Maffie gained with farms, cows and cheesemaking—her farm’s owner is developing a cheese program—fit her interest in food science.

She was also surprised at some of the lesser-known ways politics and government affect farms. She learned that farms are required to pay for the USDA inspectors who inspect their meat, which can “put a strain on both butchers and small farms,” says Maffie, because larger farms can slaughter so many more animals that the cost becomes nominal. Also, since only one USDA inspector shows up at a slaughterhouse, the animals on smaller farms wind up subject to more scrutiny than animals at larger ones. With higher volumes, employees there assist the lone USDA inspector who can’t watch each process at once.

Remarkably, while some feeder programs may be more diverse than in the past, the ASLF team was surprised that nearly 70 percent of this year’s applications came from women. Farming though is a white and male-dominated profession; the number of female farmers has held steady in recent years, according to USDA data.

“I think it is probably a backlash to the fact that it is a male-dominated field,” says Maffie. “Now, there’s a bunch of women who are like, ‘No, I want to do that, too,’ so I’m going to start setting myself up to do that.”

Surprisingly, women “outnumber males in aquaculture in Maine,” says McPherson. He bought his farms from women owners and his staff is well over half female.

“I think it is really cool that people can see [food production] as a career option, especially young women,” says Battle. She says programs such as the ASLF can have a huge impact on people’s lives. “Your formative years, you can see a subversive career path and that it is sustainable. And you can go where you want with it,” she adds.

The post This Immersive Farm Apprenticeship is Training the Next Generation of Farmers appeared first on Modern Farmer.

Ghiorse had stopped cooking professionally by the time she had moved back to her hometown of Greenwich in 2014; years of cooking at scale had been physically demanding and stressful, and she was ready to expand her knowledge and skills. But she felt she had lost her platform to connect with the food system in an impactful way.

She began learning about the area’s food system and volunteering with local endeavors like the town’s sustainability committee. The committee helps guide Greenwich in advancing sustainable policies and practices that impact its natural environment, economy, and community. As chair of the committee’s food systems sector, she noticed “a gap,” she says, “in general awareness of the deeply ingrained, harmful impacts of our industrial food system.”

So, in 2020, she founded The Foodshed Network (TFN), an educational and convening platform to encourage residents in her hometown of Greenwich, CT, and surrounding Fairfield County to become food system changemakers.

“Our food system is so complicated,” says Ghiorse. “It’s very important to know and understand the impacts of our industrial system and then to understand the huge amounts of creativity, connectivity, and community that happens around food.”

Living in the activist hotbed of San Francisco’s Mission District helped her realize the connection between systemic racism and food access. “It’s fraught with deeply rooted practices of exploitation,” says Ghiorse, “beginning with the enslavement of Africans, the genocide of Indigenous peoples, and extraction of soil watersheds, and natural and social ecosystems.

“I learned about the importance of bridge building, network weaving, cross pollinating between initiatives, and convening people around food, and,” she emphasizes, “using the power of gathering as a lever for social change and healing.”

To address all of these distinct yet intersecting issues, TFN is made up of several sub-organizations, including the Greenwich Food Alliance (GFA), The Foodshed Forum, and a resource library. The GFA is a community of practice, assembling business leaders and government officials in an informal group bound by shared interests and expertise. Members network, share ideas, and learn about issues and advocate for policy surrounding food, such as making SNAP benefits available at nearby farmers markets. The Foodshed Forum is the educational arm, partnering with organizations to host events such as a current three-part lecture series entitled “Heritage Foodways: Seed, Hearth & Taste” at local libraries.

The resource library, available on the website, offers a wealth of information including Thirty Ways to be a Food System Changemaker, concrete suggestions people can take to be changemakers. There’s also a monthly newsletter.

Ghiorse runs TFN full-time; it’s self-funded on a shoestring budget, but she is working towards non-profit status and finding a fiscal sponsor so she can begin fundraising.

Myra Klockenbrick, land and water Sector chair of the Greenwich Sustainability Committee and co-director of Greenwich Pollinator Pathway, credits Ghiorse with bringing up a conversation that is not natural to Greenwich. Although Greenwich is particularly affluent, the town has initiatives such as community gardens and a food pantry, as 29 percent of the community experiences financial hardship.

“She’s really deepened our awareness of the diversity in our population,” says Klockenbrick. “She has this knack and grace of not being on her high horse, but educating us deeply about our food system, both good and bad in ways that aren’t scolding but always uplifting.”

“Ali’s brought this food system conversation to Greenwich,” says Sarah Coccaro, the Town of Greenwich’s assistant director of environmental affairs. “There was conversation around food systems,” she adds, “but there wasn’t any framing or awareness of the food system with a sort of equitable racial justice lens on it.”

Coccaro says food systems topics are being integrated into conversations within the town’s Conservation committee, and that she sees the context that TFN offers helping residents understand the industrial food system’s impact. She mentions a new Grow A Row effort in which community members grow an extra row of food in their gardens to donate. “People are starting to connect dots around food systems and how it needs to change and what they can do on a local level or regional level,” she says, “and I’m proud to see that change happening.”

Ghiorse aspires to create a culture shift where food, land, and seed sovereignty are the norm. That’s “the North Star for me, where people and community reclaim our collective commons,” she sas. “That’s fertile soil, clean waterways, and nutrient-rich woodlands that are accessible and available to everyone as a human right. That’s foundational.”

The post Spotlight On a Network Aiming to Make Everyone a Food Changemaker appeared first on Modern Farmer.

And there are distinct differences in how a President Kamala Harris would govern for the farmers, eaters, and workers in the United States than a President Donald Trump would. Just how different? We looked at their past actions and stated policy goals to learn more. 

The Landscape for Farmers Under Harris 

Vice President Harris’s track record on agriculture can be traced from her time as a California attorney general and US senator to her time as Biden’s second in command. 

As attorney general in California, she appealed a federal ruling that nixed California’s foie gras ban, and defended California’s law requiring humane, free-range facilities at egg farms. 

While Harris hasn’t formally outlined any agricultural policy plans for voters yet, Jonathan W. Coppess, former administrator of the USDA’s Farm Service Agency and current associate professor and director of the Gardner Agriculture Policy Program at University of Illinois, forecasts very little change from the current status quo for farmers and farming policy under Biden. 

“There are no indications that a Harris administration will deviate from the Biden administration on agriculture or trade,” says Coppess. “Also, it’s important to keep in mind that presidents only have so much power. The bulk of farm policy is controlled at the congressional level, so the president can only have a limited role in planning what will ultimately end up in a farm bill.”

According to many measures, farmers have been higher on the hog under Biden than Trump. Net farm income hit $165 billion between 2021 and 2023, compared with $94 billion between 2017 and 2019. 

The administration also provided $56 billion to American farmers in direct payments.

The Landscape for Farmers Under Trump

Farmers and ranchers in the US appear poised to back Trump for president, according to a poll commissioned by Agri-Pulse and a survey conducted by Reuters. While both of those studies were conducted before Harris entered the race, they are unlikely to change, says Ferd Hoefner, founding policy director at the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition and consultant on farm, food, and environmental policy.

“You’ve got this strange dichotomy where he polls well in the farming community, but yet they all live in mortal fear of a trade war,” says Hoefner. “When Trump was in office (farmers) lost billions because of the trade war he started with China, but he essentially paid them off because he knew it was politically expedient to do so. They think he’ll do the same thing again, but I don’t think that’s logical.”

Trump, indeed, shelled out $32 billion to farmers in 2020, and, over his entire presidency, he spent at least $61 billion on bailouts to compensate ag companies for the cost of the trade war he started. 

If Trump is elected, he has proposed another round of punishing tariffs: a baseline of 10 percent on all imported goods and a 60-percent tariff on all Chinese imports. This would constitute the highest and broadest tariffs imposed in the US since World War II, and it would result, Goldman Sachs projects, in a rise in inflation of 1.1 percentage points and a reduction in GDP growth by a half point, not to mention five additional Fed rate hikes. 

“Agriculture is very export dependent,” says Hoefner. “Farmers should think long and hard about which candidate they decide to support and what the implications of each candidate’s past and stated plans might mean for them.”

The Landscape for Eaters Under Harris 

Food prices have spiked 25 percent between 2019 and 2023, and price inflation at restaurants has been even higher. There are more than 44 million Americans currently facing hunger. One in five children doesn’t have enough to eat or access to healthy food, making food assistance programs a hot political topic that inspires now-familiar partisan rhetoric.

“Harris hasn’t forecast that much on what she would do as president, but her past actions indicate that she may be more active on consumer issues than Biden,” says Hoefner. 

During her entire political tenure, Harris has advocated for improving food security and nutrition for all Americans, but especially low-income families and children. During COVID, she introduced two pieces of legislation that aimed to help eaters and producers.

She co-sponsored the Food Donation Improvement Act as California senator. The act was designed to encourage food donations by nixing liabilities for people willing to contribute. Harris also boosted the state’s Farm to School program, helping both farmers and children, and increased food assistance programs across the board. 

The Closing the Meal Gap Act of 2020 expanded the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits for all who needed it. The FEMA Empowering Essential Deliveries (FEED) Act granted the feds the power to team up with small restaurants and non-profits on meals for people in need. 

The Landscape for Eaters Under Trump

If Trump’s promised tariffs go into effect, there will likely be retaliatory tariffs imposed on American goods, including food, which could cause a cavalcade of effects. 

His immigration policy could also cause a variety of challenges that would trickle down to workers, says Coppess. 

“It’s a giant unknown if what he’s saying will actually be pushed through, but a significant portion of the agricultural labor force is immigrant labor,” says Coppess. 

Labor costs currently comprise about 15 percent of a farmer’s costs, and that number is on the rise, according to the USDA. Almost half of the labor force on farms is undocumented. If many of those workers are deported, without a ready and willing supply of hands, the price of food will likely continue to surge. 

Under his previous administration, Trump sought to cut SNAP benefits by $180 billion, or close to 30 percent. There was also a $50-million proposed cut that would have limited student access to free or lower-cost meals at schools. 

Project 2025, a 900+ page manifesto-cum-wish list for Trump’s next term drafted by a coalition of more than 100 conservative organizations—from which Trump has distanced himself, despite his deep ties to many of its creators—includes a plan to divide the farm bill.

The notoriously unwieldy farm bill typically pairs policies backed by red-leaning rural farming communities (i.e., farm subsidies) and blue-leaning cities (food aid programs such as SNAP), and allows both parties to negotiate a piece of the action. Project 2025 would bifurcate the bill and slash spending on farm-friendly programs such as Agriculture Risk Coverage, Price Loss Coverage and crop insurance, while also targeting SNAP and school meals. 

The Landscape for Workers Under Harris 

Trump may have farmers’ votes, but farm workers seem to be backing Harris. United Farm Workers officially endorsed Harris shortly after news broke that Biden was stepping down. They applauded the Biden-Harris administration for championing unionization efforts for farm workers, helping undocumented workers secure COVID vaccines, and increasing legal protections in the industry. 

“Since the very beginning of her career in California—the nation’s largest agricultural producer—Kamala Harris has proven herself a loyal friend of all working people,” said United Farm Workers president Teresa Romero in a statement. 

Hoefner argues that in addition to promoting fairer competition and lower food costs and aiming to correct previous wrongs committed against farmers of color, the mood changed at the USDA. 

“I am regularly in touch with a variety of people at the USDA, and I can say that, under Biden, there was a huge morale boost,” says Hoefner. “People felt once again that they were able to address climate change and workers’ issues. They felt like the work they were doing is worthwhile.”

The Landscape for Workers Under Trump 

Under Trump’s guidance, the USDA delivered more direct aid to farmers than any prior administration. During the COVID pandemic, almost half of farmers’ incomes were coming from the feds. But these payments mainly helped larger conglomerates, not smaller farmers. 

About two-thirds of the aid went to the largest 10 percent of recipients. (The average payment for the top tenth was $164,813, versus the average payment of $2,469.49 for the bottom half.)

Under Trump’s guidance, the USDA also put the Grain Inspection, Packers and Stockyards Administration under the control of the Agricultural Marketing Service, which critics said weakened oversight.

“What little is left of commodity and farm support will completely disappear under a second Trump administration,” Hoefner predicts. “And while it hasn’t gotten much better under Biden, it could potentially get much worse.”

Potential Wild Cards 

“Who they pick for the secretary of agriculture will tell us a lot,” says Coppess. “With Trump, it was one of the last cabinet positions he filled. And we don’t know who he’ll pick this time. Strong contenders are Texas Agricultural Commissioner Sid Miller, who is right of Attila the Hun and would be the MAGA pick, or Kip Tom, an Indiana farmer who served as US ambassador to the U.N. under his previous administration, and would be more of the center pick.”

Kentucky GOP Rep. Thomas Massie, a vocal critic of benefits programs, has also thrown his hat in the ring, adds Coppess. 

On the Harris side, Coppess floats two potentials: Karen Ross, secretary of the California Department of Food and Agriculture, and Xochitl Torres Small, the current US deputy secretary of agriculture. 

“I think they’d both do a good job, and [they] have expertise that would balance business and farm interest,” says Coppess. “Karen works in California now, but she’s a Nebraska farm girl, so she has Midwest cred, and Xochitl and Tom [Vilsack, US secretary of agriculture under Biden] are both seen as balancing farm and business interests.”

Even with all of the evidence and policy projections in the world, there are plenty of wild cards, no matter who wins.

The post What a Trump or Harris Presidency Will Mean for Farmers and Eaters appeared first on Modern Farmer.

Two years before the dawn of the COVID-19 pandemic, I was researching a book idea about rewilding—a subculture of the better-known land conservation movement where people pursue a preindustrial or even preagricultural, hunter-gatherer existence. My interviews included survivalists living on a tropical island, primitive skills enthusiasts creating forest schools and subsistence homesteaders. 

I’ve lived in cities my entire adult life, so it doesn’t take a psychologist to unpack my personal attraction to the idea of backpedaling from the increasing overwhelm of life in the twenty-first century: the incessant infiltration of technology and media; social isolation and loneliness; disconnection from nature, especially its troubling impact on our kids; escalating global conflict; and accelerating natural disasters validating our fears that the endgame of climate change is not only inevitable but happening now. 

Still, as time went on, I became a little weary of the doomsday pre-occupation. More importantly, I was unsure of its helpfulness. Everyone can feel the tumult of these times, but very few of us, myself included, have the wherewithal or the chutzpah to toss aside everything they’ve ever known and hunt and forage from a cabin in the woods. 

Some of the solutions being touted in the world of rewilding were inspiring, but I wished for a doable purpose in the here and now; preferably one where I would feel more alive and useful than I did rhapsodizing in front of a computer.

I also had a concurrent realization: In my longing to reclaim the ways of the past, it was traditional food culture that most lit my fire. And so, six months into COVID lockdown in Los Angeles, my husband and I decided, “enough with the daydreaming,” and sold everything we owned and moved with our two young daughters to Central Oregon, where I serendipitously stumbled into the area’s local food movement and subsequently enrolled in a groundbreaking farmer training program. The immersive internship was centered around regenerative agriculture—a new (but actually ancestral) and holistic approach to growing food that restores soil and biodiversity and sequesters carbon in the ground.

I’ve covered the ills of our industrialized food system for more than a decade, so regenerative farming was a field I was closely following. High-profile books and documentaries were pointing to its promise while sounding the alarm on the finiteness of intensive agriculture—warning of vanishing groundwater and the world’s dwindling supply of usable topsoil. Yet, until I encountered the training program in Oregon, it never occurred to me to actually take matters into my own hands and consider small, sustainable farming as a viable career path.

A week into my first farm job, I realized it was the most joyful and fulfilling work I had ever experienced. After two months of being outside all day, nearly every day, I felt the best—both physically and mentally—that I ever had in my life. But the real transformation occurred as I began to meet and learn about the new and driven farmers, graziers and food activists emerging all over the country. They hadn’t grown up in farming families; they came from backgrounds vastly underrepresented in agriculture; and many of them were far younger than I was, not to mention decades younger than the average American farmer. I was awestruck by their intention and ingenuity. They hadn’t turned to this way of life as some back-to-the-land fantasy. They had chosen sustainable agriculture as a tactile way to affect environmental activism and food justice; for cultural reclamation; to reconnect to nature, food and community; to live aligned with their values; to do “something that means something.”

And during the environmental and societal reckoning of the pandemic—not to mention the collapse of the industrial food supply chain—the work of these regenerative farmers became more meaningful than ever before. They filled the void amid empty supermarket shelves and miles-long food lines and fed millions of Americans not just food but the most delicious food many of us had ever tasted. They witnessed hundreds of thousands of people needlessly dying of COVID due to diet-related disparities and pushed ahead for funding and food sovereignty. So I started to wonder: How could we scale a “greatest generation” of sustainable small farmers?

What would this country look like transformed by a vast network of resilient local food systems that restore the environment and ensure healthy, fresh food is accessible to all?

These two questions launched me on the journey to write this book. But it was only later that I learned of their urgency. In the coming decade, 400 million acres of American farmland—nearly half of all farmland in the United States—will become available as the older generation of American farmers retires or dies. Meanwhile, the groundswell of new growers eager to steward that land are up against seemingly every obstacle: access to affordable land, access to capital, a livable income and the billionaires and corporations now grabbing farmland at a staggering pace. 

And yet, there’s hope: Big Ag may be the norm in the United States, but small growers globally produce around a third of the world’s food on farms of five acres or less.

Mapping research shows up to 90 percent of Americans could be fed entirely with food raised within 100 miles of where they live. Project Regeneration highlights regenerative agriculture and other nature-based farming methods as critical strategies in the plan to reverse global warming. And the human power exists: The number of new, beginning and young farmers has been increasing for the past 10 years, a trend unparalleled in the last century. 

I came to farming as an outsider, and that’s exactly the point. Two hundred years ago, nearly all of us lived and worked on the land that fed us (although not all of our own free will). Even a hundred years ago, one-third of us did. Today, that number stands at one percent. Yet, right now, so many of us are yearning for something we can’t name, an intangible we don’t even realize has been lost. It’s our connection to our food, that most fundamental of human needs, and it is that which ties us to everything else.

These are the stories of a new, diverse generation of agrarians unfolding an alternate vision of the future, if only more of us would join the call.

The post How Can We Mobilize New Farmers? appeared first on Modern Farmer.

“Our vision is a strong, resilient, environmentally sustainable and equitable local food system,” says Virginia Ortiz, GoFarms executive director.

Ortiz sees GoFarm’s role as a hub that takes care of the logistics of supporting small farms and feeding the community. 

Building community partnerships is a crucial element, and GoFarm works with other food access organizations such as Hunger Free Golden and JeffCo Food Policy Council to reach more people and create a broader base of resources.

Founded in 2014, GoFarm started with its local food share program (essentially a CSA curated from multiple farms). More than a decade later, it has become an organization that trains and develops beginning farmers and creatively tackles the problem of how to get affordable, fresh food to the community. As a nonprofit, it is able to fundraise for grants and donations to support its programming and supplement that with revenue generated through produce sales. 

GoFarm’s incubator farmer program gives beginning farmers access to a quarter acre of land for the two-year duration of the program. The farmers receive all the training they need to plan, plant and manage a farm—regardless of their background. 

“The average age of current farmers is 55 to 59, and we know that, over the next 10 years, half of current farmers are going to retire, which means that we need to develop a new base,” says Ortiz. But she points out that there is a “tremendous need” for agricultural education.

“Part of our goal is to change the paradigm of farm ownership. Currently, in Colorado, there are approximately 34,000 farms and only one percent are owned by people of color. Yet, 95 to 98 percent of farm workers are people of color, primarily Latinos,” says Ortiz, who shares that she comes from a long line of farmers and farm workers. She says she is proud that, in the farmer development program, 50 percent of participants are people of color, 65 percent are women and 40 percent self-identify as LGBTQ+.

Moses Smith of Full Fillment Farms was an engineer who had gardened before taking GoFarm’s 20-week course and joining the incubator program. “The important thing was the Whole Farm Planning course that really focused on what it takes to actually grow food,” says Smith.

“One of the biggest benefits is that they not only provide us with land access, which is very hard as a starting farmer, but they also give us a market avenue,” says Ann Poteet of Three Owls Farm. As incubator farmers are establishing their businesses and learning how to generate their own markets, they sell produce back to GoFarm. 

GoFarm’s local food share program feeds anywhere from 500 to 800 members each summer. Members come every week to pick up their share from a few different locations where GoFarm has refrigerated shipping containers to store food after it’s delivered by farmers. Plus, GoFarm takes Chuck out and about in Denver and Jefferson counties every week to ensure they can reach underserved populations that are challenged with food insecurity, disability, transportation and other barriers, such as the communities living in designated food deserts in south Golden. 

“I have an interest in nutritional insecurity,” says Poteet, who was a nurse practitioner before starting her farm. 

“It’s been really inspiring,” says Smith about being able to see his food nourish the community through GoFarm. 

But farmer’s market prices can be high, as producers need to be fairly compensated for their labor and costs. “Customers were clear to us that having access to healthy food was critical to them and affordability was a barrier,” says Ortiz. So, in 2022, GoFarm found the funding it needed to implement a new solution that goes even further to improve accessibility for the 2,600+ households it reaches. 

Customers at its mobile markets can choose from one of three price tiers to shop that day, depending on their needs. For example, bags of mixed greens have three prices listed: $2 (purple), $3 (green) and $4 (orange). And the microgreens are even cheaper, at $1, $2 or $3 for a box. Pasture-raised eggs can be $3, $5 or $7 a carton. 

“You are what you eat,” says Kaylee Clinton, a first-time GoFarm mobile market shopper. “I just feel better about myself when I eat fresher.” As inflation has hit grocery stores, she says that SNAP has helped make food more affordable and she appreciates that GoFarm lets shoppers pick their price point. “I really love it. I think it’s great for everybody.” 

“Typically, I either buy green or orange. I like buying orange when I can. It’s good to have the flexible pricing,” says Ed Gazvoda, who has been shopping at GoFarm for years. “I want to live a good, long, healthy life, so it’s a personal thing, but I just love the food.”

Jess Soulis, director of the Community Food Access program, highlights that accepting SNAP’s DoubleUp Food Bucks—where shoppers essentially get a 50-percent discount—is just one way to make food more affordable. The group also partners with WIC’s Farmers Market Nutrition Program, where participants get a credit to shop. Through its market locations at Littleton Advent Hospital and Juanita Nolasco Senior Residences, the program offers shoppers $10 worth of produce for free. SNAP/DUFB account for 13 percent of its mobile market sales, but all of these incentives combined are closer to two-thirds.

“We’re building this beautiful, vibrant, local food system and we don’t want to replicate the injustices and inequities that are so prevalent in the existing food system,” says Soulis.

The vision continues to grow. The only limitation? “Infrastructure,” says Ortiz. GoFarm is currently seeking out refrigerated warehouse space along the I-70 corridor between Golden and Montbello. 

“That area is important because we need to make it accessible to farmers along the Front Range,” says Ortiz. “With that refrigerated warehouse space, we could easily source from more farmers, distribute more food and serve more communities.”

The post Meet the Nonprofit Training Farmers and Feeding a Whole Community appeared first on Modern Farmer.

At nine years old, I started a rabbitry. Raising my trio of Dutch rabbits to take to the fair, I fell in love with the breed and raising them. Before long, I expanded to include Polish rabbits, Dorset advantage sheep and Welsh Harlequin and Call ducks. I eventually added horses and hogs to my growing small business, raising animals for sale in my community. I named my business Diamond B Show Stock, a nod to my family farm, Diamond B farms. The family business started in the 1970s and is still running strong today. I’m proud to be the next link in the chain for my family’s agricultural business, and I hope to keep it going for the generations that come after me. And I got here with the help of 4-H. 

I grew up in a farm family and, as a result, I’m entirely hooked on agriculture. There’s something special about watching a newborn lamb’s first steps, seeing it grow and ultimately feeling the satisfaction after its sale on a humid August county fair day, knowing that I’ve given it a life full of long evening walks, gentle hands, tasty treats and security. Those moments reassure me that agriculture will always be a part of my life; now, as I work through my plethora of 4-H projects, I’m in college studying to be a veterinarian and eventually working to protect and improve the lives of livestock. 

But not every kid has the opportunities I’ve had. Our industry is suffering from an inability to summon enough youth passion to join its ranks. I attended the National 4-H Conference in Washington, D.C. this April, where US Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack explained it best: The average age of a farmer is close to 60 years old. To protect the future of America’s food, youth must become involved in agriculture, and organizations such as 4-H are the solution. 

More than just agriculture

Established in 1912, 4-H (collectively, head, heart, hands and health) was originally conceived to introduce youth to agricultural work through after-school programs. More than 100 years later, it’s grown to encompass so much more. Each regional 4-H club hosts a variety of programs, with a focus on hands-on learning. You can raise animals, like I do, but you can also learn about all sorts of things, such as photography, public speaking, sewing or technology.

McKenzie Diamond, a recent high school grad from New York, is looking at college. A few years ago, she saw agriculture as just a hobby, not what she thought she could pursue as a career. But that changed last year. 

Along with her other 4-H projects in nutrition, art and community service, she raised goats with her mother. After one of the goats needed to have her leg amputated, Diamond and her family met with vets from Cornell University to discuss their best course of action. It was this meeting where she realized that her hobby could become her career. “My mom grew up in a very agricultural family, and I think that it implanted on me at a young age that [agricultural] lifestyle and goals in life. Truthfully, I don’t think I would be who I am without ag in my life.” Now, Diamond intends to major in either agricultural education or agribusiness. 

Fighting for the future

As lawmakers open their ears to youth voices, 4-H members have been put on the front lines in advocating for farming practices. Wyatt Morrow, a 4-H alumni and college freshman from Ohio, was selected for Citizenship Washington Focus, a nationwide 4-H opportunity recruiting teens to share their thoughts with legislators on Capitol Hill. 

Morrow got to speak to the office of Ohio Senator J.D. Vance in 2023 on behalf of 4-H. Upon his return home and starting his first year at Wilmington College, he was trusted with a position by the college, one of only three freshmen in the group, to again travel to D.C., this time to advocate for the passage of the Farm Bill. Morrow called the lobbying “one of the most eye-opening experiences I’ve ever had. It showed me that advocating for issues you and others are passionate about can really make a difference in shaping our country.” 

Through 4-H, he not only was given a life-altering opportunity to gain hands-on experience working with legislators, but he was able to use it to foster growth in the industry. 

But it can be difficult to get kids involved in agriculture, especially urban kids or people who don’t grow up in farm families. “Kids are involved in so many different activities that demand their time. Oftentimes, coaches and teachers are not allowing them to have the time off from school or extracurricular activities that they need to fully engage in 4-H since it’s not a school-sponsored activity,” says Kathy Bruynis, an Ohio State University Extension 4-H educator. 

Fortunately, one thing 4-H does have going for it is choices. With more than 200 projects available in the state of Ohio alone, such as livestock, gardening, robotics, nutrition, financial management, welding and more, there are topics for nearly every kid. Additionally, keeping with 4-H’s traditional creative spirit, 4-H professionals and volunteers are working hard to come up with new ways to recruit members. Jamie Stacy, an Ohio 4-H advisor and Junior Fair Board director, hosts bowling or swimming parties and always brings snacks. “Offering some type of food is usually a pretty good way to pull kids in when they get free food and fun,” says Stacy. 

Becoming royalty

Fair or 4-H royalty serve as another valuable tool for recruiting new 4-H members. I was chosen as my county’s queen nearly a year ago after completing a lengthy application and interview process. On the first day of our county fair, I was presented with my crown and sash and given the job of representing 4-H not only to others in agriculture but the general public as well. After a week of helping out at shows, sales and other fair events, I was tasked with visiting other local fairs and festivals. When the fair season wrapped up, I made it a priority to involve myself in the community in other ways. I passed out candy at a Trunk-or-Treat, taking time to socialize with each child and talk to them about why 4-H really mattered to me. I read a book at my local library and eagerly answered the questions fired at me from kids and parents alike. I hugged a veteran as he accepted a quilt made by a 4-H-er at my fair’s annual quilts for veterans and first responders event, and I later connected with Wreaths for Veterans to place wreaths at a nearby cemetery at Christmas. One of my favorite experiences was taking a few baby rabbits and a baby goat with a 4-H friend to a nursing home and seeing the reactions of the residents.

All of these experiences helped 4-H project a positive image onto the local community. Prior to my visits, many of the people I met didn’t even know what 4-H was, but I left them knowing more and feeling good about it. Keeping 4-H present in the community is essential to its survival.

The post Young People Need to Find Farming. 4-H is the Answer appeared first on Modern Farmer.

There are also huge benefits to supporting new farmers. Aside from bolstering our food supply, new and young farmers tend to bring unique new perspectives to the field, including a dedication to sustainable farming methods. According to the National Young Farmers Coalition’s (NYFC’s) 2022 National Young Farmer Survey, 86 percent of young farmers practice regenerative farming—growing in harmony with nature—while 97 percent use other sustainable practices.

However, for young people interested in a career in agriculture, there can be many roadblocks in their path. The price of land continues to rise, grants and educational opportunities can be hard to come by and there’s a steep learning curve for folks who didn’t grow up in a farming family. 

With these stories, we spoke to young farmers directly about how they see farming as a viable future and what they need to succeed.

The post The Future is Farmers appeared first on Modern Farmer.

Sam Rudman, one of the first-year farmers of Friends Farm in Lafayette, Colorado, says covering a field with fertilizer shortly before 60-miles-per-hour winds started up was definitely one of his many “rookie mistakes” as a new farmer. He clearly remembers the day in February 2024 when winds threatened to blow away hundreds of dollars in supplies and hours of hard work as a big wakeup call. 

“We got lucky,” he laughs. “And that is going to be our strategy for the rest of the year going forward, to remain lucky in regards to Mother Nature.”

But the Friends Farm team isn’t counting on luck alone. The three team members—Rudman, Oliver Aurand and Kevin Reiss, who met in 2023 on a nearby farm—bring backgrounds in soil science, anthropology and just over a decade of combined field hand experience. They have also tapped into an innovative community network to find land and mentorship. “Land access is the top challenge cited by current farmers, aspiring farmers and those who have stopped farming,” writes the National Young Farmers Coalition in a 2022 report.

Friends Farm is not technically located on agricultural land. The two-acre vegetable operation is owned by Nyland Cohousing Community, a 42-house community established with the aim of creating connection and supporting sustainable ideals. A former member started the farm a decade ago but became disillusioned by the inability to make a profit. In 2023, Waves of Grain Food Coop leased the land to continue the organic farm in support of its mission to provide fresh and affordable produce to communities along the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains. 

“Solo full-time farming two acres is an insane thing to do,” says Waves of Grain co-owner Red Clifford , especially while also running a coop. Around that time, Clifford learned of the Friend Farm crew, who were looking for land to farm at the same time Clifford was trying to find help.

It was a serendipitous moment that helped inspire Waves of Grain to use its resources to establish an incubator farm. The coop continued to lease the acreage from the cohousing community and subsidized rent for Friends Farm. It would also help sell a portion of the farm’s produce at regional farmers markets.

Waves of Grain also started mentoring the new farmers, sharing insights about the particularities of the land, preparing the produce for market and helping build the relationship with Nyland residents. The farmers appreciate the practical knowledge Clifford shares from their own mistakes the previous season.

Waves of Grain also hopes to supplement some of the supply chain aspects of a farmer’s job, so the farmers can focus more on farming. During the growing season, a farmer is often focused on the small space of ground before them. Their “view is a 36-inch bubble,” says Clifford. “It’s like basically where they’re looking on the ground to weed.” So far this season, Friends Farm has had particular success selling its salad greens and hakurei turnips.

But Friends Farm was also founded on the idea that farming is about more than cultivating vegetables. Aurand’s background in anthropology helped create a focus on nurturing community. So far this season, the farm has hosted nine classes covering topics such as edible landscaping and native gardening as well as community farm days, during which Nyland residents and others help work the farm and learn about growing food. In addition, the farm provides a CSA program to 20 of the Nyland residents.

Friends Farm has thrived because of help from its community, but even with support, it has learned that farming always comes with challenges. The farmers were spreading fertilizer on that windy day in February to amend a clay soil that had been compacted by years of heavy machinery use. A large weed seed bank caused problems in past years, such as the bindweed that consistently outcompetes crops. And the farm relies on municipal water for much of the season, resulting in water bills in the thousands of dollars, says Rudman.

“The concerns are not that you’re going to do a bad job and you’re going to run a bad farm,” he says. “It’s that things can go wrong. The weather can screw you over. Small mistakes can be very costly.”

The learning curve remains a challenge, the farmers agree. So far this year, they’ve explored more efficient ways to run the farm and fine-tuned their use of tools such as the Jang seeder, which helps speed up and space out seeds. They’ve also tried relay cropping experiments such as planting tomatoes and peppers before the other was finished growing to help optimize their planting space. Their efforts have yielded varying degrees of success. They consider the support from Waves of Grain and Nyland a leg up. Just having the buildings and irrigation set up was helpful, says Rudman. And Nyland residents have often helped fix problems with the water system.

The relationship between Nyland, Waves of Grain and Friends Farm works because of its reciprocal model, says Clifford. Nyland exchanges its land for a secure food source, and Waves of Grain provides its resources for a supply of food today and an investment to support the farming community and the food they will grow into the future.

This story is part of our Future Farmers series, highlighting the joys and hurdles of a career in agriculture today. You can read more of this series here. 

The post Young Farmers Dig Into Land appeared first on Modern Farmer.

Dzap’l Gye’a̱win Skiik translates to busy eagle or an eagle who gets things done. A perfect name for Jacob Beaton. As an Indigenous businessman from the Tsimshian First Nation, he never imagined himself farming or teaching others. He lived a quintessentially suburban life with his wife and two sons before devastating wildfires and floods in B.C. inspired him to start thinking about climate change and food security for his family. 

In 2018, they bought Tea Creek, a 140-acre farm outside the village of Kitwanga in northern B.C. With the intent of keeping most of the property forested and only farming a few acres, they settled into farm life. But Beaton had to learn from scratch. He turned to YouTube videos and started visiting other small organic farms throughout the Pacific Northwest and as far away as Europe. 

“Farming, ranching, field base food production were a big part of Indigenous culture in this region that got wiped out by the Indian Act,” says Beaton. When the act was enacted in 1876, it took control over land rights and access away from Indigenous populations, which blocked most agricultural opportunities. “Immediately, from day one, our First Nations friends local to the area started dropping by, really excited that we were farming,” he says. Some remembered stories their grandparents and great-grandparents had told about farming in the area and asked Beaton to come to their communities and teach them.

But he was busy learning himself and, as he put it, there’s only one of me to go around. In 2020, the pandemic struck, and with food sovereignty top of mind for Indigenous communities in the region, it quickly became clear to the Beatons that they could do more to help their community and it was time to expand. Developing the Food Sovereignty Training Program, they invited Indigenous people interested in learning how to grow their own food to Tea Creek. 

Providing skills training in a culturally appropriate and empowering way is not an easy thing to do, but Beaton is “the eagle who gets things done.” 

Realizing that whatever was taught at Tea Creek had to translate into marketable skills and employment opportunities, Beaton enlisted support from SkilledTrade BC. Working with  employers, industry and government, Skills Trade BC approves non-public training providers, such as Tea Creek, to train and certify individuals who meet industry and government accreditation standards in their trade of choice. Tea Creek is able to offer apprenticeship programs and train an individual all the way to Red Seal certification. Recognized as the interprovincial standard of excellence in the skilled trades, it is the highest level of training in the country. 

Programs run from January to November, and they are open to Indigenous peoples 16 and up at no cost. Meals are provided and bunkhouse accommodation is available. All programs have Indigenous instructors and include carpentry, safety training, first aid, drone mapping, heavy equipment operation, cooking, horticultural training and administration. 

Tea Creek is not a school with desks and classrooms. The land is the classroom. All courses are held outside as much as possible. Instructional cohorts are small, ranging from three to six people. This creates better opportunities for instructors and mentors to connect with trainees who in turn receive more hands-on learning experiences. 

Arriving at Tea Creek in 2020, Sheldon Good was 23 years old when he learned to repair and operate tractors. He says the experience at Tea Creek motivated him to get up during the day and do things. “The environment is really welcoming and there are really nice people taking care of everything,” he says. Acquiring skills he otherwise wouldn’t have learned, he now works at a sawmill.

Tea Creek though is more than learning to operate a backhoe or tractor. The farming methods taught here include best practices from regenerative and conventional farming. This includes learning how to make fertilizer from compost and using a tractor to till the soil. Beaton’s business savvy has him insisting that trainees leave Tea Creek with a range of economically viable farming skills. With food sovereignty top of mind, traditional Indigenous crops such as corn are grown alongside kale, broccoli and lettuce. In 2022, the first crop of Ozette potatoes was harvested. These fingerling potatoes, renowned for their nutty flavor, were brought to the Pacific Northwest from South America by Spanish settlers 200 years ago. Grown primarily by First Nations peoples, they were rarely known outside of Indigenous communities until the late 20th century.

In 2023, Tea Creek hosted Farmstand Fridays where 20,000 pounds of fresh mixed vegetables were distributed to Indigenous families and communities. Tea Creek also prepares and serves 100 hot meals per day to trainees and staff using vegetables from the farm. 

In 2021, Tea Creek’s first year of accredited training, 33 people graduated from Food Sovereignty Training programs. Last year, 292 Indigenous people enrolled in training programs and more than 140 graduated from at least one course. 

“Tea Creek, can solve Canada’s farmer shortage. If funded and supported in a real way, Tea Creek could be scaled with multiple training centers across the country.” Jacob Beaton

It’s estimated that, by 2033, 40 percent of all farm operators in Canada will retire. Two-thirds don’t have succession plans in place. 

“Tea Creek, I’ve been told,” says Beaton, “in the area of agriculture, outputs more people in a year than any other agricultural training program in the province.” With a waiting list of 75 First Nations from the east to west coasts eager to learn, there is no shortage of enthusiasm. 

The legacies of Canada’s Indian Act, though, are far reaching. Canada’s residential school system stripped Indigenous children of their cultural identity and language. This has caused intergenerational harm that continues to be experienced through ongoing marginalization and systemic racism.

In 2023, 93 percent of Indigenous youth attending programs at Tea Creek identified this historical trauma as a factor in their mental health challenges. Through the peer-to-peer counseling Tea Creek offers, the sense of belonging and the purpose it provides through its training, 100 percent of trainees 30 and under, in 2023, reported improvements in their mental well-being. This is Tea Creek’s real success. 

“Before I got here, I was really in a dark place,” says Justice Moore, who is featured in the film Tea Creek, part of CBC’s Absolutely Canadian documentary series. “I was getting to the point of, just, no return. That’s the only way I can put it. I wouldn’t be here if Tea Creek weren’t here. That’s a fact.”

This story is part of our Future Farmers series, highlighting the joys and hurdles of a career in agriculture today. You can read more of this series here. 

The post Meet the Farmer Training Indigenous Youth and Revitalizing a Culture of Food Sovereignty appeared first on Modern Farmer.

There are many organizations out there, from large national groups to regional and community efforts, all working to help young farmers start their careers. Whether you’re looking for advice on organic farming or you want to try an apprenticeship or you want to understand federal policy, there’s a group for you. 

This is a (definitely non-exhaustive!) list of just a few of the organizations that can help get you started on the right path. 

Young Agrarians – This Canadian group has resources and mentorship for farmers across the country and apprenticeship programs for people in western Canada. 

National Young Farmers Coalition – This national group has 24 chapters across the US, and it has a goal of remaking the food system to be more equitable. 

Future Farmers of America  – This national student organization prioritizes agricultural education as a path to success in many fields, including farming, biology, chemistry, engineering, and more.

4H – This is a huge youth program, with more than 500,000 volunteers and six million participants. Kids complete hands-on projects, such as raising livestock.

Canadian Young Farmers Forum – This organization prioritizes education and training, with farmer-to-farmer networking. Its annual conference brings farmers from across the country together. 

Greenhorns – Based in Maine but running nationally, this organization works to reform the agriculture industry with a focus on regenerative ranching, ecological restoration and food justice. 

Junior Farmers Association of Ontario – Like many regional organizations, the JFAO works with farmers between the ages of 15 and 29 from all over Ontario, hosting monthly meetings and even an international exchange program.

Beginning Farmer and Rancher Development Program from the USDA – This program provides grants for education, mentorship and technical assistance. 

Young Farmers and Ranchers program from the American Farm Bureau Federation – This leadership program for young Farm Bureau members helps develop and advocate for public policies that strengthen agriculture and rural communities. 

National Farmers Union Youth Advisory Committee – This arm of the NFU represents young farmers across Canada. The group has two seats on the NFU Board of Directors, and holds events like an annual retreat.

This story is part of our Future Farmers series, highlighting the joys and hurdles of a career in agriculture today. You can read more of this series here. 

The post Where to Get Started: A Guide For Young Farmers appeared first on Modern Farmer.