King Tobacco no Longer Reigns over Mountain Agriculture

Source from:  By Julia Merchant • Staff Writer  09/11/2008

It wasn't so long ago that the golden leaves of the burley tobacco plant lined fields of most every farm in Haywood County. And as Bill Holbrook, one of the last remaining mountain tobacco farmers, stands amidst the leafy stalks hanging to dry in his tobacco barn, his reverence for the crop once abundant in Haywood County is undeniable. "It was the king," he says matter-of-factly. Yet no king can reign forever, and today, the acres of tobacco that put kids through college, paid the bills, and bought Christmas presents for Haywood County families, have largely disappeared. Three years before the tobacco buyout of 2004, there were 715 acres of tobacco being farmed in Haywood County. Three years after, that number has dwindled to 175 acres according to the farm service agency. Most farmers quit growing tobacco after the buyout since they could no longer get a guaranteed price or buyer for their crop. It became just like any other vegetable - unpredictable - and lost some of its luster. "We used to be a huge tobacco county - we don't have very many growers left," says Tony McGaha, the cooperative extension agent who oversees tobacco in the county. He estimates the number at less than 20; before the buyout, growers numbered more than 200. "It's dropped drastically." "I'd say right now, there's 15 to 20 percent of the tobacco crop grown than there was before the buyout," says Haywood County grower Danny Hyatt, who farms two and a half acres of the crop. "Most people quit. Maybe they found another crop, or a better, permanent job." Like any other crop Hyatt was one of the holdouts. After 40 years of farming tobacco, he had the equipment, barn and fertilizer - all the reasons he needed to keep tending the crop. Because Hyatt works a day job at the Mountain Research Station, the drawn out process of harvesting and curing the tobacco works with his schedule. Unlike produce, which must be sold soon after it's picked, tobacco dries for 6-8 weeks before it's ready to be sold. "You can pick it, then let it go another week," before doing anything with the crop, Hyatt says. But tobacco no longer comes with the guaranteed lucrative price it once did. Before the buyout, Hyatt could earn more than $2 for a pound of tobacco - that number has since dropped to around $1.60 to a $1.70 a pound. He says the price fluctuations make it tough to rely on tobacco. "We don't know from one year to the next what the price is going to be," he says. That's a sharp contrast to the way it once was, says Holbrook. "A lot of times, tomatoes and peppers wouldn't make no money, and tobacco would," says the Bethel farmer. "It's like anything else now - whatever the market brings," he adds. "I would say it's become a more risky crop. It's not black and white anymore." Holbrook now grows three and a half acres - about half the amount of tobacco he used to. In fact, he's not sure he'll grow it at all next year. Much of his farming is focused on tomatoes, and he has a good deal going with a local buyer. Ironically, tomatoes could now be a safer investment than tobacco. Hyatt's also not sure if he'll continue growing. He wonders if something so labor-intensive (few machines are used in the tobacco harvesting process; it's mostly done by hand) is worth it if he could get the same profit selling an easier crop. The cost of fertilizer is also making it tough. A few years ago, it sold for $300 per ton; the price has since skyrocketed to $1,100 per ton. Then again, Hyatt's debated getting out of the tobacco business for years. "I may quit next year, but I've been saying that for 20 or 30 years," he laughs. Yet in an era where it's getting tougher and tougher to eek out a living on a farm, some say tobacco remains one of the safest investments. "Price fluctuations on tomatoes and peppers is more volatile. Tobacco is a much more constant price per acre," says McGaha, the extension agent. This year, for example, tomatoes from California have flooded the market, causing oversaturation. The more tomatoes available, the less buyers are willing to pay for them. In contrast, tobacco is less abundant, and there's almost always a market for it - if not here, then overseas. According to tobacco farmer Don Smart, much of the North Carolina tobacco crop is shipped as far as Russia, Iran and China. With 50 acres, Smart is the largest tobacco grower in Haywood County, and is actually thinking about getting rid of his other crops to focus solely on tobacco. Sadly, he says, vegetables are no longer a reliable source of income. "Vegetables sure isn't profitable," he says. "I've got a lot of tomatoes, and I'm losing my shirt. The tomato business is just about over with from what it looks like. I don't see no future in growing vegetables." Decline steepest in mountains The decline in WNC tobacco growers doesn't resonate statewide. "When you look at the state as a whole, tobacco production is probably not that much lower than it was three to five years ago," says Billy Guillet, director of the Agricultural Advancement Consortium. Giant tobacco farms still populate the eastern part of the state, where the land is flat and plentiful. "It has not gone away like people say it has," Guillet assures. The uneven terrain of the mountains has prevented the existence of large-scale farms like the kind that exist in the piedmont and coastal regions of the state. Here, tobacco and other crops are grown in small pockets, wherever flat land can be found. Haywood County has traditionally been the biggest tobacco producer of the seven counties west of Buncombe. Before the buyout, in 2002, Macon County had 46 acres, Jackson, 17, and Swain, 11. Today no tobacco farms are left in Macon, according the toe Farm State Agency, and any remaining acreage in Jackson or Swain is so low statistics aren't kept. Until recently, mountain tobacco farmers still had an advantage over the rest of the state - burley tobacco, which likes cooler temperatures, could not be grown successfully elsewhere. The rest of the state grew flue-cured tobacco, a different variety. But technology has allowed for the development of a heat-resistant strain of burley tobacco, making geography increasingly irrelevant. "Now there's as much burley production in the piedmont as in the mountains," says Blake Brown, a North Carolina State University professor of agro-economics. "There was no burley here before." Farmers in other regions of the state can now mass-produce burley tobacco - something mountain growers cannot do. "If a guy is able to mass produce burley with huge crop row machines, the small farmer who's working off a tractor is not competitive anymore," Guillet says. Not just tobacco The decline in tobacco production is synonymous to the overall decline of farming in the mountains. "It's the same in all agriculture, to be honest," McGaha says. For instance, Haywood County was once know statewide for its dairy and apple production. Today, there are nine dairies and a single apple grower still in operation, says McGaha. "We've changed from an agricultural area to one with tourism," he says. Farms are struggling to stay afloat amidst the rapid pace of development in the region. "With the cost of property and development, you're seeing a large, large amount of farms being lost in the mountains," says Guillet. In contrast, other parts of the state are seeing the loss of individual farms - but not necessarily farmland acreage, Guillet says. Instead, there's a push to consolidate farms - 10 farms could become one, but the amount of land is simply combined and remains the same. "The acreage is actually staying pretty steady," says Guillet. Eastern parts of the state, aside from the coastal region, are largely immune to the intense development pressure facing the mountains. "The way we're growing now, with housing and taxes, we're just going to have less green space," McGaha says. The end of an era? The future of mountain tobacco remains uncertain. It will likely be up to the current tobacco growers to carry on the tradition - newer "lifestyle" farmers who've relocated here aren't jumping on board. "Tobacco is a learned process that's been handed down from generation to generation, of exactly how to grow it and how to get the quality," McGaha says. "The newer ones have stayed away from tobacco. It's the people who have been here a long time." A crucial factor that will determine tobacco's future in the mountains is having a reliable place to take a crop. Once, farmers took tobacco to a Phillip Morris market in Johnson City, Tenn. Then the station moved to Virginia, and it's now in Kentucky. Farmers now take their tobacco to Asheville, where it's weighed and purchased. But tobacco growers weren't sure if that market would open back up this season. "There's no reliable place to take it," says Hyatt. McGaha is confident that "as long as we still have a market in place," tobacco will still be grown in the mountains. "But if you start having to haul it to Kentucky, the price is going to have to increase, or it's going to be less and less," worth the trip, he says. Guillet says he's not sure burley tobacco prices are high enough to entice farmers in the mountains to continue to grow the crop. He predicts a continued decline in burley tobacco in the entire Appalachian region, stretching from eastern Kentucky down to Tennessee., Virginia and North Carolina. In the end, the fate of burley tobacco in Haywood County is in the hands of farmers - at least some of whom have no plans to abandon the crop they feel indebted to. Smart, the largest tobacco farmer in the county and a lobbyist for tobacco farmers, is one of them. "Tobacco made North Carolina the state it is," he says. "Until they make it illegal, I'll continue to grow it." Enditem