SPECIAL FROM THE MICHIGAN LAND USE INSTITUTE
Katie Brandt and Anna Hoekstra combined their own
savings with matching federal funds to expand their
successful, seven-acre farm in Van Buren County
Soon after Katie Brandt graduated from the University of Michigan, in 2001, she landed her dream job—working as a hired farmhand. Even though she earned a minimal wage, Ms. Brandt learned so much she realized that she was indeed born to be a farmer.
Too often that’s where the story stops for so many young people who want to farm. But Ms. Brandt is now working for herself on her own farm in Zeeland. She overcame one of the biggest obstacles to new farmers—financing the land and the farm operation—thanks in part to an innovative combination of local leadership and a federal business development program traditionally applied to inner city needs.
Known as an Individual Development Account, the program uses funds from the U.S. Small Business Administration to match money that an entrepreneur saves toward needed business investments. Ms. Brandt participated in an IDA program through the non-profit Grand Rapids Opportunities for Women organization...
Continue reading Young Farmers Defy Ownership Odds: Michigan short on innovative assistance by the MLUI's Julie Hay.
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Why care?
Farming is the state’s second-largest economic sector and the average age of its farmers is over 55 years old. Experts say that if retiring farmers cannot find new ones to buy their land, these experts say, they will sell to developers.
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