He watched the ag industry grow

NEZPERCE — In the 28 years Ken Hart has served as the University of Idaho extension educator in Lewis County, agriculture has taken some major leaps.

Bigger farms, fewer farmers, space age technology that makes cultivating thousands of acres of a wheat farm on par with planning a trip to Mars.

But on the Camas Prairie where Hart has spent most of his career, farming continues to be a generational legacy passed down through families for more than a century.

“Farms have gotten bigger, aided by bigger equipment so they need less people to operate them,” Hart said recently at his tiny office in the Lewis County Courthouse he shares with the planning and zoning and noxious weed departments. The walls are lined with his numerous awards and bookshelves bulge with tomes of various thickness regarding agriculture practices.

“But I’ve not noticed the trend where they become factory farms or they’re corporations — not families,” Hart said.

“They’re still the same families that I started working with. They’ve just grown. And when some people retire from farming, they don’t have heirs, so they rent to these farmers that are growing. And the rental market is really competitive for land around here. And that’s partly because (farmers) have the equipment and they can farm a lot more acres.”

Hart, 67, will retire at the end of February. Although his entire career as an extension educator has been spent in Lewis County, Hart has shared his expertise with farmers around the globe and seen for himself how agriculture intersects with democracy.

Hart grew up in Spokane, but after meeting his wife, Gail, the couple moved to Weippe to take over her family’s farm. They now have five children and four grandchildren.

He was president of the Idaho Grain Producers Association and had a keen interest in agriculture policy — the governmental decisions that affect day-to-day life on the farm, such as the Farm Bill and other such legislation.

That’s when he decided on a life course pivot.

“I was still farming full time but I knew I needed more income,” Hart said. “Our family needed more income than the farm would provide.”

He enrolled in a master’s program at the University of Idaho, studied agricultural economics and obtained a degree in agricultural policy. In 1994, he was hired as the sole extension agent for Lewis County, with responsibilities throughout the five-county region of north central Idaho. Lately those responsibilities have also included the 10 northern counties of the state.

Hart started teaching farm management courses required by the 1994 Farm Bill for all producers who borrowed money through what is now called the Farm Services Agency.

“It was kind of a hard way to start in extension because people were forced to take it in order to borrow money,” Hart recalled. “So we went through several curriculums through the years.”

Courses in the following years, however, have gained more acceptance among farmers. Those include farm marketing, risk management and a nationally recognized class called “Keeping the Legacy Alive.”

“We formed a team with extension educators and had a good estate lawyer and we presented 130 farm families on the prairie and Palouse estate planning and farm succession management planning.”

The program continues now at the state level and other states have adopted the formula, he said.

Hart has also contributed to entrepreneurial programs designed for smaller acreages and ranches that market to local food systems, such as cooperatives.

Although most farms in this area tend to grow bigger over time, Hart said there is a definite trend toward smaller operations.

“I thought they would grow faster (in this area) ... and they are some. But not quite as fast as I thought because I don’t think consumer preferences for food have changed that much,” he said.

“But they have changed nationwide. And back in the ‘70s, when I was in college, the only place you could find organic food was the co-op. Now every grocery store has a Huckleberries, or whatever. Even Walmart has an organic section. So I think people’s food preferences have changed some and so that gives local farmers a better chance to participate.”

The UI, he added, is putting more emphasis on smaller-acreage agriculture, and in this area, there are several livestock producers that sell directly to consumers.

In recent years, Hart has taken six sabbaticals to countries in Africa and eastern Europe to help farmers there establish or improve on farm cooperatives. It was a way to improve public relations between the U.S. and other countries — some of which were communist governments.

But the cooperatives he worked with had a high failure rate because, he said, farmers in those countries didn’t trust each other and didn’t work together well.

Cooperatives, however, remain one of his passions. Hart serves on the board of directors for the Moscow Food Co-op.

“I think there is a big opportunity for cooperatives to serve local food systems and for local farmers who want to produce on small acres or direct marketing,” he said.

“I like them. I really have a belief in them. I think what they do is that people who disagree with each other about different areas in life — and there seems to be plenty of that going around these days — can come together in a marketplace and agree, ‘Hey, we both like this and we can work together.’

“So I think it’s a good democracy tool, a democracy builder, but it also is a good marketplace tool because it improves market imperfections that our normal systems miss. In smaller food systems, I think cooperatives can fix those things.”

Hedberg may be contacted at khedberg@lmtribune.com.