American Family Farmer

Bill Tomson has been an agriculture reporter for 22 years. He graduated from Central Michigan University and started his career as a correspondent for Knight Ridder in Sao Paulo, Brazil, reporting on soybeans, corn and wheat production. Bill also covered the automobile and telecommunications sectors there.Since then, Bill has covered ag for Dow Jones, Politico and now Agri-Pulse in Washington DC. Bill currently focuses on trade issues for Agri-Pulse, where he recently broke the story on the details of the U.S.-China deal to resume beef trade.The U.S. dairy sector is fighting harder than ever on several fronts to halt the European Union’s global efforts to block cheese producers in other countries from using names like Roquefort, Asiago and Gorgonzola on the products they export.“We can’t afford to lose this race with the EU,” Vilsack said. “Mexico is our number-one market … for dairy products, so clearly what happens here will make a difference to the nearly 42,000 (U.S.) operations that are producing product

Jonathan White, the son of a math professor and an editor, fell in love with cheese when,  as a twenty-one year old engineer, he had been shipped off to London to manage a project, where his local grocery had no less than forty types of cheese! (This was in 1977, when his US supermarket stocked three colors of the same cheese!)Twelve years later, after falling in love and marrying a young modern dancer named Nina, he moved with his wife and infant to the woodlands north of New York City. Nina had two young ballet students whose father, American musical legend David Amram, kept goats on his hobby farm. When little Alana and Adira turned their noses up at the prospect of drinking goat's milk, David turned to Jonathan and said "Pops, you like to cook, want to try to make something out of all of this milk?"After a few years of hobby cheesemaking, Jonathan realized that he liked his hobby better than his job.Twenty-four years later, Jonathan and Nina are making cheese and bread at their Bobolink Dairy and Bakehous

Tinicum CSA is a partnership between Bucks County native John Crooke and Minnesota native Stefan Streit, who met each other in 2012, while they were both working as CSA apprentices at Sisters Hill Farm in Stanfordville, NY.John grew up sharing the chores with his brothers on his parents’ dairy farm.  His interest in vegetable farming began at Cornell University, where he co-managed the student farm at Dilmun Hill.  He is a returned Peace Corps Volunteer from Paraguay, where he worked for three years in Agricultural Extension and Corps Member Coordination.  For his part, Stefan grew up in Minnesota, and not long after college, worked as an Americorps member for an environmental restoration non-profit in Seattle.  Together, John and Stefan have a shared vision for Tinicum CSA.  They believe there are four essential elements of Tinicum CSA.  First, they insist that what they do must be good for the members who participate in the CSA.  They  believe that what they grow is healthy, nourishing, and a good value for

Rob Larew, VP of Public Policy and Communications at the National Farmers Union, talks about NFU’s position on biofuels and Renewable Fuel Standards, as well as the farm economy, rural development, and health care. The National Farmers Union has been working since 1902 to protect and enhance the economic well-being and quality of life for family farmers, ranchers and rural communities through advocating grassroots-driven policy positions adopted by its membership.The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released the Trump Administration’s first proposed set of volume obligations for the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS). The proposal maintains the conventional biofuel amount at 15 billion gallons, yet lowers obligations for advanced biofuels, including biodiesel, and ultimately falls nearly 7 billion gallons short of the levels prescribed by Congress in the RFS statute.In response to the proposal, National Farmers Union (NFU) President Roger Johnson issued the following statement:“For the past year, Preside

JOHN WESLEY BOYD, JR. is the founder and President of the National Black Farmers Association, which he started in 1995. He is a fourth-generation black farmer from Baskerville, Virginia near the town of South Hill, Virginia. He has been chronicled by national media organizations including a Person of the Week profile on ABC World News Tonight, The Washington Post, and Roll Call newspaper which is influential on Capitol Hill. He owns and operates a 300-acre farm where he grows soybean, corn and wheat and currently raises a hundred head of beef cattle.He was an early supporter of Senator Barack Obama during the 2008 Democratic presidential primaries and played an important role organizing African American voters. He has been named one of the "100 Most Influential Black Americans and Organization Leaders" by Ebony magazine several times.THE NATIONAL BLACK FARMERS ASSOCIATION has been a national voice on the issue of farm subsidies, arguing that black farmers are left out of the massive system of subsidies provid

Scott Henry is the Business Development Manager for LongView Farms and is responsible for business growth, process management, and the implementation of precision technology. He is a 27 year old, 4th generation farmer, currently working alongside his parents and the rest of the crew at LongView Farms. He graduated with a bachelor’s degree in Agricultural Business, International Agriculture, and Finance from Iowa State University. Prior to joining the LongView Farms team, Scott worked for Summit Farms near Alden, IA where he managed new construction and development projects within Summit’s livestock operations.Longview Farms produces Commercial Corn, Commercial Soybeans, Seed Corn and Seed Beans.Millennials will go back to farming, but wont settle for tradition -  is a story that Scott wrote for The Des Moines Register.Nearly 100 million acres of farmland will change hands between 2015 and 2019. For young farmers such as myself, it’s an extremely expensive barrier to entry into the farming world if you don’t h

BOB GARVER is the founder of Wicked Joe Organic Coffees and is a globally recognized coffee expert and barista Judge. It was while in the service, based in Turkey, that he learned the power of flavorful coffee as the bridge to conversations. He brought his new-found admiration for the powerful bean back to America. On leaving the service he started a coffee shop in Santa Cruz, California. Moving his family to Maine, with his coffee – Wicked Joe was born.WICKED JOE COFFEE is Located in Topsham, Maine. It is a family-owned company, committed to producing exceptional coffees, using sustainable business practices. The coffee is roasted in an organic certified, energy efficient facility and made with Organic and FairTrade beans, purchased directly from farmers and cooperatives across the globe. Keeping true to its mission of ethical and sustainable production, they built a new 25,000 sq. ft. sustainable roasting facility, that redefines sustainable coffee roasting.The facility is Certified Organic and Fair Trade,

JIM GOODMAN and his wife Rebecca operate Northwood Farm, a certified organic dairy farm that provides fresh milk to a local cheese producer. They also market beef directly from the farm and at the Dane County Farmers' Market in Madison, WI. Their cows are raised according to organic standards and are predomiantly grass-fed.Jim is also a frequent contributor to National Family Farm Coalition.On april 30th, he wrote: The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) must be replaced with a transparent trade agreement that ensures farmers in all three nations—Canada, Mexico, and the United States—receive fair prices for their production, that consumers are guaranteed the right to know the content and origin of their food, and that strong environmental protections are put in place to protect the sustainability of rural communities.While our government officials appear to be concerned about the well being and economic viability of Wisconsin’s dairy farmers, I wonder if they are really more interested in the viabilit

GAY GORDON-BYREN is Executive Director of The Repair Association at repair.org. She was born into a computer geek household and grew up around computer parts and designs. She wanted nothing to do with computers as a kid, but wanted to be a figure skater like Peggy Fleming or an opera singer, but didn’t have the right stuff.REPAIR.ORG believes that every time a farm equipment manufacturer inserts a computerized part into their product – they seem to take that as an opportunity to monopolize repair. Its wrong on every level – so it must be stopped. Farmers do own their equipment but they often give up those rights with a hidden agreement that states otherwise. MODERN FARM EQUIPMENT is very much like computer mainframes were in the 1970s.  When they break – it’s a very big deal.  There is little or no tolerance for downtime. They are expensive, bulky, and have to be repaired in the field. It’s as impossible to fix a modern tractor as it is a computer without the tools, parts, schematics, diagnostics and firmware

EMILY MEREDITH is the Chief of Staff at the National Milk Producers Federation (NMPF) in Arlington, VA.  Her primary responsibilities lie in the areas of strategic planning, organizational oversight and stakeholder outreach. She also oversees the National Dairy FARM ProgramTM, which assures consumers that milk and other products from American dairy farms are the end result of responsible animal care practices.  In supervising the exceptional FARM Program team, she focuses on other education and training modules that are identified as part of the FARM program, and assists in other areas of the regulatory department such as biosecurity and residue avoidance. The NATIONAL MILK PRODUCERS FEDERATION, established in 1916 and based in Arlington, VA, develops and carries out policies that advance the well-being of dairy producers and the cooperatives they own. NMPF is the voice of more than 32,000 dairy farmers in Washington. The members of NMPF’s cooperatives produce the majority of the U.S. milk supply, making NMPF

KEVIN SKUNES is a vice president at the National Corn Growers Association and a fourth-generation farmer outside Arthur, North Dakota. On his 6,000 acres, he currently raises about 55 percent corn, 45 percent soybeans. This constitutes a big change since Skunes was a child in the 1960s. Back then, the farm was about 2,000 acres of wheat, barley, sunflowers and soybeans, with no corn.Farmers who had long rotated plantings among a diverse group of grains are increasingly turning to a single one. Corn has always been a mainstay of U.S. agriculture, but its increasing profitability has driven up corn's share of total production, while grains such as wheat, oats and sorghum have steadily fallen, according to a Bloomberg analysis of a half-century of crop data. This locks farmers, as well as machinery-makers including Deere & Co., to the rises and falls of one crop, as both domestic and export markets grow more and more tied to the dominant U.S. grain. That exposes farmers to greater volatility and greater trad

DANNELE PECK is Director and Agricultural Economist, USDA ARS Rangeland Resources and Systems Research Unit. Previously, she was an Associate Professor of Agricultural Economics at the University of Wyoming, where she conducted research, extension, and teaching for 10 years. Her area of expertise is decision-making under risk and uncertainty. Raised on a dairy farm in upstate New York, Dannele is a first-generation college graduate. Her region, which includes Colorado, Wyoming, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota and South Dakota -- is an agricultural powerhouse. Dairies are sprouting up and growing in Colorado, Nebraska and South Dakota, while beef cattle feedlots dot the landscape throughout. In crop production, the Dakotas rank high nationally for production of field crops like oats, wheat, sunflowers and dry beans. THE NORTHERN PLAINS HUB OF THE USDA is responsible for delivering science-based knowledge, practical information, management/conservation strategies, and decision tools to farmers, ranchers, forest

CHRIS HOLMAN was born in Oceanside, CA. In 1989, his family moved to the middle of the Navajo Indian Reservation. After high school, he joined the US Army, where he served as an Arabic Linguist. He went on to teach Arabic at the University of Oregon, and eventually left for Wisconsin to work on the farm that he and his wife Maria purchased. Neither of them had ever farmed before 2009. In addition, he has taught at UW-Madison, Madison College and he is currently finishing a two-year contract at Cornell College in Mount Vernon, IA. He is also a Wisconsin Farmers Union board member.“FULL-THROTTLE AGRICULTURE” is where production surges, markets buckle and farms are left in the wreckage. Chris points to the recent crisis in which dozens of dairy farms lost their milk buyer and were nearly forced out of business in a marketplace flooded with their product. The buyer, Grassland Dairy Products of Greenwood, said it dropped the farms May 1 because it lost millions of dollars of business in Canada.Dairy plants and far

MICHELE PAYN is known as one of North America's leading experts in connecting farm and food. Her lifelong passion for agriculture stems from childhood and she has been breeding and judging dairy cattle as a registered Holstein breeder since the age of nine. She now resides on a small central Indiana farm, where she enjoys working on the farm with her daughter.She knows agriculture because she lives agriculture. Payn holds degrees in Agricultural Communications and Animal Science from Michigan State University. She is past president of College of Agriculture and Natural Resources Alumni Association. Career highlights include a Regional Directorship for the National FFA Foundation, where she sold over $5 million in corporate sponsorshipsand led campaigns to develop community support for various Foundation expansions. She has also marketed and sold dairy genetics to more than 25 countries, managed e-business accounts and presented training programs in developing countries. CAUSE MATTERS challenges people to meet

JOLENE BROWN, CSP is a real live “FARMER BROWN.” Her corn and soybean farm is in east central Iowa, 40 minutes west of the Mississippi River, on a non-flood year. She also can hypnotize a chicken, plug grain augers and entertain the folks behind the equipment parts counterShe has been authoring books and speaking professionally for 25+ years, primarily to agricultural audiences including grass roots farmers & ranchers, their Associations and Corporations. This includes those who produce in and those who serve the food, feed, fiber and bio-fuels industries. But, come October, she’s completely involved with harvest on the Brown farm and she’s in a tractor, not an airplane!JOLENE’S TOP TEN REASONS FAMILY BUSINESSES FAIL:1. Assuming all genetic relationships equal good working relationships2. Believing the business can financially support any and all family members whowant to work together3. Assuming others will / should / must change and not me4. Presuming a conversation is a contract5. Believing mind readin

DINO GIACOMAZZI  is a fourth-generation California dairy farmer, who embodies what it means to have farm responsibly and sustainably, on his 900-acre farm, with 900 dairy cows. He and his family live on the dairy property and oversee all aspects of its operations. And now, their newest crop is almonds.He has become a leader in the community, advocating the benefits of conservation tillage to other dairy farmers. He uses social media channels and hosts demonstrations and field days at his farm to connect with others inside and outside of the agricultural community.Dino has taken the lead on education and outreach efforts. His combination of traditional methods: farm field days and working with farm magazines; combined with more modern approaches: a blog and social media sites, have made him a successful advocate for implementing land conservation practices. CASI considers his Giacomazzi’s 2006 public field day to be “the most successful and impacting extension education event that [their] workgroup has been in

PETE KENNEDY is an attorney in Sarasota, Florida and serves as the president of the Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund and vice president of the Farm-to-Consumer Foundation. Pete has worked on raw dairy issues in various States as well as other food distribution aspects including extensive reviews of legislation, particularly food safety and raw milk bills. On April 14, Governor Doug Burgum signed House Bill 1433 (HB 1433), referred to as the North Dakota Food Freedom Act, into law.On April 7, the North Dakota House of Representatives concurred in amendments the Senate made to HB 1433, clearing the way for the governor’s signature. Like the version that initially passed the House, the bill allows the direct sale to consumers by producers of all foods without licensing and inspection except meat, meat products, and raw dairy products. According to USDA, federal law prohibits the unregulated sale of meat and meat products. Under the Food Freedom Act, producers can sell up to 1,000 poultry annually of their own

CELESTE LONGACRE lives in Nashua, NH and is a radio personality, author, professional speaker and astrologer for The Old Farmer's Almanac. She is also author of “Visitor’s Guide to The Planet Earth, an Astrological Primer.” Celeste will also be doing gardening, canning, freezing, etc. workshops at her home this summer.Her charts in The Old Farmer’s Almanac are based on the Moon’s sign and shows the best days each month for certain activities, such as: planting crops, pruning, cutting hay, breeding livestock, and more!GARDEN DELIGHTS will show you how to grow, can, ferment, freeze, dry and root cellar fresh produce. If you can’t do it all, just do what you can. Start small. Even if you live in an apartment, you can grow a tomato plant or two in pots.You can find out more information from her by visiting www.celestelongacre.com, www.almanac.com/bestdays/timetable and www.yourlovesigns.com

SALLY FALLON MORELL is someone that I met, several years back, at the “Raw Milk Symposium” in Wisconsin. Her lifelong interest in the subject of nutrition began in the early 1970s when she read Nutrition and Physical Degeneration by Weston A. Price traveled the world over studying healthy primitive populations and their diets. Sally applied the principles of Dr. Price’s research to the feeding of her own children, and proved for herself that a diet rich in animal fats, and containing the protective factors in old-fashioned foodstuffs like cod liver oil, liver, raw milk, butter and eggs, make for sturdy cheerful children with a high immunity to illness. She is probably best known as the author of Nourishing Traditions®: The Cookbook that Challenges Politically Correct Nutrition and the Diet Dictocrats. This book contains a startling message: animal fats and cholesterol are not villains but vital factors in the diet, necessary for normal growth, proper function of the brain and nervous system, protection from d

JULIE KELLY is a cooking instructor, food writer, blogger and a Mom who lives in the Chicago area. In 2015, she got passionate about GMOs. Kelly is a contributing writer to the Wall Street Journal, National Review, Huffington Post, The Hill and other media outlets.While science and farming communicators struggle with how to best educate consumers and the media, organic executives and celebrities are defining the narrative on GMOs. This is not without serious ramifications if we turn away from genetically modified crops. Food prices will rise and farmers will be forced to use more insecticide and more toxic herbicides. It’s wonderful to celebrate the performances of TV, movie and music celebrities, but their opinions on science issues are no more relevant now than they were when they were waiting tables in Hollywood and Nashville looking for a break.• Hollywood is in our homes daily, often spreading misconceptions about science, and GE crops in particular• Gwyneth Paltrow has emerged as the face of “celebrity