The Greenhorns: Next generation agriculturalists

Severine von Tscharner Fleming and The Greenhorns are promoting, recruiting and supporting young farmers--and having a whole lot of fun along the way.

By Amanda Kimble-Evans

Severine von Tscharner Fleming is a Pied Piper of sorts--joyfully leading young people into farming--and her goals are lofty. She wants to throw the doors of the aging agricultural community open and reintegrate the next generation into the conversation. Although none of this sounds revolutionary, the survival and success of farming as a viable and attractive career path has been in doubt for decades. The recent rise in number of young farmers across the country is a sign of hope for the community. A sign von Tscharner has made the focus of the non-profit Greenhorns (www.thegreenhorns.net).

“There is a lot of land drama for farmers, but especially young farmers. When you’re working with a resource that is really expensive and you don’t own it, you have a high level of vulnerability and instability.” ~ Severine von  Tscharner Fleming

How did you get involved in agriculture?

I grew up spending summers on my family farm. I loved animals and plants but it was all very abstract. In college, I was part of the founding of the organic farm at Pomona College. Pomona is the goddess of the orchard and apples, but down there it was citrus. We were growing citrus, guavas and a lot of things that just don’t grow elsewhere in the United States. It was like magic. You put something in the ground, water it, and grows, like, 10 feet.

I eventually dropped out of college to farm, focusing on dairy initially, interning and apprenticing on farms across the United States and Switzerland. Then started my own farm with three partners (including my brother), but we lost our land last season when the owner broke our lease.

There is a lot of land drama for farmers, but especially young farmers. When you’re working with a resource that is really expensive and you don’t own it, you have a high level of vulnerability and instability.

Tell me about the Greenhorns.

We are a small non-profit, powered mostly by volunteers, working nationally to promote, recruit and support young farmers. We convene parties, workshop and events that are educational and celebrational because we believe we’re here to nurture but also to be joyful with the next generation in ag. Good business skills are incredibly important, but we really feel strongly that the energy and the camaraderie and the farmer-to-farmer relationships are just as important as farmer-to-mentor relationships.

The Greenhorns actually started as a film project about young farmers. It has taken us three years and $140,000 dollars to get this far and we’d like to bring the film out to the world. We’re showing the final rough cut to farmer audiences on the West Coast to make sure the film reflects their values and that the tone resonates. Over the winter we’ll knit those comments in and starting in January we’re hitting the ag conferences, colleges and schools with young farmer mixers.

It is time to ramp up for the Farm Bill and we want to get people to think about joining the agricultural community. We need more businesses and caring hands on the land. The only way to do this is to reach out and to figure out how to make policy changes so it is easier to succeed. So we’re campaigning to raise money for outreach—our goal is $15,000 by October 22nd.

What inspired the Greenhorns?

I’ve been organizing gatherings since working the Pomona College organic farm. When we wanted to plant trees, we pulled together a planting party. It really comes from needing working bodies at a particular place and time. And it reflects the larger story in American agriculture.

We’re at a time when we need bodies. American ag has not been an attractive place for ambitious, forward-minded people lately. That’s changing. The pioneers of the organic farming movement of the 1970s are the mentors we’ve grown up knowing about and these are the kind of practices we want to do. But there are challenges if you’re coming in without land or money. People who have gone to college have neither land nor money and, on top of that, a lot of debt already. How do you start a business and start a family?

What do you want Farm Bill 2012 to look like?

For one thing, I’d like to make sure that the beginning farmer and rancher project has continuous finding. And SARE, too—all the great progress that has been made to support conservation and education. Sustainable ag research, grants for farm start ups, FSA (Farm Security Administration) that provides loans for organic production—these are just not happening and they should be.

There also needs to be real energy put behind empowering people who aren’t able to afford healthy food to buy good food from their local economies. So many of my friends are selling to people using food stamps who are frustrated they can’t get more fresh, local food. WIC customers only get once-a year farmers market checks. That just doesn’t cut it. None of this sounds controversial to me.

I was talking to a guy on a flight out of Iowa who hunts with Secretary Vilsak. Raising hogs used to be the way young people could to get into farming. You can grow equity really well with a small hog operation on the side while doing something else—smoking meats, making bacon. Instead the confinement hog operations have taken over. It is unfair to deny that as an entry way for young farmers. It totally resonated with him and he told me “I didn’t know I cared about beginning farmers until this minute.”

What I’m saying is we have to get more politically savvy as young farmers.

How has the agricultural community changed over the last 10 years?

There are more and more young people at conferences and all my friends having babies! A generation of young farmers are moving from apprentice class to being farm owners. And the American public is waking up. The literacy of the average American consumer is increasing. At Farm Aid Neal young spent half his time on stage talking about the state of farming and people were nodding. We obviously have a long way to go still. But my mother joined a CSA. It took about 10 years of persuasion, but she finally did it!

Are there any misconceptions consumers have about food and farming and do you think there is a way to change those misconceptions?

Farming takes work. As Stephen Colbert said when he had his day on the farm, the work is “at ground level.” With veg. work, you’re bending down all the time. Something as simple as that is not fully appreciated. You’re standing at a farmers’ market and the carrots are $3 a bunch. Someone looks at that and they balk at the price, and I know I’ve spent hours weeding those carrots, pulling those carrots, washing those carrots. If people knew what went into those carrots, they wouldn’t make faces. Similarly we wouldn’t feel as a society that it’s okay to offer no promise of security and protection to the people who are doing all this work practically for free.

An easy answer is that people don’t realize how powerful they are. We can grow the number of young people who want to farm but there needs to be a commitment from society to buy that food and keep buying that food in a bad year. Everyone needs to realize how direct it is. It is not abstract or occasional or image. It is hand-to-mouth. The money you give me today is the money I used to grow tomorrow’s food. That money is going back into the local economy.

I just want to tell people when they make a purchase, “What you’re doing is so relevant.”

Were there any organic pioneers that inspired you when you were starting out?

There was an elder living on the mountain above my school farm. She identified what we were doing and made sure we got free seeds. She made sure I got on a bus and got trained in Biointenstive with John Jevens. I’m here because and elder reached out.

We did a mixer this year at the Small Farmer’s Journal Auction and Swap in Oregon. The appearance of young people had never been so large at the event. Lynn Miller was clear about young people looking at farm equipment. “Explain to them what it is!” he said. And he was encouraging elders to reengage and take on an apprentice.

The social infrastructure doesn’t exist for young farmers any more. The elders need to help create that. Farming institutions need to be welcoming the next generation in explicitly. There should be an understanding that keeping land in farming is in the best long-term interest of the organizations and the nation. Instead of decisions based on the security of the current farmer membership.

What tool couldn’t you live without?

I have a short handled Hida sickle. They’re Japanese. It is the best border trimming, harvesting grasses for rabbits and a million other things. It’s my favorite tool ever.

Can organic feed the world?

Hell yeah! We can do it, we just need a few more of us!