The cost of farmland has skyrocketed, putting the dream of working the land out of reach for many young farmers.
In Ohio, land transfers between retiring landowners and aspiring farmers are seen as a solution to keep land affordable and out of the hands of developers.
Sharon Maish and her husband own Maish Meadow Farm and Preserve in Fayette County. She explained in order to acquire the 48-acre property from a retiring farm couple they knew personally, they worked out a seller-financed loan.
"It's so hard for older farmers to figure out how to get their farms out there," Maish observed. "They don't understand social media, they don't understand how to find small farmers, but there's so many of them out there, that'd be willing to do something like we did."
Maish added they have three years to secure a regular loan or pay the remaining amount for the property from their own funds. In the meantime, the farm's previous owners function as the mortgage lender, and she and her husband will make interest-only payments to them.
Maish pointed to HeartlandFarmLink.org, a free land-linking service as resource for both farm seekers and farm owners.
Kelly Cabral, farmland specialist for the Ohio Ecological Food and Farm Association, Kelly Cabral explained more than 40% of agricultural land will be in transition over the next decade. Conventional financing requirements will leave many young farmers unable to put down roots.
"Almost half of all of our land where we grow food will be in transition in the next fifteen years," Cabral pointed out. "To me, that's like a call to action. It affects not only our farmers and their livelihoods, but it also affects the cost of food that we're paying. "
Maish hopes to raise awareness about land transfers among beginning and aspiring farm families.
"They're young couples with children and, and they want to have a small homestead or a farm, and they just can't find it, and there's so much land out there," Maish noted.
Ohio has more than 30,000 beginning farmers, the sixth-highest number in the nation, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture's National Agricultural Statistics Service.
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Illinois is known for having some of the weakest environmental laws for concentrated animal feeding operations, with a lack of oversight and public transparency for the entire process. A coalition of rural landowners is working to change it.
In Illinois, it is estimated there are more than 21,000 concentrated animal feeding operations.
Chad Wallace, director of rural affairs for the Illinois Environmental Council, works with the Illinois Livestock Reform Coalition, which has about 70 members across states. They are trying to come up with legislative solutions for the growing concerns of landowners who have been affected by them.
"The industry is basically embedded," Wallace acknowledged. "It is very hard for folks to go up against something that is so broad and so organized."
Nearly all applications submitted in Illinois over the past decade have been approved. Wallace pointed out several attempts to introduce legislation to increase regulation have failed, with the most recent in 2019 for a proposed moratorium on lagoons being used for holding confinement waste.
More than 90% of animals raised for agriculture in the U.S. come from concentrated animal feeding operations, yet environmental advocates argued the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency is unaware of the locations of the majority of operations, making it difficult to regulate them and account for their environmental impact.
Wallace, who grew up in a farming family, raises beef, pork and lamb and has been approached by people wanting to construct operations on his land. He declined but noted it came with a cost.
"One of the struggles is constantly having to build the value of your product due to not being in the industry," Wallace explained.
Wallace sells locally to get the best prices for his products. He added many in his position are left discouraged by the difficulties they face in going against the industrial ag industry. Proponents of concentrated animal feeding operations said they are an economic necessity to keep retail prices of meat, milk and eggs affordable for consumers, and are crucial to the viability of rural communities.
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A Midwest coalition of consumer, farmer and rural groups, including those in Missouri, is pushing to reinstate mandatory country-of-origin labeling for meat, poultry, seafood, fruits and vegetables, as well as some nuts.
Earlier this month, federal lawmakers reintroduced the American Beef Labeling Act to restore such labeling for beef.
Noah Earle, a farmer and member of the Missouri Rural Crisis Center, contended claims from the "big four" meat packers, arguing such labeling hurts their export and is costly and time-consuming are not valid.
"They already do provide a lot of information and they know this information," Earle pointed out. "They already have systems to track marketing attributes such as organic, or certified Angus. So, it's not really much of an additional step to just put 'Product of the USA.'"
Those opposed to the regulation worry it could lead to trade disputes with Canada and Mexico, which happened when a similar rule was repealed in 2015.
The U.S. introduced mandatory country-of-origin labeling in 2002, updated it in 2008, and removed beef and pork in 2015 after Canada and Mexico won a World Trade Organization case. The standard requires accurate labeling in addition to origin records. Earle warned without it, meat packers can mislead consumers.
"Also been the case that those packers could ship in primals or live animals that had been raised up until the date of slaughter in a foreign country, and then cut them up into smaller pieces, make them into value-added products and then stamp them 'Product of the USA,'" Earle reported.
Earle hopes The American Beef Act's mandatory country-of-origin labeling restoration will be included in Trump-era trade talks. He stressed it is not about politics, it is about just getting it done.
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By Olivia Herken for the Wisconsin Independent.
Broadcast version by Judith Ruiz-Branch for Wisconsin News Connection reporting for the Wisconsin Independent-Public News Service Collaboration
On his farm in Maribel, a small town in Manitowoc County, Wisconsin farmer Michael Slattery grows cash crops such as corn, soybeans and canning vegetables, along with hosting a fleet of honeybees and about 50 fruit trees.
He’s run his farm for about 25 years, and he sells his crops to canning companies, corporations and farming cooperatives to make a living. But in 2018, when President Donald Trump imposed tariffs on goods imported from China, it cost him.
Trump’s tariffs prompted the Chinese government to place retaliatory tariffs on American agricultural products. Slattery told the Wisconsin Independent he lost 60% of his revenue from soybean sales because China was one of the biggest importers of U.S. soybeans at the time. Farmers were left with a surplus of product with nowhere to go, Slattery said, adding that it’s not easy for them to quickly pivot to new buyers because it takes years or decades to develop trade relationships.
“We can’t turn around and just go simply someplace else,” he said.
Now, just a few weeks into his second term, Trump again plans to impose tariffs on China, Canada and Mexico — the United States’ largest trade partners. This could hurt Wisconsin farmers again, Slattery and experts say, as well as raise prices for consumers and have negative ripple effects on other businesses and industries in Wisconsin.
Trump announced on Feb. 1 that he would impose 25% tariffs on imports from Mexico and Canada and 10% on imports from China. Initially, both Canada and Mexico responded with retaliatory tariffs of their own, and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau urged Canadians not to buy American-made products, but later Trump claimed he won concessions from the leaders and announced he had agreed to pause the tariffs for 30 days. Trump’s tariffs on imports from China went into effect on Feb. 4, and the Chinese government imposed 15% counter tariffs on U.S. goods that morning.
Tariffs are taxes one country imposes on goods imported from another country. Trump issued tariffs in his first term with the promise of increasing the number of factory jobs in the United States, which he didn’t do. This time, his tariffs on goods from the country’s largest trading partners are, he claims, part of his efforts to curb immigration and the importation of drugs into the United States.
The potential imposition of tariffs on goods from Canada, Mexico and China, and the trade war with all three that could ensue, could have significant effects on Wisconsinites’ wallets, according to University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire economics professor Thomas Kemp.
“If all three of those were to be implemented, Wisconsin consumers would see a pretty substantial increase in costs in general, because those are our three largest trading partners as a state, and as a nation,” Kemp said.
Prices could be raised for groceries, fuel, cars, machinery, appliances, electronics, toys and clothing. Specifically, the U.S. imports a lot of fruit and vegetables from Mexico; lumber, oil and vehicles from Canada; and machinery and computer equipment from China.
Kemp said that often when tariffs affect the prices of consumer goods, there are sometimes cheaper substitutions to be found at the store. But because these tariffs will be placed on goods imported from America’s three main trade partners, and some of them are simply not produced domestically, it will be impossible for consumers to avoid some imported goods, Wisconsinites’ access to a range of products could be limited.
“There’s a reason why we trade, and there’s a reason why we specialize, and that allows us to consume a variety of goods and services. It’s unlikely that we’re going to produce mangoes in Wisconsin, because it’s just too cold. It’s unlikely they’re going to produce soybeans in the south of China because it’s just too hot and wet,” he said.
Retaliatory tariffs on American exported goods such as the ones China implemented and the leaders of Mexico and Canada have threatened, are also likely to hurt Wisconsin businesses and workers, especially those who rely on specific markets.
Producing more in the U.S. isn’t as desirable as people might think, Kemp said. Since manufacturing and agriculture have gotten more efficient and productive with fewer workers, producing more domestically wouldn’t necessarily result in many additional jobs. Kemp also noted that some specialized jobs are dependent on trade relationships.
“I don’t know if we think of things like the very specialized machinist in Wisconsin only can exist because of the very generalist manufacturing plant in China,” Kemp said.
Kemp said Trump’s promise that tariffs will shore up production and jobs in America is unlikely to be fulfilled immediately.
“The simple reason why it’s unlikely to happen in the short term is you just don’t start up an automobile factory overnight,” Kemp said. “You’re talking years, almost certainly, and perhaps even decades, before you start to see those effects.”
Many businesses, from mom-and-pop shops to big corporations, rely on equipment that comes from overseas, Kemp said, meaning their production and supply chains could be slowed by Trump’s tariffs.
In Wisconsin, many farmers use fertilizer and equipment, such as tractors, that are imported from other countries, Slattery said.
“This adversely affects us as farmers,” he said. “It affects us as both the lack of markets for us to sell our produce into, our products into, as well as increases our cost of doing business.”
All of this, he said, could lead to more small and mid-sized farms across Wisconsin being squeezed out by larger farms at a time when they’re already shuttering at rapid rates.
“We’re in a bad position,” Slattery said.
Olivia Herken wrote this article for the Wisconsin Independent.
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