young farmers confront the future of farming

“Where is the next generation of farmers?” asked 27-year-old farmer and massage therapist Annalisa Miller, who has farmed her own land for about five years at Wild Miller Gardens at Tuckaway Farm in Lee.

Unable to sleep one night, Miller wrote an essay calling on fellow young people to take action in the farming industry. She posted her essay on the Great Bay Agricultural Resources Network’s Web site.

“I just had these thoughts in my head and I had to get (them) out of my head before I could rest,” Miller said.

Her concern for the future of farming is that few young people understand that farming is a legitimate career option.

Richard Uncles, director of regulatory services at the N.H. Department of Agriculture, said the average age of farmers across the state and nation has been increasing over the past few decades, and is currently in the mid to late 50s. As of 2007, the USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service found the average age of farmers in Rockingham County to be 55.6.

“It’s troublesome,” Uncles said.

Miller said she is also concerned about the region’s food security. “New Hampshire can feed itself, it’s just a matter of matching the new farmers with the land and the skills and the knowledge and giving them the opportunity to do the work,” she said.

Miller said the younger generation needs to learn a large chunk of knowledge, including skills like saving seeds so they don’t have to be ordered from elsewhere, and designing homes with root cellars so people have food stocked in their own houses.

This knowledge is currently missing, Miller said, due to a lack of exposure to farming in most people’s childhoods. Farming is not included in most school curriculums and many young people never see how food and animals are raised, she said.

Economics is another factor in creating challenges for young farmers. Nicholas Furnald, of Whippoorwill Farm in East Kingston, said it’s difficult for a farm to break even without having another outside source of income.

“The way farming has gone in New England, it’s not the economically efficient career to be completely involved in,” said Nicholas, who is currently in college. He added that he wants to continue being involved with the land for its therapeutic value, but he is not studying farming in college.

Whippoorwill Farm is not currently a working farm, but the Furnald family is collaborating with the Society for the Protection of New Hampshire Forests and the towns of South Hampton and East Kingston to conserve their land so that it can serve as working farmland in the future.

Thatcher Furnald, Nicholas’ younger brother, hopes to run a working farm within 10 years.

Thatcher agreed with his brother, though, saying the financial burdens of having a farming business deter most young people who will not inherit farmland from their parents. Most recent college graduates don’t have the money to purchase farmland.

Heather Fernald, 27, of Fernald’s Farm in Nottingham, also cited financial challenges for young farmers. Her husband has been farming for his entire life and inherited the dairy farm from his family. But people who don’t have farmers in their family struggle to enter the industry.

“They just monetarily can’t break into the field,” she said. Although she helps out on the farm when she can, she has several part-time jobs to help make ends meet.

Attracting younger farmers, Miller said, involves educating people about the importance of food security. “I think it’s just asking people to step back and look at the big picture and imagine what kind of life they want to lead for their grandchildren and to create that place,” she said.

Older, retiring farmers must work to make their property available to younger farmers so that the land continues to be used for farming, Miller said. An example is the Tuttle Farm in Dover, one of the nation’s oldest continuously operating farms, which recently went up for sale. The owners are too old to keep running the farm, and their children are not interested in taking over.

The Tuttle Farm has been designated as conservation land, meaning future owners can’t develop it for anything other than agriculture. Local land trusts attempt to acquire conservation easements on agricultural land, ensuring that the property can’t be turned into condos or strip malls.

Clint Furnald, father of Nicholas and Thatcher, is focused on creating farming opportunities at Whipporwill Farm. Clint purchased the property at age 23 with the intent of conserving it as farmland for future generations.

“That’s huge. We’d give an opportunity for someone else to do that,” Clint said.

The Forest Society has already raised $965,000 to conserve the farm and must raise another $26,000 by Sept. 30.

Miller said many farms in the area offer apprenticeships for young farmers so that they can practice farming without taking on the financial burdens of the land.

“I’m feeling pretty hopeful because I keep meeting people who are young farmers and interested,” she said.

Nada Haddad of the UNH Cooperative Extension said many young people are requesting information as they get into the business of growing.

“The interest is there, and they are either leasing land or working on other land, whether it’s during the growing season or during others,” Haddad said.

The Cooperative Extension provides growers with education and workshops covering an array of topics regarding growing, livestock, marketing and more. The program also takes participants to different farms to see what other farmers are doing.

Maureen Duffy, young farmer coordinator for the N.H. Farm Bureau Federation, agreed that younger people have been expressing interest in farming. “A lot of people think that young people aren’t interested in seeking this career path, but there are those young people that are very interested,” Duffy said.

The Young Farmer Committee offers training opportunities for people between the ages of 16 and 35, geared toward developing the state’s future agricultural leaders.

Heather Fernald said she thinks it’s important for young people to usher in a new generation of farming. “To be sustainable for a long period of time, you have to change and evolve with the current practices, and older farmers are a little hesitant to do that and they aren’t going to be around forever,” she said.

Although farming presents its challenges, Fernald and her husband love the farm life. They even spent their last vacation in New York for Empire Farm Days.

“It’s our life. It’s all we do. It’s all we think about,” she said.

Miller said she enjoys farming because all the hard work is rewarding. “Being able to have my work outdoors and to have my feet and hands in the Earth, I think that really provides a grounding life for me,” she said.