Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
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so excited. They had never seen anything like this in their lives. We have a
big part of history here, but people who are just getting into organics, they
don't even have a clue.”
Even with their history and their colorful personalities, Rob and Mary
have only succeeded due to sheer determination and hard work. Mary de-
scribes the difficulties they encountered: “When I got in this business, it was
fighting tooth and nail. Nobody would divulge any buyers to me. We would
have to read about them in magazines. We had to muscle our way in, and it
was tough getting in. It took forever, but now I have a list of people who call
me. People say, 'If you ever have excess, let me know. I'm interested in doing
business with you.' I can't handle all the business because I have built the
name for quality.” Rob says, “I sell tree-ripened fruit, and I have no doubt I
am going to sell my fruit.”
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IVERSITY INSTEAD OF CORN
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Joel Rissman, Illinois
Th
is is the Corn Belt. The corn/soybean rotation rules here in north central
Ill
inois. Joel Rissman returned to this area after receiving his college degree
in
agricultural engineering. “I graduated in 1991 and moved back to the
fa
rm. My dad was ready to retire from farming, and so I thought that, hey,
I l
ived on a farm all my life and that it would be fun. You know, you can't
ge
t it out of your blood once it's in there. So I came back.” He and his wife,
Ad
ela, started farming here on rented ground. “It's my uncle's farm, and it
w
as only 372 acres, and I farmed it chemically for the first two years. I was
pr
etty disgusted. You spend all that money, and all the chemical people and
fe
rtilizer people get paid first, and what's left over is yours. And there is just
so
little left over, and there is nowhere to expand around here. All the big
fa
rmers, if land becomes available, they'll put this huge rent on it. The little
gu
ys like me can't afford to compete with the big guys.”
He knew that something had to change. “I had done some research, and
it
was in the back of my mind to go organic, but basically the first few years
I didn't know how. The weeds were terrible, and I thought this isn't going
to work. So I did some research and talked to other people, and I found out
that it was possible.” He began to seek out information from other organic
farmers and publications. “I started going to talk to Paul. I was going to quit
farming, but he showed me
Acres
. I called them up and got a subscription
and ordered about $150 worth of topics. And that winter, all I did was read.
[115],
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