GenNext Growers, Where Are You?
December 30, 2015 
Christina Herrick
This issue marks our first of its kind State of the Industry report. We, the editorial team of American Fruit Grower® and Western Fruit Grower® magazines asked for your take on everything from planting, to marketing, to trends you’re seeing within the industry.
I won’t spend time poring over the details here but, I will pull out one stat that stood out to me. When you were polled as to whether or not there is someone of the GenNext Growers generation who is preparing to or has assumed leadership in your operation, 53.23% of you answered “no.”
It seems like every year the average age of those in agriculture continues to increase without much “new blood” to lower that figure. According to the latest USDA Census of Agriculture, that age is now 58.3 years old.
“We have an aging farming population. If left unchecked, this could threaten our ability to produce the food we need – and also result in the loss of tens of thousands of acres of working lands that we rely on to clean our air and water,” said USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack during remarks to the Drake Forum on America’s New Farmers.
USDA’s Start2Farm program notes the number of growers older than 75 has grown 30% in the past five years, and the number of growers under the age of 25 has plummeted by 20%.
I recently talked to Eric Hansen, policy analyst for the National Young Farmers Coalition, who said young adults who have an interest in farming can struggle with securing loans, finding available land to farm, and often have student loan debt putting a huge financial strain on their future.
It’s no secret that having a considerable amount of debt not only hinders those interested in agriculture from entering the industry, but also makes it very difficult for those young people to secure the capital to run a fledgling business.
Hansen says a big goal of his organization is to link those interested in entering into agriculture with those who are near “retirement” in agriculture. It’s also why our GenNext Growers initiative is seeking to help link organizations such as Hansen’s with the next wave of specialty crop producers in this country.
Whether you have someone in the next generation poised to take over your operation or not, it’s important that we all understand the success of the next generation ensures agriculture has a bright future. It’s so important we continue to keep the GenNext Grower generation at the forefront of our conversations about the future of agriculture.
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