Posted on Sep 1, 2022
There aren't enough young farmers. Congress is looking to change that
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https://www.npr.org/2022/09/01/ [login to see] /farm-bill-not-enough-young-farmers-congress
Bobbi Wilson is about to kick off her first farming season, prepping the soil to yield ripe tomatoes and potatoes next year. Her plan: to start a small farm market — which she hopes will also include other produce like onions, beans, strawberries and corn — and to eventually expand to grow flowers and raise poultry.
For Wilson, this has been 10 years in the making. The 32-year-old living in southern Oregon fell in love with farming during a year off from college, when she worked on a northern Arizona farm in exchange for housing and food.
Wilson does not come from a farming background, and she spent years trying to figure out how to access land. Ultimately, she opted to lease part of her mom and stepdad's property. If it wasn't for this, she said, she wouldn't have any options.
"I think there's kind of this phrase of like 'marry it or inherit it' kind of thing — like, that's the way that people access land, and that's not something that was previously accessible to me," she said.
Bobbi Wilson is about to kick off her first farming season, prepping the soil to yield ripe tomatoes and potatoes next year. Her plan: to start a small farm market — which she hopes will also include other produce like onions, beans, strawberries and corn — and to eventually expand to grow flowers and raise poultry.
For Wilson, this has been 10 years in the making. The 32-year-old living in southern Oregon fell in love with farming during a year off from college, when she worked on a northern Arizona farm in exchange for housing and food.
Wilson does not come from a farming background, and she spent years trying to figure out how to access land. Ultimately, she opted to lease part of her mom and stepdad's property. If it wasn't for this, she said, she wouldn't have any options.
"I think there's kind of this phrase of like 'marry it or inherit it' kind of thing — like, that's the way that people access land, and that's not something that was previously accessible to me," she said.
There aren't enough young farmers. Congress is looking to change that
Posted from npr.org
Congress
Farming
Agriculture
Posted >1 y ago
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Good luck Destroying family farms on one hand and then trying to fix it with the other.
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Farms around us are slowly dying off as the older generation stops. Kids don't want anything to with it...Too many regualtions, price gouging at the grain bins, chemicals/seed/fuel/equipment/parts so high you can't make a living. When it costs you 5 hundred/acre to grow the crop and then at the end you take whatever the price is and say you make 700 an acre...yo uonly net 200 an acre...can't raise a family on that caus eyo have turn right around and put it into parts, equipment, fuel etc to start thenext year. Plus like people like AOC want to tax cow farts....or my favorite last year in an op ed to a paper against farmers the woman actually said we don't need farmers, just go to the grocery store and get what you need!!
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