Thursday, 7 Nov 2002

ABINGDON, Va.

An excellent day yesterday with the four folks from “Good Morning America.” They were very open, down-to-earth, and enjoyable.

Organic garlic.

ASD.

We started the “tour” at 6:30 a.m. at Martin Miles’ farm in Lee County, in the far western corner of Virginia. Goats, greenhouses, and garlic were all that was left to see, given the time of year. Martin, a gruff old coot himself, is tender towards his 200-plus nannies, all Boer meat goats destined for supper tables (primarily Muslim and Hispanic). The goats provide an excellent manure fertilizer for Martin’s 16 acres of organic crops. And, they’re light on the land; in fact, the goats have replaced herbicide in his pasture fields as they completely clean them of briars, multi flora rose and other weeds cattle won’t touch.

At 8:30 a.m., we went to ASD’s “packing and grading house” just up the road from Martin’s farm. Our friends from ABC watched as we ran a few bushels of organic potatoes across our cleaning and grading line. That’s about all we have left now; we’ll close the facility in another week or so. Although we had some significant shortages in both supply and demand this year, we still ran nearly 12,000 cases of organic produce through this facility from June through October. Next year, we should approach 20,000 boxes, I believe.

Martin Miles at the ASD packing house.

ASD.

The last stop of the day was at the LaForce Farm on the Clinch River. Tom, our agriculture education coordinator, guided the crew to the farm, which sits just outside the tiny town of Dungannon. When I first came to southwestern Virginia in 1985, Dungannon was a “hot spot” for grassroots development. I worked with a worker-owned sewing cooperative and a dynamic community organization, the Dungannon Development Commission. Seventeen years later, the co-op is long gone, but the DDC continues its work, including a partnership with the Nature Conservancy around eco-tourism.

Warren LaForce is one of the youngest farmers in our network, and one of the most articulate as well. He and his dad, Mansell, continue to raise tobacco, along with four acres of certified organic produce. In addition to the produce he raised this year, Warren also coordinated three organic production research trials, one on his farm, the other two on farms in neighboring counties. A partnership with Virginia Tech faculty and grant funds from the Virginia Tobacco Commission helped to make this possible. Virginia’s Tobacco Commission has become a terrific partner in our efforts to help farmers move to organic production.

Tom, Warren, and I talked briefly, a prelude to a meeting next week at which we’ll plan our strategy for grower outreach and recruitment for the 2003 season. With the new federal organic standards now in place, the certification process will be three to four times more expensive for Virginia growers and about twice as expensive for Tennessee farmers, relative to what they’re used to paying. Thus, we’ll need to start the recruitment effort sooner and try to find some ways to help reduce or defer those costs.

Tomorrow, some summary thoughts as we wrap up this week from the Appalachian Mountains.