SARE Farmer/Rancher Sample Projects

Wheat Farmers Create, Package Unique Snack to Add Value Adding value to a traditional crop like wheat can pump up farm profits. Wes and Jean Roundy of Cache Junction, Utah, received a SARE grant to buffer the risks of taking their product, popped wheat snacks, from idea to consumer. They dubbed their popcorn alternative “C.R.0.P.S Wheat Snacks” and launched the new venture to weather low-price cycles and continue an 80-year family tradition. In their first year, the Roundys sold 900 pounds of labeled popped wheat snacks -- plain, flavored and combined into bars with ingredients like peanuts, chocolate, fruit and honey – through stores. As a commodity, the 900 pounds of wheat at $3.50 a bushel would have grossed $52.50. Sold as shelf-ready snacks, the 900 pounds generated $5,040, nearly a 100-fold increase. The project has stimulated a local, grant-funded incubator kitchen where others can test products, and a local association devoted to promoting wise resource use and sharing information on farm entrepreneurship. [For more information, go to www.SARE.org/projects/ and search for SW00-117]

'Natural' Pork from Sows in Deep Straw Captures Guaranteed Price

To lower the cost of producing pork and earn a premium on the retail market, Dave Serfling began raising hogs in an indoor deep-straw system -- with the help of two SARE producer grants. One grant helped him convert an old building into a pre-wean-to-finishing unit, where Serfling houses sows with three- and four-week-old piglets through weaning and finishing. With two sow groups a year, Serfling has raised up to 180 pigs in a system that requires no supplemental heat because the straw, manure and heat from the animals keeps them warm – even on days when the Minnesota farm records 30 degrees below zero—and requires little manure management.

In his other project, Serfling collaborates with three other hog producers to test farrowing in straw during the winter. Groups of 18 sows farrow every six weeks, including litters in the winter, a schedule that plays into a market niche for sustainably raised pork. The winter-raised piglets supply pork in the summer when the fresh pork market tends to run dry, prompting upscale meat companies to pay top dollar to Serfling and other pork producers. [For more information, go to www.SARE.org/projects/ and search for FNC98-208 and FNC02-379]

To Manage Nematodes in Cotton, Add Beans

Grown extensively in Alabama until the advent of commercial fertilizer in the 1940s, velvet beans fix nitrogen in the soil and crowd out weeds. Edgar set aside 10 acres divided into eight plots of 16 rows or more to test rotations of velvet bean alone, and velvet bean grown on trellises of corn and grain sorghum to keep the bean vines off the ground. The velvet beans on corn were a consistent winner, with Edgar recording nematode populations as low as five per 100 cubic centimeters of soil. When he followed with a cotton crop, the young plants were able to establish before the adult nematode populations could rebound and do any damage. Moreover, he found he could sell bean seeds for $2.50 a pound. [For more information, go to www.SARE.org/projects/ and search for FS97-049]

Season-Long Harvest: Cooperative of Community Farms Serves 200

CSA farms, which have operated in the U.S. for more than a decade, create partnerships between consumers and farmers. Consumers share some of the risks by paying in advance, then reaping the harvest for months. While a CSA enterprise usually is run by an individual grower, the New Hampshire cooperative brings other farms into the mix, allowing them to produce what they grow best or substitute for others’ crop losses. The SARE grant helped the farmers incorporate as a cooperative, set rules and promote the CSA in the Concord community. The Local Harvest CSA farmers helped each other, sharing information about production issues like seed varieties and fencing options. Moreover, they diversified their income and improved their profits.

  For Farmers Page

Top