| | Issue #21.17 :: 04/23/2008 - 04/29/2008 | This Land is Struggling Land
State Lawmaker: Farming Co-Ops Can Create Wealth in Lower Richland
| BY FREE TIMES WRITERS
| By Nick McCormac
A push for the creation of farming co-ops that encourage local growers to work together and meet statewide demands for organic food and alternative fuel production is under way in the Midlands.
State Rep. Joe Neal, D-Richland, is spearheading an effort aimed at getting farmers in poorer, largely African-American communities in Eastover and Lower Richland to work together to bring more wealth into their struggling areas.
“As the Midlands economy grows, African-American communities are left behind, and new opportunities need to be created,” Neal says.
A recent study, titled “Growing Together: Thriving People for a Thriving Columbia,” affirms Neal’s point and says that blacks own 72.4 percent of the farms in Lower Richland.
The study, released in January by the New York-based Center for Social Inclusion, emphasizes a regional approach to economic development and asserts that local black communities are being left behind as this area grows.
“Racial isolation from regional opportunities has helped fuel sprawl, wasteful and costly development at the region’s urban edges and beyond,” the report says. “Low-income black communities in rural areas do not have critical public infrastructure, like water and sewer lines. This is both a serious public health issue and an economic and social development issue.”
To change this, the study recommends identifying opportunities for those communities.
Neal says he thinks their farmland holds opportunity by way of the co-ops he hopes to create. Although plenty of the land is being farmed, the communities are “land rich but cash poor,” he says.
His effort received national attention in a March 9 article in USA Today. “The initiative comes against a dismal backdrop for black farmers and rural landowners,” the story says. “Many small farms are struggling, shutting down as industrialized farming dominates.”
One part of Neal’s plan is to increase attention on the farming of organic foods. He says doing so would be helpful on many levels. “First, we can improve the access to healthier foods, which will hopefully have a positive impact on the health of poor communities.”
Also, Neal says, “The popularity of organic foods is on the rise. I think bringing that into the community could be a good vehicle for the creation of wealth.”
Developing the production of alternative fuel sources, like ethanol and other biofuels, is another part of Neal’s plan. This component of the effort could bring new and developing technologies into poorer areas.
Neal also wants to help the farmers market their products.
Local free-range pig farmer Emile DeFelice, a former candidate for state agriculture commissioner, lauds Neal’s effort. “They want to put this land to its highest and best use and I think that’s just great,” DeFelice says.
He says he is glad others are pushing the issues he feels so passionately about. “We have great farmers, great land and a great market, so we need to strengthen and utilize what makes us unique,” DeFelice says.
To garner support for his farming co-ops project, Neal has met with U.S. Department of Agriculture officials. And he says he already has lined up backing from the Institute for Economic and Community Development at the Clemson Sandhill Research and Education Center in Northeast Richland and the Michigan Institute of Technology.
U.S. House Majority Whip James Clyburn, D-S.C., is on board as well, Neal says.
Mac Horton, director of the Clemson institute, says he is glad to help make Neal’s ideas a reality. “Joe approached us for our expertise in agriculture,” Horton says. “He has a realistic and healthy vision of what could happen in underdeveloped areas, and he wanted to see what Clemson could do to help.”
The specifics of Neal’s plan include creating a business incubator in order to get the necessary technology and tools necessary into the hands of the people who can utilize them. “We want to help individuals already in business expand, and help those who want to get into the business get started,” he says.
Neal wants to keep the farming on a small, individual level. “I don’t want to create a mega farm,” he says. “The main goal is to help create wealth in these communities, and you can’t do that with a bigger company controlling everything.”
Ideally, the lands would continue to be passed down from one generation to the next. “This land is a blessing, not a burden,” Neal says. “If it all works out, we’ll all collectively be better.”
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