Helping their Field of Dreams Come True
Meet the New Face of Agri-Biz
Women are digging in and getting down to business. Holistic Management International’s (HMI) Beginning Farmers & Ranchers Program is helping to show them the way. The objective of this program is to educate and empower these newcomers so they are positioned to apply Holistic Management principles and practices in order to build successful businesses. While the program can be adapted to any group with less than ten years of experience, our initial implementation is focused on women farmers, where the need is great. Currently in the U.S. there are approximately 1,009,000 farms run by women and social and economic factors indicate the number will keep rising.
Learning the Ropes
We teach an intentional whole farm planning framework that helps farm and ranch families integrate economic, social, and ecological factors into their management decisions. Infused in this program are sessions to help farmers learn and implement leadership and communications skills. Participants gain sustainable cropping skills, livestock production skills, whole farm planning skills and gain entrepreneurial focus.
Now In The Lone Star State
HMI’s Beginning Farmers & Ranchers: Women in Texas program will educate, coach, mentor and support beginning women ranchers and farmers with less than ten years of agricultural experience, allowing them to create successful food production businesses. It will also increase productivity and profitability of the land and enrich the communities in which program participants live. Beginning Farmers & Ranchers Turning Demand into Action In the Fall of 2011, we held four introductory seminars in Texas and we found over 150 women eager to get started right away. If you’re interested in participating, partnering or funding this program, give us a call.
Proven Success in the Northeastern U.S.
Empowering Women in Agriculture
Our Beginning Farmers & Ranchers Program was established in the Northeast and funded in 2009 via a grant from the USDA/NIFA Beginning Farmer and Rancher Development Program (Grant#2009-49400-05967). To date, 180 women have benefited from this successful program.
Participant Responses Reflect Significant Results
95% gained confidence in writing a business plan and understood its significance beyond usefulness for obtaining a bank loan
83% will tie their marketing decisions to their holistic goal/farm mission statement.
82% committed to monitoring soil health as a result of the soil fertility class.
88% will structure farm/family meetings differently based on the skills they learned in the leadership class.
You can find more detailed outcomes from our Northeast program implementation in our Outcomes Flyer.
HMI Beginning Women Farmers in the Northeast Outcomes
In March of 2012, HMI hosted the Beginning Women Farmer Conference: Exploring Whole Farm Planning at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA. We’ve published the full proceedings from the conference. Here, you’ll find a treasure trove of information about Holistic Management and the successes of the women in the program. The page includes links to short video profiles of many of the women involved in the program. It’s a great chance to see how Holistic Management has effected the lives and farms of the women involved.
