October 29, 2009

Banding together seen as way to strengthen agriculture

KERNSTOWN—Shenandoah Valley farmers learned how their counterparts in New York’s Hudson Valley are working together to help agriculture prosper.

“I think it can work here in the Shenandoah Valley,” said cattleman David Weiss, a member of the Clarke County Board of Supervisors and Clarke County Farm Bureau.

The Hudson Valley and Shenandoah Valley are similar in that both have fertile soil, rolling hills, rivers, streams and easy access to metropolitan markets. In both locations, development pressures are challenging agriculture’s future.

At two recent meetings Todd Erling, executive director of the Hudson Valley AgriBusiness Development Corp., told Virginia farmers how his nonprofit group is assisting New York farmers.

Established in 2007, HVADC promotes the Hudson Valley as an attractive, viable region for agriculture through technical assistance, business development services and the coordination of financial and other resources.

“Farmers have never been excellent marketers,” said Weiss, who attended one of the meetings, which was held in Kernstown in Frederick County. “We’re good at production but not marketing, so we need someone who can help find new outlets for us.”

Weiss said that other industries have had similar ventures, and agriculture should too.
“The business of agriculture does not end at the county line,” said Philip Shenk, senior district field services director for the Virginia Farm Bureau Federation.

Joan Comanor, vice chairman of the Shenandoah Resource Conservation and Development Council, said that, in exploring ways to increase agriculture in the seven counties the council serves, Augusta and Shenandoah counties have identified a need for an agriculture economic development officer to increase and expand agribusiness opportunities.

A year ago Comanor heard Erling speaking about how the HVADC hired him to develop, promote and enhance the agriculture industry in a four-county area. She asked him to come to Virginia and explain how the development corporation was formed.

Afterward, an ad hoc group of county government and county Farm Bureau representatives and others was formed to consider doing the same thing in the valley.

“We have had five county governments pass resolutions saying that they would support this,” Comanor said.

Contact Weiss at 540-247-9555, Comanor at 540-459-5209 or Shenk at 540-270-1487.