The future of American agriculture is in jeopardy unless farmers
have a way to add value to the crops they grow and bring
consumers closer to the farm gate.

Scientists, farmers and farm policy makers from around the
country gathered in Tifton, Ga., Dec. 13-14 to discuss new ideas
on how to accomplish this and put dollars back into the rural
economy.

Subpar Rural Economies

“Economic gains are uneven across America. And you see the lowest
growth in areas where we grow commodity agriculture,” said Mark
Drabenstott, director of the Center for the Study of Rural
America of the Federal Reserve Bank in Kansas City.

Despite $104 billion in government payments in the 1990s, three
out of four farm counties in the United States had subpar
economies, Drabenstott told participants at the Symposium on
Value-added Agriculture.

The future will have two types of agriculture, he said:
conventional, commodity-type farming and new, product-oriented
agriculture. This new approach will have to grow, develop and
market products the consumer wants.

“Commodity agriculture will persist. But the biggest payoff for
rural America lies in products (to sell),” he said.

Such ideas include renewable energy sources derived from crops,
nutraceutical crops, farmer-owned co-ops or any way to put
farmers’ products on the grocery shelf.

Rural Development

The future of agriculture doesn’t lie solely on the farm, he
said. Rural areas will have to be developed through equity
capital, the encouragement of local entrepreneurs and the
infusion of technical assistance into “Main Street” America.

“Rural America has chased the smokestacks (for too long),”
Drabenstott said. “Growing your own is much more viable.”

Tough Business

“Growing commodities right now is tough business,” said Gale
Buchanan, dean and director of the University of Georgia College
of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences. “If we can add value
to these commodities and add dollars to the farm, it would not
only help the farmers but those communities where they live.
Agriculture has a significant economic impact on the entire
state, but especially the rural communities that depend on
it.”

“Growers must be innovative and progressive at times like these,”
said Randy Hudson, director of the UGA Emerging Crops and
Technologies program.

Drabenstott said, jokingly, that one of the biggest problems
facing this new value-added agriculture is getting 200 farmers in
the same room to agree on something. But, he said, it can be
done.

The symposium was sponsored by the UGA CAES and the Georgia
Department of Industry, Trade and Tourism. The strategies and
findings of the symposium were presented to key members of the
Georgia legislature.