Local Farmer Turning Over a Bold New Leaf

Source from:  YANCEYVILLE, N.C. By LAUREN CHESNUT Register & Bee staff writer 12/19/2005

Ricky Smith is determined to stay in farming - and to succeed. A Locust Hill tobacco farmer until this year, Smith is now growing a variety of vegetables and herbs with the help of grants generated by Master Settlement Agreement Phase I money. In 1998, 46 states and the tobacco industry settled state lawsuits related to health care costs in an agreement referred to as the Master Settlement Agreement. The industry agreed to pay the states more than $20 billion - what is known as Phase I money - over 25 years. North Carolina created three entities to distribute its Phase I money: the Golden Leaf Foundation, the North Carolina Health and Wellness Trust Fund and the North Carolina Tobacco Trust Fund Commission. Smith has applied for and received several Phase I grants, including one this year from the Pittsboro, N.C.-based Rural Advancement Foundation International-USA, or RAFI-USA, which uses a Tobacco Trust Fund grant of its own to administer its Tobacco Communities Reinvestment Fund. For most of the past quarter century, Smith farmed about 20 acres of tobacco. "It was our bread and butter," he said. Smith began phasing out his tobacco acreage in recent years until he was growing only about 10 acres. But that wasn't the only change he and his wife, Jan, decided to make. "We started diversifying quite a few years ago," he said. "We saw the writing on the wall with the tobacco situation. We knew what was coming." The Smiths' first experimental venture about eight years ago was with greenhouse herb plants, Ricky Smith said. He and his wife planted both culinary and medicinal herbs. A couple of years later, the Smiths decided to expand into organically grown field vegetables, specializing in heirloom tomatoes. In 2002, Smith received a Golden Leaf Foundation grant and used it to construct a special greenhouse to grow heirloom tomatoes indoors. In 2003, he planted a quarter acre of raspberries into which he interspersed asparagus plants in 2004. Smith also got a Tobacco Trust Fund grant in 2003, using it to expand his production of medicinal herbs, planting a trial acre of echinacea. In 2004, he planted four acres of the herb, popular for its use in boosting the immune system to fight off colds and coughs and other ailments. Smith considers the echinacea an experiment as he practices marketing new products and seeing what will be successful for his Moon Creek Farm. "As far as profitability, I'm still not sure (echinacea's) the way to go," he said. "Labor costs are too high. We're going to have to find a way to mechanize." That led him to apply for a grant from RAFI-USA to build a value-added kitchen facility. Smith was one of three Caswell County farmers to receive a RAFI grant in 2005. "The people making the money are the processors and the distributors," Smith said. "That's where we're going with this facility. "Since the (early) 1900s, the farmer's cut has been decreased. They made more off the farm dollar in 1920 that we do now. "With value-adding, I'm going to get more of that dollar." Smith's facility will have a walk-in cooler for overnight storage of fresh-picked herbs and vegetables and will have washing sinks to improve the presentation and appearance of his produce. While Smith is currently marketing his produce exclusively in Greensboro, he said he would like to sell it locally if he could. He's already made arrangements to sell to Yancey House Restaurant beginning with his spring 2006 crop. Smith said he also plans to use his value-added facility to make prepared foods such as fresh salsa and packaged frozen vegetables. Caswell farmers Thomas Hall and Randy Massey also received RAFI grants in 2005 - Hall to build an "agri-tourism" corn maze and Massey to grow disease-free strawberry tips to sell to growers, according to Caswell County Extension Agent Joey Knight. Knight said applying for RAFI-USA grants appears to be a good route for Caswell farmers looking to supplement the financing of plans to grow and/or market new crops as they are more specifically geared toward individual farmers. Direct grants from the Tobacco Trust Fund and from Golden Leaf are highly competitive and often go to large businesses or community colleges, he said. Knight urged those interested to put a bit of thought and time into preparing a RAFI-USA grant application. "When folks write these grants, they need to be innovative, creative and look at economic development - how will this (grant) help the economy, generate revenues for the county and the state and create jobs," he said. Enditem