Teach Your Livestock to Eat Weeds

Posted on May 15, 2011 by Women's Agricultural Network

Our colleague Rachel Gilker at the Vermont Pasture Network is offering an unusual opportunity to learn how to use animals to reduce your weed load.

Calling livestock farmers coping with weed challenges in northeastern, northwestern or southern VT: The opportunity has opened up for several grazing-livestock farms to participate in on-farm training with animal behavior expert Kathy Voth as part of a project teaching livestock to eat weeds this summer.

What you’d get:

· Kathy’s book and DVD;

· on-call technical assistance to develop your own personalized weed eating plan;

· follow-up assistance as needed and

· FEWER WEEDS (is the plan!).

What you’d give:

· A 1-2 hour period per day over 7 days with a group of (preferably) younger animals as “trainees”,

· several hours of planning time,

· your permission for UVM researchers to monitor changes in your pasture plants and

· your willingness to host a workshop where Kathy comes to train other farmers in what you’ve just learned.

Sound like a great idea? Contact Rachel at 802-656-3834 or rgilker@uvm.edu

Posted in Resources for Beginning Farmers | Comments Off on Teach Your Livestock to Eat Weeds

USDA Pledges to Address Legacy of Discrimination Against Women and Hispanic Farmers

Posted on March 21, 2011 by Women's Agricultural Network

The USDA recently took steps to resolve a long history of alleged discrimination against women and hispanic farmers. Two court cases– Garcia vs. Vilsack and Love vs. Vilsack allege that USDA improperly denied women and Hispanic farmers farm loan benefits. Now, in an effort to provide relief, the USDA has created a process to resolve the claims of farmers who allege they were unjustifiably denied benefits because of their ethnic background or gender.

“The Obama Administration has made it a priority to resolve all claims of past discrimination at USDA, and we are committed to closing this sad chapter in USDA’s history,” said Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack. “Hispanic and women farmers and ranchers who allege past discrimination can now come forward to participate in a claims process in which they have the opportunity to receive compensation.”

The program provides up to $50,000 for each Hispanic or woman farmer who can show that USDA denied them a loan or loan servicing for discriminatory reasons for certain time periods between 1981 and 2000. Hispanic or female farmers who provide additional proof and meet other requirements can receive a $50,000 reward. Successful claimants are also eligible for funds to pay the taxes on their awards and for forgiveness of certain existing USDA loans. There are no filing fees or other costs to claimants to participate in the program.

Participation is voluntary, and individuals who opt not to participate are not precluded by the program from filing a complaint in court.

You may be eligible if:

1. You sought a farm loan or farm-loan servicing from USDA during that period; and

2. The loan was denied, provided late, approved for a lesser amount than requested, approved with restrictive conditions, or USDA failed to provide an appropriate loan service; and

3. You believe these actions occurred because you are Hispanic or female.

If you want to register your name to receive a claims package, you can call the Farmer and Rancher Call Center at 1-888-508-4429 or access the following website: http://www.farmerclaims.gov

Posted in General info | 2 Comments

March is Women’s History Month

Posted on March 3, 2011 by Mary Peabody

In preparation for Women’s History Month we thought it would be interesting to post a few facts:

$36,278
The median annual earnings of women 15 or older who worked year-round, full time, in 2009, up 1.9 percent from $35,609 in 2008 (after adjusting for inflation).

Women earned 77 cents for every $1 earned by men.
Source: Income, Poverty, and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2009

29.9 million
Number of women 25 and older with a bachelor’s degree or more education in 2009, higher than the corresponding number for men (28.7 million). Women had a larger share of high school diplomas, as well as associate, bachelor’s and master’s degrees. More men than women had a professional or doctoral degree.

$1.2 trillion
Receipts for women-owned businesses in 2007. There were 141,893 women-owned businesses with receipts of $1 million or more.

7.8 million
The number of women-owned businesses in 2007. Women owned 29 percent of all nonfarm businesses; 910,761 of these were employer firms. Women were also equal owners with men of another 4.6 million businesses.

Want to learn more about women? Check out www.census.gov

Posted in Facts & Figures, General info, Leadership | Comments Off on March is Women’s History Month