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The initiative is called Growing New Farmers. Its Web site is owned and maintained by the New England Small Farm Institute. It was launched with a grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture with the purpose “to provide future generations of Northeast farmers with the support and expertise they need to succeed.”

Growing New Farmers serves across the entire northeast region of the U.S., including New England, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware and West Virginia, providing a network of support and informational resources for all aspects of farming, from the technical skills to the all-important business management practices.

On its Web site, new farmers can search on the following topics: Business Planning, Credit/Financial, Farmland/Land Tenure, Land Use/Conservation, Marketing, Production, Professional Development and Tax/Legal/Regulatory.

Who will farm?

There are many people who have started or hope to farm in the Northeast. These new farmers have a passion for farming. Despite the formidable challenges, with sufficient help and support they will succeed, bringing new vitality to our region’s farming industry, contributing to local economies, and keeping our agricultural resource base productive.

In the Northeast, as nationally, there are twice as many farmers over the age of sixty-five as under 35. Over 400 million acres of farmland will change hands in the next twenty years. Traditional methods of learning to farm and acquiring the necessary resources are no longer sufficient to insure a new generation of farm operators.

Looks like a great idea that should be implemented in all regions of the country.

On the Web site of WBIR, a media station serving eastern Tennessee, this article describes an upswing in the number of young people who didn’t grow up on farms becoming farmers. It’s not a stampede, by any means, but it’s a large enough trend to warrant some recent news, as I blogged here and here.

As the average age of farmers hovers near 60, younger people in Tennessee have been signing on to farm apprenticeships, attending organic conferences and even enrolling in a young farmer program through the Tennessee Farm Bureau. While the federal government says 87,000 farms were lost from 1997 to 2002 – not just to bankruptcy but also to aging out – young people are embracing a model of small diverse farms even among the challenges farm life brings.

As a back-to-the-lander from 1971, I understand the attraction to farming that many of these new farmers feel. Farming – growing food and products that are essential to life, being in synch with the seasons, being hyperaware of the weather, soil conditions, the encroachment of pests and the threats of disease – puts you in direct contact with life itself on a day-to-day basis. As such, it comes with dire risks – you are at the mercy of natural forces (as I’ll describe in the next post). It calls for tremendous resilience and creativity, as well as absolute commitment. These are all qualities veterans can bring to the vocation. Let’s not forget courage, for all small farmers must be courageous in their work.

But the new farmers in the article are also driven by a mission to serve new markets for sustainably grown food. As we learn more about health, climate change and environmental systems, the need is becoming more obvious for food that is not only good for the consumer, but also good for the environment.

Jason Adkins, the 31-year-old vice president of the Tennessee Organic Growers Association agrees that the groundswell extends from farmers to consumers.

“There’s much more demand for local farming than supply,” he said.

With degrees from Trevecca University and Newcastle University in England, Adkins thought he would someday teach English or write, but as he studied the problems of the world through theology and literature, the farming crisis called to him as a place for making a difference.

The number of farmers dropped drastically in the United States as they headed for factories after the industrial infrastructure established by World War II. Adkins says about two-thirds of the world population works on farms, but only about 1 percent to 2 percent farms in the United States – a number smaller than our prison population. Concerned about lost farms and a lost connection to the land, Adkins tends to the soil by day and waits tables by night.

“This is what I want to do with my life,” he said. “I want to farm.”

For many young farmers, “sustainable” agriculture is the key (or buzz) word. They often take an interest in farming through ecology and other disciplines, feeling a need to care for the land rather than exploit it.

“When I was in college, farmers were like the anti-environmentalists, and now sustainable agriculture is the environment’s friend,” Nancy VanWinkle said. “I think it’s a search for something more authentic in a society so consumer driven.”

The image of the small farmer is changing radically. Not long ago, that image was of the small family-run operation that had been handed down from generation to generation. But as small family farms went out of business and were absorbed into huge factory farming operations, a gap emerged as the demand grew for locally grown, fresh and organic produce, dairy and meat. This gap in skilled and willing farmers is increasingly being filled these days by enthusiastic new practitioners who come from some unlikely origins. KayCee Wimbish, 32, a former teacher, moved to Tivoli, N.Y., to raise sheep and chickens with Owen O’Connor, 22.

This New York Times story, Leaving Behind the Trucker Hat, is about city slickers with college degrees who have chosen to join the farming community – a job and a lifestyle they’d never experienced before.

Yes, it’s possible to learn to be a farmer and to be successful, but it’s a challenge that requires plenty of advice from seasoned veterans of the profession.

While this is hardly the first time that idealistic young people wanted to get back to the garden, the current crop have advantages over their forebears from the 1960s and 70s, many of whom, inspired by the Whole Earth Catalog or Wendell Berry’s books about agrarian values, headed to the country, only to find it impossible to make a living.

But the growing market for organic and locally grown produce is making it possible for well-run small farms to thrive, said Ken Meter, 58, who studies the economics of food as an analyst at the Crossroads Resource Center, a nonprofit advocacy group for local food initiatives that is based in Minnesota.

“A lot of people in our 20s went to the land and wanted to farm and had a lot of enthusiasm, but not many resources,” he said. “It has only been the last five years where the payment from working your fingers to the bone and supplying urban markets with high-quality produce has been enough where you could imagine making a living.”

Whether young, first-generation farmers constitute a flood or trickle is difficult to say. But many long-time observers of small farms say they have noticed an increase in recent years among college graduates who want to farm, even if they intern at established farms or rent tiny parcels.

Statistics quoted in the article include these:

Nationally, there were 8,493 certified organic farms in 2005, using just over 4 million acres of land, more than double the acreage in 2000
New York had more than twice as many certified organic farms, 735, in 2007 as it did in 2004
Organic farmers are on average 46 years old, compared with an average of 52 for all farmers

“It has opened up a better opportunity than we’ve had in a while for entry-level farmers,” said Stephen R. Gliessman, a professor of environmental studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz, who studies sustainable agriculture. He said many of his students in recent years have started farms after graduation.

The Kellogg Foundation (yes, the “Frosted Flakes” Kellogg) provides grants to benefit rural development and studies of rural life in America. A previous article here included a slide show that was part of its Rural People, Rural Policy initiative.

Rural People, Rural Policy (RPRP), a multi-year national initiative, is based on the premise that rural America has abundant assets and that the brightest potential for rural America emerges when a critical mass of rural people are stronger, more organized policy actors. RPRP builds and strengthens skilled networks and organizations to advocate and act in the rural policy arena. Rural People, Rural Policy energizes and equips networks of organizations to shape policy that improves the lives of rural people and the vitality of rural communities.

An article in the LaCross (WI) Tribune tells about Lyyne Tschumper, who became a produce grower at age 50 and for 10 years has increased the percentage of her product she sells to local buyers through the Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program. With more people wanting to buy food grown nearby, she’s finding success.

And a new blog called Freshman Farmer, chronicles the startup efforts of a younger, much newer CSA farmer named Andrew. His blog is sponsored by Peaceful Valley Farm and Garden Supply, probably thinking that this local farming occupation could catch on.

Support for New Farmers

Who will farm?

Back to the land, Part II

Being a "farmer" ain't what it used to be

W.K. Kellogg Foundation: Rural People, Rural Policy

Community supported agriculture expanding

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