News

April 12, 2009

Small farms run by women crop up across Pennsylvania

The growth comes as women have taken a more active role in business in general.

ARLENE MARTINEZ and SCOTT KRAUS The (Allentown) Morning Call

ALLENTOWN — From the time she was a little girl, helping her father in the family’s backyard garden in Easton, Teena Bailey was attracted to farming.

But she could never afford to buy the expanse of land needed to turn the outdoor hobby into a financially viable job.

Three years ago, capitalizing on a rising demand for locally grown produce, Bailey, 63, launched a small vegetable farm on her 1.5-acre property in Germansville, about 15 miles northwest of Allentown.

“There is nothing nicer than seeing the seasons and the growth of plants and actually producing something that is valuable that makes people happy and makes people healthy,” said Bailey, who grows greens such as lettuce and bok choi and other vegetables to sell at local farmers markets.

Bailey is part of a growing community of women farmers in the state, across the nation and in the Lehigh Valley.

The number of women as principal operators of a farm increased 41 percent in Pennsylvania, and 29 percent nationally between 2002 and 2007, according to data released in February by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

There are now 8,550 women farmers in Pennsylvania, including 150 in the Lehigh Valley.

Their numbers are up largely because of the popularity of small, specialized farms, which require less land to turn a profit, eliminating some of the barriers to entering farming.

Overwhelmingly, women are the proprietors of small farms. About half of the state’s female farmers, 4,471, earned less than $1,000 from their crops.

The growth has come as women have taken a more active role in business in general and as opportunities for agricultural education have expanded, said Mark O’Neill, spokesman for the Pennsylvania Farm Bureau.

“A lot of women go to college with the idea they will get a job in agriculture,” O’Neill said. “Many come back to the farm, purchase their own farm or lease a farm themselves.”

In the 2007 survey, the USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service tried to better capture the number of small farms and ones run by minorities and women, in part by working with community-based organizations.

The survey also reflects that women are reporting their roles as principal operators more to the USDA than they have in the past.

Ruth Raber, who’s been farming since she was a “knee-high to a grasshopper,” falls into that category. She hasn’t always been listed as a primary operator — a farm can list up to three primary operators, but she is now.

Raber said she’s noticed more women at the annual farming practice workshops that farmers attend to keep certain certifications.

“You go to the pesticide meetings, the herbicide meetings, you see more and more,” said Raber, who grows corn, soybeans and wheat in Orefield, about 10 miles west of Allentown. Women are taking over family operations when their husbands or parents are unable to continue, O’Neill said.

Some are engaging in specialized agriculture such as community co-ops, organic produce or raising nontraditional farm animals such as alpacas, said Maria Bentzoni, Northampton County’s farmland preservation administrator.

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