Modern Farmer JJC 10/21/23

Supplement to the Jacksonville Journal-Courier Saturday, October 21, 2023 | $1

Schools, ag industry look to grow next generation of farmers............page 4 Buzzing business: Beekeeping takes planning and a bit of luck.......page 7

2 | SATURDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2023

MYJOURNALCOURIER.COM | MODERN FARMER

Dave Dawson/Journal-Courier

ON THE COVER: Wayne Strange and his son, Henry, take a ride on a Farmall tractor.

Modern Farmer Saturday, Oct. 21, 2023 Old methods survive because of dedicated few.................................2

Schools, ag industry look to next generation of farmers.....................4

Farmer shares advice for new generation......6 Beekeeping takes planning and a bit of luck ...............................7 Indoor farms are shutting down as businesses struggle ....8 Survey sets baseline for farmers to track nutrients.......................9 Bill would make building up easier along Mississippi River .......12 Young goat farmer uses YouTube to spread word.............................13 Composting businesses sprouting — but many cities unprepared.......14 School lunch getting federally funded makeover ....................15 4-H teams with ‘Spy Kids: Armageddon’ to launch learning platform ......................16 $3 billion available for climate-smart practices .....................................17

Old methods survive because of a dedicated few

By Dave Dawson A S S I STA N T E D I T O R

Preserving old farming methods and equipment is important to the members of the Prairie Land Heritage Museum, but even they would tell you that using antique equipment is not practical in the modern world of agriculture.

But that doesn’t deter people like Dale Lair and Mark Hall from occasionally indulging in their favorite pastime of tinkering with old engines in order to make the machines of the past come to life.

Hall is chair of the Prairie Land Heritage Museum’s Fall Festival and Steam Show, while Lair is

in charge of the antique tractor displays at the show.

“It’s an education to see what it was like back then and how it compares to today. The old equipment and the new equipment do the same job, but there is no comparison. You can do more in an hour with modern equipment than you could in a week with the old stuff,” Lair said.

Their success in showcasing the vintage machinery and their passion for preserving a slice of that life can be measured by the thousands of people who turn out each September to see the steam show on the museum grounds in South Jacksonville.

“I’m like a kid who hasn’t grown up. I enjoy working on them, restoring them and making them look nice,” said Lair, who has a few tractors of his own and spends time tinkering with them and making them run.

For Lair, getting involved in the show was a matter of being a regular visitor to the steam show.

“I just started coming out here because I was interested in it. It was something that drew me here and I got involved. I’ve been out here 30-some years,” Lair said.

“I was raised around the older stuff and used it for years when I was a kid on my dad’s farm. I like old

MODERN FARMER | MYJOURNALCOURIER.COM tractors and it just spread from there,” Lair said. “If you ain’t interested in it, you’ll get sick of it in a hurry. Otherwise, it’s like a magnetic force.”

Hall was practically born into the steam show.

He is a third-generation member of the museum.

His father, Paul, and grandfather, Art Bickel, were involved in the steam show for years, and Bickel was a founding member of Prairie Land in 1969.

“It’s just kind of engrained. I grew up with it. That’s why I am involved,” Hall said.

Hall’s sons, Matt and Chris, are carrying on the family tradition of preserving steam engines and have been involved with the show since they were in diapers.

“They’ve grown up with steam,” Hall said.

Both men said it is im-

portant to preserve the old ways of life so, among other things, people can appreciate what life is like today on the farm.

“If we don’t preserve it now with the current generation, it won’t get preserved with the future generations. This whole way of life could be lost if the few who are keeping it going now let it go. We want to keep that way of life alive so people can see what it used to be like. It’s all a part of history,” Hall said.

“It’s important for younger people to see it and learn about it, and the older people like to reminisce about it,” Lair said.

While not common, some of the older machinery is still in use in smaller farms around the area.

“One of the things that gets used is a four-bottom plow pulled behind a tractor. They will still shell the

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2023 | 3 corn instead of using a combine. It’s hands-on.

There are still some people who do that,” Hall said.

Lair has several tractors of his own, mostly 1940s and 1950s vintage International-Harvesters and Farmalls, but he likes all brands.

“I don’t use the ones I bring out here. I don’t take them to the field anymore.

Some small operators are still using them, but they are not designed to handle the equipment of today,” Lair said.

“It’s not very practical for a large operation. The advances in equipment let guys farms a lot more acreage. With the equipment we had back then, it would be impossible to farm that much ground,” Lair said.

Hall marvels at the craftmanship it took to build some of the older equipment.

Dave Dawson/Journal-Courier

Dale Lair explains the workings of a Model 72 Allis-Chalmers combine from the 1950s. Lair has had a long fascination with vintage farm equipment.

“If you look at one of those pieces you wonder how they built it without a computer because everything now is automated.

Molten steel cast in sand, with connecting rods. The old things were all built by hand, and each one has a difference,” Hall said.

“They are not all alike.

Out of 500 threshing machines, the one in the middle will have improvements Methods continues on A16

4 | SATURDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2023

MYJOURNALCOURIER.COM | MODERN FARMER

Schools, ag industry look to grow next generation of farmers

By Angela Bauer R E P O RT E R

The agriculture industry is busy these days, growing not just grains, produce and livestock but the next generation of farmers and industry leaders.

“All throughout my career, the age of farmers has continued to grow older … because we have fewer young people who have come in and participated in farming,” said Jeff Galle, an agribusiness professor at Illinois College. “Not just farming, but farming and agriculture.”

One result of that is the consolidation of smaller, family farms into larger operations.

“The number of true farmers — in production

agriculture — there’s getting to be fewer of those,” said Mike Tenhouse, director of agriculture sciences at John Wood Community College. “The cow herds are getting larger, everyone is doing more in terms of number of acres or number of heads.”

Despite consolidation, there’s still demand for agriculture products and the industry now is hoping for a bumper crop of people interested in producing them.

“There is a labor shortage; there is a need for people,” Tenhouse said, noting “the industry is supporting the same number of acres, the same number of heads,” just with fewer owners.

On the plus side, students are starting to catch on to the fact that today’s

agriculture narrative is different from the one that saw the start of the Farm Aid music festival in 1985 to help struggling family farmers.

“That was a pretty tough time in agriculture,” Galle said. “A lot of the things that were going on in the homes where these kids were born and raised on the farm, there was a lot of encouragement to look for something else to do with their lives. It was a tough swing to get people to come back to agriculture.”

But swing things have.

Farming “wasn’t dead, it was just going through some tough times,” Tenhouse said. “We still have to grow things to feed the world, to clothe it.”

And there are people in-

Madelyn Sinclair/Provided

Bob Koppelman (left), an aGROWhood volunteer, and Cameron Ruyle, Morgan County Soil and Water Conservation District resource conservationist, visit a chicken coop at the aGROWhood farm on Church Street. Small, neighborhood farms like the aGROWhood farm are a way for more people to get involved in farming without the major financial investment required for the land and equipment of large-scale farming operations, Ruyle said.

terested in doing just that.

“From a youth perspective, we probably have the largest number of FFA members that we’ve had in years,” Galle said. “The idea that we have young people who are interested in agriculture and farming and that part of it is exciting, encouraging.”

It still may not be enough. Industry leaders are in a constant push to show younger generations

what agriculture has to offer in terms of a lifelong career.

“When I graduated from high school 50 years ago, you’d have a classroom of 20 agriculture students,” Tenhouse said. “Almost all of them came from a family farm. Everybody farmed a corn-soybean rotation. Everybody had a little bit of everything.”

Today, fewer students come from a family farm

and fewer still are returning to one, in part a matter of math: The region’s population is shrinking and, as a result, high schools’ graduating classes are getting smaller, Tenhouse said.

And not all students who take agriculture classes in high school see a future for themselves in agriculture.

Some end up there simply because agriculture is their school’s answer to an “industrial arts” program, he

MODERN FARMER | MYJOURNALCOURIER.COM

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2023 | 5

Photos by Angela Bauer/Journal-Courier

The aGROWhood community farm on Church Street houses a variety of crops, from food to flowers, along with bees and chickens. It's part of a sustainable farming effort being spearheaded by the Jacksonville Park Foundation in partnership with the city, county and other organizations.

said.

“They’re not collegebound, so they get into something that provides them more of a skill,” he said, noting some are not future farmers but simply “kids who like to work with their hands.”

Some industries also are known to recruit agriculture students, looking to fill out their own workforce with employees who have a farmer’s work ethic, Tenhouse said.

Students who otherwise might be interested in a career in agriculture can be put off by some of the costs involved, said Cameron

Ruyle, resource conservationist for Morgan County Soil and Water Conservation District.

“Getting young farmers started, there’s a lot of upfront costs,” Ruyle said, noting ever-climbing land prices and increasing equipment costs. “Unless you’re connected to a farming family, it’s hard to get started on your own.”

Ruyle is hoping aGROWhood farms — small, urban farms grown on vacant city lots or in people’s residential backyards — might help. Jacksonville and Morgan County, along with the soil and water conserva-

tion district, is partnering with Jacksonville Park Foundation on its MainStreet Farms aGROWhood Initiative.

Along with growing produce and flowers, aGROWhood farms can include bee boxes and chicken coops.

“It’s going to serve a purpose to get the younger generation interested and it’s going to create more jobs as more of these urban farms pop up,” Ruyle said.

“There’s more need for someone to lead the different initiatives, so it’s going to create new jobs to address that problem of the upfront cost of starting

A cow pauses to greet a visitor at Orr Beef Research Center in Pike County.

your own large-scale farm with expensive equipment.”

With fewer students arriving at college with a farming history, agriculture education programs like those at IC and JWCC have figured out they need to start at the beginning.

“They maybe didn’t grow up on a farm but grew up in a rural community, where agriculture was happening,” Galle said.

“Where they lived, life evolved and revolved around agriculture. If they

want to go back to that community … agriculture is going to be a good choice.”

Part of agriculture education now is helping people realize all the different paths a career in agriculture could take.

“The number of people actually involved in production agriculture and day-to-day growing crops is probably 10% to 12% of what agriculture is all about,” Galle said. “The other 80% is the support system. … The breadth and scope of agriculture is

huge. A big job that I have is helping people know and understand what’s out there.”

JWCC covers a lot of that ground through the John Wood Community College Agricultural Sciences Complex and Fred L. Bradshaw Learning Center at the Orr Agricultural Research and Demonstration Center in Pike County. The facility, in partnership with Orr Corp. and the University of Illinois, also includes the Orr Beef Research Center.

“We’re real excited about what we have here,” Tenhouse said.

Galle’s still working to let people know Illinois College has an agribusiness department, he said. Answering prospective students’ questions about how an agribusiness degree could be a benefit is the easy part.

“When they ask, ‘What can I do to be a part of agriculture?’ I just tell them to look around, because it’s all there,” Galle said. “Everything is agriculture in one way or another.”

6 | SATURDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2023

MYJOURNALCOURIER.COM | MODERN FARMER

Farmer shares advice for new generation

By Ben Singson R E P O RT E R

As America’s farmers continue to grow older, one farmer from the region has advice for its newcomers.

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the average age of the American farmer increased from 56.3 in 2012 to 57.5 in 2017. Also in 2017, the department found that just over 908,000 farmers identified as “beginning producers,” with 26% of them being 35 years old or younger.

For Marty Marr of MD-M Farms in New Berlin, the world of agriculture looked different when he began farming in 1975. He said that when he started, agriculture was “still considered a great occupation” that he was “anxious to be involved in.”

“It’s something I’ve always to do growing up,” Marr said. “That’s all I’ve really ever wanted to do, is farm and raise a family on a farm.”

Marr described the world of American agriculture when he started as “a roller coaster,” due in part to things like high interest rates and the country’s grain embargo against the Soviet Union in 1980. Since then, though, he remarked that the industry has changed a great deal.

Marr said that agricul-

Marty Marr of M-D-M Farms in New Berlin looks at photographs of his children, many of whom are also in agriculture. A farmer since 1975, he shared some advice for farmers who were just getting into the industry.

Photos by Ben Singson/Journal-Courier

New Berlin farmer Marty Marr emphasized the importance of good business sense to people who are just starting out in farming.

ture had changed in two ways. One was the use of conservation techniques in farming practices, including no-till farming and a “heightened awareness of caring for the land,” he said.

“Farmers have always cared for their land,” Marr said. said, “but the way we do it now is different.”

The other way it had changed was how far had technology had advanced.

Marr said that everything from yield monitors on combines to guidance systems on tractors have helped to increase efficiency on the farm. He also said

that advancements in genetically modified crops were “ever-evolving.”

“The yield trend is always going up,” and a lot of it’s due to technology that we see in the seed industry.”

With those changes, however, come of new problems that didn’t exist when Marr was first getting his start in agriculture. While the industry has always been expensive to break into, those costs have only amplified in recent years, he said.

“The rate of increase in all our input costs (and) the machinery we use has real-

ly just taken off to the high side,” Marr said. “From a capital standpoint, you really have to sharpen your financial skills to weather these ups and downs in the market.”

Despite the changes, Marr said that dealing with the markets, alongside handling the weather and combating misinformation about farming, were challenges that had stuck around for as long as he had been farming. New farmers also had to learn how to work with nature and exercise their agronomic skills out in the field rather than

inside a classroom, Marr said.

“Just knowing how to balance all that is kind of a learning experience, I think,” he said.

Marr also emphasized the importance of finding a healthy work/life balance and “knowing that you’ve got a good balance with your family (and) your farming operation. I think having a good faith helps, too.”

For new farmers, Marr said it was important to recognize the strong suits of their family and fellow team members in their operation. A strong education and business sense were also “quite critical” to run-

ning a successful farm, he said.

“It’s just very, very important that you learn to study your ... balance sheets, your cash flow statements, all those things that go into planning and running a farm operation today,” Marr said.

The agriculture industry still had “an exciting future,” Marr said, and he was proud to be an American farmer. He hoped that the young people who were just getting into the field became as good of planters as they could be.

“There’s a lot of rewards and a few risks along the way,” he said, “but that’s business and farming.”

Marty Marr of New Berlin said new farmers should strive for a healthy balance of work, life and faith.

MODERN FARMER | MYJOURNALCOURIER.COM

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2023 | 7

Buzzing business: Beekeeping takes planning and a bit of luck

By Samantha McDaniel-Ogletree R E P O RT E R

During the spring and summer when the bees are flying around, that is one of a beekeepers busiest times.

For those that create beehives and gather the honey, it is a process treatment, luck and trusting the bees to do their job.

Jacksonville beekeeper Gary Glaenzer has been raising bees since he was 12, starting through 4-H after one of his mentors raised bees.

“I started with just one hive,” Glaenzer said.

“This year I have 55 hives across Morgan County.”

His fascination with bees started as one of is 4-H leaders had a tree that housed bees, as well as several hives.

As he has continued to keep bees, Glaenzer said he has learned a lot about their behavior. Mainly, bees do not actively sting a person if left alone.

“If you are going to work with bees, you are going to get stung eventually. I get stung all the time,” he said.

For Glaenzer, he his bees usually start gathering nectar from plants and flowers as early as late-February or early March and can produce up until October, depending on the weather.

With the warmer temperatures that lasted longer this year, Glaenzer said he was able to collect honeycomb as late as early October.

It takes a lot of bees to produce just a few gallons of honey, he said.

Each hive will start a typical season with about 12,000 to 15,000 bees in one hive. Those include

the fully grown gathering bees to the newly hatched.

At the peak, Glaenzer said hives can have up to 60,000 to 70,000 bees depending on the strength of the Queen Bee. On average, each hive can produce roughly 48 to 60 pounds of honey, depending on the year.

But, he said there is a lot of work that goes into making honey by the bees.

Types of bees in a hive

In a hive, a Queen Bee is responsible for laying eggs, regulating hive activity and swarming. According to Best Bees, a queen will live on an average of one to two years and is the sole queen in a hive.

A queen’s pheromones give each hive a distinct scent that allows bees to recognize their colony of bees.

The drone bees are the males of the hive and help aid in reproduction. According to Best Bees, drone bees make up 10% to 15% of the hive and do not survive in the winter after they are kicked out of the hive by the worker bees in order to preserve food stores for the queen bee and worker bees who take care of her.

Worker bees make up the remainder of the hive population — about 80% to 99% of the colony’s population — and are females the do not reproduce.

These bees will often live for an average of five to seven weeks, however, those that serve the queen inside the hive can live for three to five months.

Worker bees are often the bees that are seen collecting from plants during the spring and summer

months. They are responsible for collecting pollen and nectar, building honeycomb, cleaning the hive and hive repair. Worker bees do most of the jobs within the hive from preparing cells for the honey and capping the honey comb with a wax sealing that prevents evaporation or contamination of the honey.

Pollen into honey

“It’s an amazing process,” Glaezner said.

Glaezner said the bees collect the nectar and pollen from the surrounding areas, before placing it into the various cells of the honey comb. From there, the bees inside the hive Bees continues on A17

Samantha McDaniel-Ogletree/Journal-Courier

Gary Glaenzer has roughly 55 hives positioned around Morgan County to house his bees.

8 | SATURDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2023

MYJOURNALCOURIER.COM | MODERN FARMER

Lots of indoor farms are shutting down as businesses struggle.

So why are more being built?

By Melina Walling and Kendria LaFleur A S S O C I AT E D P R E S S

LM Otero/AP

Aaron Fields looks at produce growing in vertical farm green house he manages. Indoor farming brings growing inside in what experts sometimes call “controlled environment agriculture.” There are different methods; vertical farming involves stacking produce from floor to ceiling, often under artificial lights and with the plants growing in nutrient-enriched water.

Inside a bright greenhouse, workers in hairnets and gloves place plugs of lettuce and other greens into small plastic containers — hundreds of thousands of them — that stack up to the ceiling. A few weeks later, once the vegetables grow to full size, they’ll be picked, packaged and shipped out to local shelves within 48 hours.

This is Eden Green Technology, one of the latest crop of indoor farming companies seeking their fortunes with green facto-

ries meant to pump out harvests of fresh produce all year long. The company operates two greenhouses and has broken ground on two more at its campus, where the indoor facilities are meant to shelter their portion of the food supply from climate change while using less water and land.

But that’s if the concept works. And players in the industry are betting big even as rivals wobble and fail. Plenty Unlimited this summer broke ground on a $300 million facility, while Kroger announced that it will be expanding its availability of vertically farmed produce. Meanwhile, two indoor farming companies that attracted strong startup money — AeroFarms and AppHarvest — filed for bankruptcy reorganization. And a five-year-old company, Planted Detroit, shut its doors this summer, with the CEO citing financial problems just months after touting plans to open a second farm.

The industry churn doesn’t bother Jacob Portillo, a grower with Eden Green who directs a plant health team and monitors irrigation, nutrients and other factors related to crop needs.

“The fact that other people are failing and other people are succeeding, that’s going to happen in any industry you go to, but specifically for us, I think that especially as sustainable as we’re trying to be, the sustainable competitors I think are going to start winning,” he said.

Indoor farming brings growing inside in what experts sometimes call “controlled environment agri-

culture.” There are different methods; vertical farming involves stacking produce from floor to ceiling, often under artificial lights and with the plants growing in nutrient-enriched water. Other growers are trying industrialscale greenhouses, indoor beds of soil in massive warehouses and special robots to mechanize parts of the farming process.

Advocates say growing indoors uses less water and land and allows food to be grown closer to consumers, saving on transport. It’s also a way to protect crops from increasingly extreme weather caused by climate change. The companies frequently tout their products as free of pesticides, though they’re not typically marketed as organic.

But skeptics question the sustainability of operations that can require energy-intensive artificial light.

And they say paying for that light can make profitability impossible.

Tom Kimmerer, a plant physiologist who taught at the University of Kentucky, has tracked indoor farming alongside his research into the growth of plants both outdoors and inside. He said his first thought on vertical farm startups — especially those heavily reliant on artificial light — was, “Boy, this is a dumb idea” — mainly due to high energy costs.

The industry has acknowledged those high costs. Some companies are seeking to push those down by relying on solar, which they say also supports sustainability. Even Vertical continues on A18

MODERN FARMER | MYJOURNALCOURIER.COM

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2023 | 9

Survey sets baseline for farmers to track nutrients

BY J OU R NA L - C OU R I E R

Illinois Fertilizer and Chemical Association, alongside several agricultural partners, today announced preliminary findings from the firstever Illinois Ag Retail Survey, setting a new baseline to track nutrient management practice adoption and quantify nutrient loss reduction achieved at retail locations and on farms across the state.

The 2022 Illinois Ag Retail Survey is designed to collect accurate, science-driven data to track nitrogen and phosphorous fertilizer use and application methods throughout the state as part of industry efforts to

meet state Nutrient Loss Reduction Strategy goals.

“With Nutrient Loss Reduction Strategy goals for 2025 quickly approaching, pressure from Illinois legislature, regulatory agencies and stakeholders to document progress within the state is mounting,” said Shane Gray, Illinois Corn Marketing Board member. “These survey results show farmers are implementing conservation practices and wanting to share their story about how voluntary agricultural framework is vital for meeting state goals.”

The survey was supported by the Illinois Beef Association, Illinois

Certified Crop Advisers, Illinois Corn Growers, Illinois Farm Bureau, Illinois Fertilizer and Chemical Association, Illinois Farm Bureau, Illinois Pork Producers Association, and the Illinois Soybean Association, with funding from the Illinois Council on Best Management Practices.

“The Illinois Nutrient Loss Reduction Strategy emphasizes the importance of partnerships in meeting its goals,” said Richard Guebert Jr., Illinois Farm Bureau president. “The ag retail survey is a great example of multiple groups working together to contribute to improving water quality.”

Iowa State University

Center for Survey Statistics and Methodology designed the survey, dividing Illinois into nine regions or crop reporting districts with a goal of surveying 500 fields. The survey was modeled after the Iowa Ag Retail Survey.

Ag retail businesses were randomly selected to acquire anonymous data related to agricultural practices from grower/customer records for the 2022 crop year. Data was collected in early 2023.

“Illinois Ag Retail Survey leaders are continuing to dig into the data provided by the survey,” said Kevin “KJ” Johnson, Illinois Fertilizer and Chemical Association

president. “This baseline of data will provide them with opportunities to identify patterns and trends of best management practices usage over time, as well as opportunities to develop new programs and initiatives to tackle key areas identified by the survey.”

From a total population of 535 ag retail locations across Illinois, 150 were randomly selected to participate in providing 10 randomly selected individual field records.

Of the customer fields selected for additional collection, only 13 customers opted out. In total, 917 agricultural fields were surveyed. High participation rates ensured statistically sound findings,

in addition to showing that farmers and ag retailers were aware and engaged in the effort.

Additional highlights include: • Much of the data provided in the initial reports is in-line with estimates from state and federal agencies, as well as other states.

• Of the fields surveyed, tillage generally occurs ahead of corn more frequently than soybean as no-till corn was 24% and no-till soybean was 44%.

• Cover crops were found on approximately 9% of fields in fall 2021.

• Anhydrous ammonia application in the fall was 49% with 97% use of a nitrification inhibitor.

10 | SATURDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2023

MYJOURNALCOURIER.COM | MODERN FARMER

MODERN FARMER | MYJOURNALCOURIER.COM

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2023 | 11

12 | SATURDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2023

MYJOURNALCOURIER.COM | MODERN FARMER

Bill would make building up levees, floodwalls easier along Mississippi River

By Eric Schmid ST. L OU I S P U B L I C R A D I O

A bill to make it easier for levee districts along the Upper Mississippi River to raise their flood protection mechanisms is going before Congress.

The Upper Mississippi River Levee Safety Act, introduced last week by Illinois Rep. Mary Miller, ROakland, calls on the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to update the flood probabilities it uses to set the design standards for levees and floodwalls at least every 20 years.

The legislation would also allow levee districts to maintain their levees or floodwalls at the levels established by those updates from the Corps. It would cover federal levees

or floodwalls between Guttenberg, Iowa, and Hamburg, Illinois, and levees south to Cape Girardeau, Missouri.

Illinois reps. Mike Bost, R-Murphysboro; Darin LaHood, R-Peoria, and Eric Sorensen, D-Moline, are also sponsors.

“It allows levee districts to maintain their level of protection, and that’s basically a requirement of FEMA accreditation,” said Mike Klingner, chair of the Upper Mississippi, Illinois and Missouri Rivers Association, which endorses the bill.

This is not the reality now, he said.

A levee district accredited to protect against a flood with a 1% chance of happening must go through an often lengthy

and expensive process to keep up with changing potential flood levels, Klingner explained.

“What we’re trying to do here is just clarify that if flood profiles change, there’s an ability to maintain (a levee),” he said.

To make changes right now, levee districts must model the risk from different flooding scenarios and how their flood protection measures may affect other communities, Klingner said. It’s part of a change implemented years ago by the Corps when it comes to changing Corps Civil Works projects, including levees, he added.

“They adopted this internal change in their policy that makes it extremely difficult, in fact, basi-

cally impossible for a levee district in the Upper Mississippi to maintain their levees,” Klingner said. “It’s in conflict with basic common sense.”

This kind bill, if passed into law, could allow levee districts to chase their accreditation status, said Olivia Dorothy, Mississippi River restoration director with American Rivers.

“What this legislation would do would be to allow levee districts to automatically build up that levee,” she said. “That’s where it gets really dangerous.”

Dorothy said she is sympathetic to the difficult reality levee districts face when trying to keep up with dynamic river systems and flood poten-

tials that are constantly changing. But she added the level of scrutiny districts must go through when considering alterations is vital to ensuring river communities stay safe.

“Water has to go somewhere,” she said. “If you’re always increasing the height of your levees, and nobody around you knows what you’re doing, then it becomes dangerous because you don’t know where that water is going to go.”

With climate change making floods last longer and bringing more extreme precipitation events, Dorothy said it’s more important than ever to have a clear understanding how and where water will move through

the country’s river systems.

“Part of answering that question is getting basic information from levee districts when they’re making modifications to their system as part of that permitting process,” she said. “To do away with that and allow levee districts to make modifications without that check is dangerous. It literally puts people’s lives at risk.”

Klingner contends the bill would not allow unchecked alterations, they would just need to meet the previous standards local levee districts agreed to when many levees were first constructed.

“Any modification or adjustment to the (levee) would have to go through Corps approval,” he said.

MODERN FARMER | MYJOURNALCOURIER.COM

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2023 | 13

Young goat farmer uses YouTube to spread word

By Will Geschke T H E N EWS-R EV I EW

Sylvia Smith has been around goats for a long time.

Her parents started raising goats when she was just 5 years old. At a young age, she started raising sheep, but found her true passion in goats, first at the age of 12.

“I felt like sheep were kind of dumb,” Sylvia said. “They didn’t have as fun of personalities as the goats, and I decided I really, really liked them.”

Over the past four and a half years, Sylvia, now 16, has grown her herd into a group of 10 Kiko goats — on top of working a job, taking school classes, participating in FFA and running a YouTube channel to document her journey.

Bred for meat production and survivability in the hilly pastoral environments of New Zealand during the mid 1980s, Kiko goats are a rare breed Sylvia chose to raise because of their low maintenance and increased parasite resistance, which allows her to spend more time on schoolwork and at her job.

“They’re really good at raising up their kids, their offspring, on their own,” Sylvia said. “They’re pretty hearty.”

Just before the start of the pandemic in 2020, Sylvia decided to start a YouTube channel, Silver Pine Kiko Goats, as a way to document her journey raising goats, while educating the public on ways to learn from the experience.

“People can see the good, the bad and the ugly side of farming, and be able to get a really good feel of that” Sylvia said.

“I’ve had people reach out

to me and tell me about how they’ve had similar experiences that are able to learn from me, learn about goats and get a small feel of farming. That was probably one of the coolest things I’ve done.”

Sylvia has a goal to reach 1,000 subscribers on the website. Over the past two and a half, she’s accumulated 858 of them, but she hopes to get more as she will continue the channel through high school.

She does most of the work on her own — a tall order for somebody in high school and working as a farmhand — but she gets some help from her siblings as well.

Noelle Smith, 10, helps Sylvia by checking on the

Will Geschke/The News-Review

Sylvia Smith, 16, stands on the ranch she uses to raise her 10 goats.

water and the goats, giving them medication if Sylvia’s out of town.

Stewart Smith, 8, one of Sylvia’s brothers, isn’t as

much of a fan of the goats — he said hopes to get a lot of dogs when he grows up instead — and sometimes takes part in what he calls

‘headbutt competitions’ with the goats.

Yes, it’s exactly what you’d expect from the name.

“Primrose is the main one I do,” Stewart said, referring to one of Sylvia’s goats that doesn’t have horns on its head. “So it’s a fair challenge, because I don’t have horns either.”

“It’s not the smartest idea,” Sylvia added.

When she graduates high school, Sylvia plans to sell her herd, hopefully to another young, promising farmer with a passion for goats — it’d be extra special if the new farmer was around 12, the age when she first started, Sylvia said. After that, she’ll go to college and study to become an emer-

gency veterinary technician.

For now, Sylvia still has two more years left with her goats. It can be a lot of work, but at the end of the day, she said, all the hard work is worth it.

“Overall, with my YouTube channel and raising goats, it’s been a really cool opportunity for me to grow and learn, while sharing that with others as well,” Sylvia said. “I’m really grateful for this, because not everybody has this opportunity. I’ve gone though a lot of challenges, but I’ve also gotten a lot of joy from it as well. I think that’s really cool, and I wish that everybody could have the opportunity to do something like this in their life.”

14 | SATURDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2023

MYJOURNALCOURIER.COM | MODERN FARMER

Composting businesses sprouting — but many cities unprepared

By Eva Tesfaye H A RV E ST P U B L I C M E D I A

In the middle of an urban farm, tucked behind houses and tall greenery, sit seven piles of food waste each in different stages of composting.

Brooke Salvaggio and Daniel Heryer, take a scoop from one of the piles of what they call “black gold” and raise it up to their noses to breathe it in.

“It just smells like really rich soil, and when we put up our fields it becomes really rich soil,” said Heryer.

Not all their neighbors agree about the smell. While Salvaggio said the compost is improving the yields of their farm, Urbavore, neighbors complained to officials about it being a nuisance.

The city of Kansas City, Missouri, now says the operation requires a specialuse permit, while Heryer says they checked before expanding back in 2021. He’s puzzled why the city isn’t embracing their efforts to

manage food waste sustainably.

“I want to create more compost hubs like this around the city and the metro area,” he said. “The cities and other municipalities around this area, but certainly the city of Kansas City, should be helping us do that.”

Food waste is the largest category of trash going to landfills, according to an estimate from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in 2018. Even more concerning, rotting food produces methane, a powerful greenhouse gas that contributes to climate change.

Municipal solid waste landfills were the third largest source of human-related methane emissions in the United States in 2021.

Community composting — creating and using the compost in the same community that generated the waste — is popping up in cities across the country. It keeps that waste out of landfills and returns nutrients to

Carlos Moreno

The compost piles at Urbavore are collected and stored in large concrete bins where they are rotated and then moved out to be used throughout the farm or given to partners.

the soil. It can also save municipalities money on landfill fees.

Yet not all cities are welcoming composting operations, especially when neighbors complain about bad smells and pests.

Gray area of regulation

Brenda Platt, director of the Institute for Local SelfReliance’s Composting for Community Project, said

composting can be a challenge for municipalities.

“Local governments can either say, ‘Oh, you’ve got a problem,’ or they can help these operations that support their communities to overcome the obstacles,” she said.

She said cities often don’t have updated zoning rules that address composting specifically.

John and Stacey Cline of New Earth Farm ran into this problem in St. Louis when they tried to start community composting.

There is only one regulation related to composting in the city’s code, but it refers to composting of leaves and grass clippings, not food waste.

Because a neighbor complained to the city while they were in the process of buying land for their farm, they agreed not to compost on that land in order to follow through with the purchase.

“There were no laws to say, ‘Well, hey, neighbor, it’s actually totally legal’ because it wasn’t legal or illegal,” said Stacey Cline.

“That’s the gray area that makes it hard because you need to build bridges.”

A bad reputation

The Midwest is especially

behind when it comes to supporting composting, said Jennifer Trent, a program manager at the Iowa Waste Reduction Center at the University of Northern Iowa.

“A lot of times it’s a preconceived idea or notion that compost sites are foul places, and that they won’t be beneficial to the community,” she said.

Luis Chen runs Wormies, a compost service for Grand Rapids, Michigan.

He is in the process of getting approval from the Cascade Charter Township, where the land he acquired is located, to start composting. He said the biggest obstacle is convincing the township that his operation won’t be a nuisance and will add value to the area.

“I knew what I was doing, and I knew that this was going to be an attraction, but that has to be explained,” said Chen.

He agreed to meet most of the township’s conditions on how to run the operation.

That includes limits on how much compost his operation can take in, as well as no drop-offs. Now he’s waiting for approval.

Composting doesn’t have to be a nuisance when done right, according to Trent.

For example, odors can be reduced even in outdoor operations by ensuring the combination of materials is right. She warned that one operation doing it wrong can ruin the practice for an entire region.

“If you have a compost site that’s not complying with the regulations, enforce those laws. Don’t allow them to continue until it’s fixed,” she said.

The U.S. Composting Council says having good zoning laws, enforcing them and educating residents about composting helps make sure everything runs smoothly.

“You can tie in the zoning and say, ‘Show me a plan.

Show me you know how you’re going to operate,” said Frank Franciosi, executive director of the U.S. Composting Council, “but I think that the best thing to do is bring people out to these facilities and show them how they’re being run.”

What cities can do

When Ben Stanger wanted to start his business, Green Box Compost, he reached out to several municipalities in Dane County, Wisconsin. Many of them said no. Eventually he landed on Sun Prairie, a suburb of Madison, which not only allowed the operation to find a home there, but also changed a zoning code for his business.

“It just happened to be that Sun Prairie really rolled out the welcome mat and helped us kind of work through this,” he said.

Stanger is composting indoors with containers and using a slightly more technological approach to prevent problems, but the city is also doing its part by educating residents, said Jake King, the city’s communications and diversity strategist.

“We really try to look at that public outreach and engagement,” he said, “so people know what we’re doing and, most importantly, know why we’re doing it.”

In Kansas City, Urbavore is appealing its violations, and hoping that will result in larger changes to city rules. Assistant City Manager Melissa Kozakiewicz, said that city leadership is currently in discussions with Urbavore on how it can better support composting and urban farming.

“Kansas City, and every other city in America has an opportunity to think about how it manages its waste in a different way,” she said.

MODERN FARMER | MYJOURNALCOURIER.COM

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2023 | 15

School lunch getting federally funded, farm-fresh makeover

By Rae Solomon KU N C

It’s a hot, buggy morning and Derrick Hoffman is poking around a densely packed row of bushy cherry tomato plants.

Behind him, rows of peppers, eggplant, kale and broccoli are still soaking up the sun, while just a few country roads away, bok choy and butter lettuce sprout under hoop house protection.

But in the cherry tomato patch, it’s already harvest season. Hoffman and a handful of farm hands are choosing tomatoes to pick — the ones already deepened to the just right shade of red.

“Or light orange,” Hoffman concedes. “Because once you put a red one with an orange one, they all turn red.”

Hoffman doesn’t want them all to turn red too quickly, because once these tomatoes leave his 100-acre farm, they have to fit with the lunch service schedule at a local public school.

In about a week, kids will be snacking on them in nearby school cafeterias.

Hoffman’s tomatoes are part of a growing farm-toschool movement that is revolutionizing the humble school lunch. When farm-to-school programming works as designed, kids fill their plates with fresh, nutritious food, and local farm economies get a major boost, creating a more resilient regional food supply chain.

It’s a seemingly simple idea that has lots of benefits. Sunny Baker, senior director of programs and policy at the National Farm to School Network, said the issue is truly bi-

Rae Solomon/KUNC

Derrick Hoffman checks his broccoli plants for pests. The Farm to School side of his business has allowed him to focus full-time on farming.

partisan.

“Farm to school is really easy,” she said. “We call it a triple win. It’s a win for kids. It’s a win for farmers, it’s a win for school and the community.”

But while Hoffman and the schools he works with represent the best outcome of farm to school programs, they are hardly typical. Getting all that local food into schools has proven frustratingly complicated. And while up-to-date data on the reach of farm to school activity is lacking, it’s clear that there’s still lots of untapped potential for growth when it comes to getting farmfresh foods into school cafeterias.

‘Fire hose’ of funding

Tapping that potential has recently gained new urgency at the federal level. The USDA explicitly connects the idea with improving the nation’s food supply chain resiliency, and expanding local foods into schools is now a priority, backed by generous funding to make it a reality.

Since 2013, the USDA funneled about $84 million to states for funding general farm to school programming. Then last school year, the department dramatically increased its spending for Farm to School pro-

grams. At least $200 million directly funds local food purchases and an additional $60 million is earmarked to fund related farm-to-school infrastructure, coordination and technical assistance.

Both pools of money give states lots of flexibility to decide how to deploy the funds in a way that works well for local conditions. And even more money supports local food programming in schools indirectly.

“We have been describing it as trying to drink out of a fire hose because there’s just so much money coming down from the USDA right now,” said Baker of the National Farm to School Network.

She described that investment as a once-in-alifetime opportunity to give school lunch a headto-toe makeover by inte-

grating it into local food systems.

“One of the best things that can come out of this massive influx of money is going to be that we’re developing really incredible examples of how this can work,” she said.

“We’re learning what’s possible.”

The challenges

Before the recent boost from federal funds, farmto-school activity was growing steadily, but slowly.

Cindy Long, administrator of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Nutrition Service, which runs the permanent Farm to School program, said she’s seen the many roadblocks slowing things down firsthand.

“We often hear that schools and producers initially don’t talk the

same language,” Long said. “Schools think about ‘Oh, I need 7,500 servings of this.’ And farmers think in terms of bushels or crates.”

Long said there are other big challenges her agency has had to tackle, citing “a lack of [cafeteria] staff capacity to engage in activities,” and an onerously bureaucratic food purchasing system.

The structured procurement system, which involves a bureaucratic bidding system, can also be off-putting for farmers, contributing to a shortage on the supply side of locally produced food.

“For the small guys, it’s an intimidating process,” Hoffman said.

Tapping into the farmto-school market has been transformative for Hoffman, and his experiSchools continues on A18

16 | SATURDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2023

MYJOURNALCOURIER.COM | MODERN FARMER

4-H teams with ‘Spy Kids: Armageddon’ to launch learning platform

METHODS From page A3 not in the first ones because they saw something along the way that needed to be improved. They would change it and carry on,” Hall said.

Though retired from day-to-day operations, Lair still does a little farm work because it gives him something to do. But time hasn’t diminished his love of working the ground.

“When I was growing up, everything had to be moldboard plowed and the ground had to be worked, planted, then cultivated at least twice. We didn’t have chemicals like we have today. So, it was an ongoing day-to-day operation. Back then corn was picked by the ear and then shelled, not with combines,” Lair said.

“Today there is still a lot of labor involved in farming, but it is different. We are using different types of equipment to do the same things,” Lair said.

By Glenn Gamboa A S S O C I AT E D P R E S S

Dave Dawson/Journal-Courier

Wayne Strange and his son, Henry, pick corn. They used Wayne’s own equipment, including a Farmall tractor and a one-row New Idea corn picker.

There are a variety of tasks that must be performed to keep Prairie Land going and Hall said there is something for everyone’s interest.

“We have 200 members who pitch in and help.

Some try to keep all of the steam engines and antique tractors in shape. Some people want to mow. Some are good at cooking. We

leave their area of expertise to them,” Hall said.

It’s the old ways Hall and Lair are trying to preserve and part of that is drawing new people into the museum.

“We’ve got plenty of room for people who are interested and want to be involved in this type of stuff.

We are always looking to have more and younger

members,” Lair said.

“We want to demonstrate how things were done. But everything we have out here is a chance to learn about how things were made and how things were done. Sometimes we don’t think about how work used to get done and the show is a good reminder of the way it was,” Hall said.

The National 4-H Council is growing in a new direction — online — by launching its e-learning platform Clover with a collaboration with Netflix and its new movie “Spy Kids: Armageddon,” the organization announced.

Jill Bramble, who took over as president and CEO of the National 4-H Council in August, said she wants the new platform to be the digital equivalent of the in-person experience that 4-H has provided to young people for more than 120 years.

Clover features more than 220 online educational activities for students, ages 5 to 18, developed by 4H’s partners in the Cooperative Extension System and its network of land grant universities. The topics covered range from farming to space exploration, from financial literacy to stress management — all designed to inform and empower young people.

The innovation, Bramble says, comes in the way the Clover platform engages with the students by using gamification and entertainment, which led to the collaboration with Netflix.

“It was a natural alignment,” she said. “When you think of the intent behind ‘Spy Kids,’ those kids are tackling some of the world’s most pressing issues and they’re doing this through coding and gamification. We wanted to align that with what we see is possible through Clover.”

Encouraging interest in coding and other STEM (science, technology, engi-

neering and math) disciplines has become increasingly important throughout education, especially after students’ science and math test scores declined during the pandemic.

Bob Hughes, director of K-12 Education for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s United States Program, recently told The Associated Press that improving STEM education is a high priority for the nonprofit, which is not connected to Clover, but last year donated $1 billion to improve math education in the next four years.

“Math is a such a gatekeeper for future success — and not just success for becoming a physicist, but for your day to day life,” Hughes said. “It’s a very tough subject for many kids. It’s emotional for many kids. And if they don’t succeed in mathematics, they can start to develop a mindset and an identity that suggests that not only are they not good at math, but at other academics as well. So math is fundamental.”

Clover was developed to help with those fundamentals by increasing students’ exposure to subjects like math and science in a less stressful, more entertaining way, Bramble said.

“The pandemic was an inflection point showing what kids need today,” she said. “We feel that Clover can support a way to catch up, but it can’t do it alone.

It’s so valuable to have an in-person program that goes along with it — the mentoring aspect that comes with 4-H. It helps bring that sense of belonging that helps a young person catch up to where they need to be.”

MODERN FARMER | MYJOURNALCOURIER.COM

BEES From page A7 use their wings to create air flow that helps dry the moisture from the nectar, add enzymes and transform it into honey.

Once completed, bees would place a wax coating on the outside of the cell that would help preserve the honey.

“When you have most of the cells capped, that means it is pretty much done,” Glaenzer said.

Taking care of hives

Glaenzer said bees take care a majority of the needs within a hive, however there are some things he has to do in order to protect his bee populations.

Though he doesn’t treat his hives for many things, he said there are two types of parasites that could cause real damage to a colony.

First, Glaenzer said he treats his hives about four times a year to prevent mites from killing off the bees. A healthy colony can be destroyed if it is infested with mites as they

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2023 | 17

kill the bees.

Also, he keeps his hives in full sunlight and treats for small hive beetles, which can destroy the honey in the hives.

“This is where a lot of new beekeepers fail,” Glaenzer said. “They don’t treat their hives. It’s pretty disheartening to see a colony destroyed by mites.

From hive to market

As the bees produce the honey, Glaenzer said it is a balance of taking the comb at the right time and making sure to leave enough stores for the bees to use over the winter months.

“The comb up to a certain point is for the bees, but anything above that is for the beekeeper,” Glaenzer said. “When the bees have cappings of wax, that means its pretty much done.”

Once he removes the comb from the hive, Glaenzer said he removes the wax cappings with a hot knife, put the comb in an extractor that spins the comb so the honey is forced from the cell.

From there is it run

through a strainer and bottled.

“I don’t do anything else to it, except strain it,” he said. “Then I bottle and label it.”

At market, Glaenzer said he is often asked why the various bottles have a different color of honey.

“Some may taste different depending on where and when it was gathered from,” Glaenzer said.

“They type of plants that the bees gather from can impact the color and flavor.”

Glaenzer said he always enjoys seeing the finished product.

“Honey lasts forever,” he said. “It can crystallize if it is pure. People like to buy it from close to where the live, because it is said it can help allergies. That depends on the doctor you ask.”

Though it can be tough, and the stinging isn’t fun, Glaenzer said he is thankful for his success in raising bees so far.

“It’s hard. And sometimes it comes down to pure luck and having your hive in the right place at the right time,” he said.

Samantha McDaniel-Ogletree/Journal-Courier

Gary Glaenzer sells his honey, as well as honey comb, both of which are produced locally.

$3 billion available for climate-smart practices

BY J OU R NA L - C OU R I E R

The U.S. Department of Agriculture is making more than $3 billion in funding available for agricultural producers and forest landowners to participate in voluntary conservation programs and adopt climate-smart practices.

These funds are provided through the Inflation Reduction Act, which invests an additional $19.5 billion for USDA’s conservation programs.

“This funding will be used to meet producer demand for our oversubscribed programs and maximize climate benefits across the country while

also providing other important environmental benefits,” Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said.

“This includes investing in popular common-sense practices such as cover crops, waste and fertilizer management, and grazing practices, while continuing to work through existing programs to help producers address other natural resource challenges.

Ultimately, this will lead to economic opportunity for producers, more productive soil, cleaner water and air, healthier wildlife habitat and natural resource conservation for future generations.”

The additional invest-

ments are estimated to help hundreds of thousands of farmers and ranchers apply conservation to millions of acres of land. The funds provide direct climate mitigation benefits, advance a host of other environmental cobenefits, and expand access to financial and technical assistance for producers to advance conservation on their farm, ranch, or forest land through practices like cover cropping, conservation tillage, wetland restoration, prescribed grazing, nutrient management, tree planting and more.

USDA will accept applications through Nov. 13.

18 | SATURDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2023

MYJOURNALCOURIER.COM | MODERN FARMER

VERTICAL From page A8 the ones most heavily reliant on artificial light that doesn’t come from renewables maintain they can be profitable by eventually producing a high volume of produce year-round.

But Kimmerer thinks there are better ways to provide food locally and extend the growing season — outdoors. He pointed to the organic farmstand-oriented Elmwood Stock Farm, which can grow tomatoes and greens the whole year using tools like high tunnels, also known as hoop houses — greenhouse-like arches that shelter crops while still being partially open to the outdoors.

He thinks investment flowing toward new versions of indoor farming would be better spent on practical solutions for outdoor farmers like weedzapping robots, or even climate solutions like subsidizing farmers to adopt regenerative practices.

Moving farming indoors can solve some pest problems, but create new ones. Without their natural outdoor predators, tinier creatures like aphids, thrips and spider mites

LM Otero/AP

Workers hand off plants during operations at a vertical farm greenhouse.

can become very difficult to control if not managed aggressively, said Hannah Burrack, an ecologist who specializes in pest management at Michigan State University.

“If you’re creating the perfect environment for plants, in many cases, you’re also creating a perfect growing environment for their pests,” Burrack said.

Indoor farming companies counter this by emphasizing high hygiene; for example, Eden Green

touts “laboratory conditions” on its website and says workers closely monitor their greenhouses to immediately catch any pests. They also say vertical farms actually need fewer pesticides than outdoor farms do, reducing environmental impacts.

Evan Lucas, an associate professor of construction management at Northern Michigan University who teaches students about proper infrastructure design for indoor farms, said he’s not con-

cerned about the shakeout underway. He said some companies may be struggling to scale up, with problems that come from launching in spaces that aren’t necessarily built specifically for indoor farming.

“My guess, based on what’s happening, is everyone saw the opportunity and started to try to do a lot really quickly,” Lucas said.

Several of the companies say they’re on the right track. Eden Green

CEO Eddy Badrina says the company has figured out a way to rely mostly on natural light for their plants. Plenty CEO Arama Kukutai said the company’s lighting system is efficient enough for the company to be profitable. And Soli Organic CEO Matt Ryan said growing in soil indoors gives the company a better product than companies that grow in water.

Plenty got a significant vote of confidence last year when Walmart joined in a $400 million round of investment also aimed at bringing the company’s produce into its stores.

But Curt Covington, senior director of institutional business at AgAmerica Lending, a private investment manager and lender focused on agricultural land, isn’t convinced that indoor farming operations can work — except maybe in cases where big retailers and greenhouses team up, like Walmart and Plenty, or where grants for urban and vertical farm operations that benefit communities could be made as a form of socially conscious venture capital.

“It’s just hard, given the capital intensity of these types of businesses, to be very profitable,” Covington said.

SCHOOLS From page A15 ence demonstrates how involving more farmers has the potential to make a big impact on the local farm economy.

When Hoffman and his wife started their farm in 2015, he kept his office job to make ends meet. He said he stumbled on the farm-toschool business by accident. But within a few years, that side of the business was so good he was able to quit his day job and focus on farming.

“We were lucky enough to find that schools can take a large volume,” Hoffman said.

“It’s allowed us to grow.

It’s allowed us to do what we’re doing.”

Today, he sells directly to eight local school districts and his produce makes its way into even more school cafeterias through indirect contracts. He said all that farm-to-school business now makes up 60%-75% of his business.

Some of the new federal money coming down is designed to help other farmers find their own paths to farm-to-school success. It funds training and technical assistance for producers in order to help get them in the game.

But there’s a catch with this wealth of federal support: The fire hose of extra funding runs out at the end of this school year, which means all of these new systems being propped up now need to be self-sustaining when the well runs dry.

“I would say we will see a huge demand over the next two to three years,” Hoffman said. “I think people are going to get a handle on it. You are seeing the money coming in.”

MODERN FARMER | MYJOURNALCOURIER.COM

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2023 | 19