younger farmers under 30yrs old

[JD4ME]

If you're interested in farm policy in Canada(Alberta) there was a new listing in the coming events on the 6th of January and there's stuff there on policy for young as well as established producers. As well I saw a discussion topic in the beef area that spoke about it as well. I am well aware personally of the effort that it takes as a younger guy to get involved in this area. All I can say is if you are going to try this game it's going to be a bumpy ride, but looking back at the last 100 years except for a period in the early 70's I believe it's been pretty bumpy all along.

[ALLFARMER]

Thanks Rookie & Farmers_son for your comments. Economics was not all we considered, Quality of Life being another although to a lesser degree.
Thanks

[Cattleman]

Maybe I am very nieve, but I still think there is some opportunities. I am under 30 and bought some more land to expand the family operation. Farmers complain about how little they are paid for products, but how expensive they are in the store, BUT do they do anything about it?? Rarely! I see this as a huge opportunity, look at all the money up for grabs with a bit of marketing initiative!! I sold plenty of direct marketed beef at a price well above my cost of production, and all of my customers were satisfied, and want more! As these large high throughput, high efficiency plants come on board, I think the more they, "improve" efficiency in their minds, the lower goes the focus on quality and consistency. Consumers in general have more disposable income, and are willing to spend it on food, if they know what they are getting.
Pet food market has great opportunity too, lots of cheap protein around and consumers, spend crazy amounts on their pets, more opportunity with not huge costs. Why do farmers run out and drop a quarter million dollars on a piece of land with very low return on investment, when they can invest in other areas to enhance their product that has a much higher return on investment? Something that continues to make me wonder. These are just a few of my thoughts

[Cattleman]

I just wanted to note that I have bought more land just to ensure a large enough base to support production for some value added initiatives.
Also, with the larger operations with all their high efficiency, the bigger they get the more ooportunities that appear, as they overlook markets and leave gaps for smaller players to fill

[nw9flynn]

I agree with cattleman, if you get too large opportunities are missed but if you are too small you are not efficient enough to be profitable. There is alot of positive attitude in this chat and it is nice to hear. I would also like to make to point that the CWB will probably take a serious blow in the next round of WTO talks. Whether you are pro CWB or anti CWB it does not matter. This will create many marketing opportunities for the young ambitious marketer to create a profit while others will be lost without the marketing of the CWB.

[MBFarmer1]

I have been reading this forum for quite some time but haven't found alot worth replying to until now. I fit into this category of 30 and under and I believe there are many opportunities in the future. It is just a matter of identifying them. In regard to the earlier posts re: Farm Groups and the participation of younger farmers I see the lack of interest as a symptom rather than a problem. I recently joined a group here in MB at the urging of a neighbour. After attending the first meeting I could see why young guys might not be interested. The meeting revolved around government programs, payments, and how they can help us. No discussion at all how we can market our produce better, how we can move up the food chain, how we can avoid the mega food companies, new innovative production ideas, nothing. YOung farmers today, in my mind anyway, are interested in what they can do to inrease profitability on their own, not what others can do to increase it for them. Just my two cents.

[Jagfarms]

I am a 34 so I am a few years over over 30. I started farming at the age of 26 when my dad had a heart attack I came home to help out. I left a good paying job to come back to the farm. For the first 3 years I went back to my job in the winter time. In 1999 I purchased a truck and super B grain trailers and started custom grain hauling in our local area. It has been working out not to bad so far.

A lot of the farmers in our area are older and I provided a service that I would shovel thier grain for them at an extra cost on top of the hauling cost. It worked good right from the 1st year I started. It is hard to keep up and find hired help to help out in the farming season to help with the trucking. We were shoveling over 300 bins a year the first few years. Our customer base kept getting bigger and we are not shoveling as much grain these days.

I think any young farmer who would start custom grain hauling and shovel bins out as well will have all the work they can handle.

In our area here in South West sask I think there is there is several different things a young farmer can do in the the form of custom farm work to make to extra money to help out with the farm income. Spraying, seed cleaning, coral cleaning, mechanic work on the farm ect.

It has helped me so far to keep farming and pay the bills. I do not know how much longer I can do it. Working 80 or more hours a week 300 days out of the year. If I just had to rely on my farm income I would have been finished 4 years ago.

My goal is someday to just farm and not have to rely on other income to keep the farm going. I do not know if it will ever happen but I love farming and I hope I can farm for many more years.


Jason

[r.reid]

I'm 26 years old, married, and farm with my Dad. I also work welding in the winter for an equiptment mfg company. Between me, dad, and my grandfather we seed around 4000 acres. My dad also raises 200 cow/calf pairs. These past few years have been tough, but I see a good future in ag. We just have to remember that some things are out of our control (frost, drought, bumper crops in other countries, border closures, etc...). Lately we have had all of these hits. We are due for a good run, real soon. The so called experts also say that food and will be a major shortage in the near future due to the doubling of the worlds population. We shall see. I also think that better uses for grain and staw will be coming shortly (biodisel, ethenol, low trans fat hybrids), we have to PUSH for this to happen sooner rather than later. I'm sorry things didn't work out for you ALLFARMER. Good luck in the future.