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UT’s Farm Management program is helping farming operations grow and succeed for generations to come. Amy Beckham has more.
Amy Beckham
UT farm management helping producers. Hello there and welcome to Tennessee Home and Farm Radio. I’m Amy Beckham.
Kevin Ferguson
Farm management is important and one of the things we often find out is that the successful farm managers are also successful leaders as well. And I think that’s very much embodies what the young farmer and ranchers program here is all about.
Amy Beckham
Well, recently, Kevin Ferguson with the University of Tennessee Center of Farm Management spoke to Tennessee Young Farmers about advice the center has on how to better operate their farms, starting with making sure they have a farm succession plan. Ferguson encourages them to
Kevin Ferguson
Begin that conversation now. Don’t wait until someone’s in their 60s or 70s and 80s. Before you plan that conversation about how are we going to transition to the next generation, because there’s a lot of tools that are available, that are out there that we can better utilize if we start utilizing those tools earlier. And you know, the whole thing is what we see from the information we have across the state. Only about 15% of our farmers indicate they’ve got some kind of transition plan, and we really like to change that.
Amy Beckham
One of the many things that the center is doing to try to combat that issue in Tennessee is hosting farmland legacy workshops across the state. Ferguson shares more.
Kevin Ferguson
We’re having farmland legacy meetings across the state where that we come in and talk about the tools we try to bring in a local attorney that sales the people informs them here’s how what we can do to work with you anything to encourage that and get them started in that because, you know, it really can help and eliminate some very difficult situations later on if you get everybody and get them on the same page and look at all of our options early.
Amy Beckham
For more information on the center of farm management and to access their many resources visit their website at farm management.tennessee.edu Thanks for joining us everyone and have a great day for Tennessee home and Farm Radio. I’m Amy Beckham.
