Visiting farmer says education remains the key

BLYTHEVILLE— Hallie Shoffner, a Newport farmer and CEO of Delta Harvest, was the guest program for the Blytheville Rotary Club Thursday afternoon at the Blytheville Country Club.

Shoffner, a sixth-generation farmer, runs a 2,000-acre farm in Newport, where she is also a Newport Rotarian.

According to Shoffner, she farms corn, soybeans, and rice but has also helped the university in specialty rice.

The Delta is comprised of seven states, 200 counties, and 8.3 million citizens. Shoffner added that one in seven jobs is related to agriculture.

Shoffner stated she farmed alongside her parents from 2016 to 2019, when they retired, and she became the primary operator.

“When I came back, we were making a good healthy profit, but since then, I have watched farm income and farm profit shrink considerably,” said Shoffner. “The problem now is every single crop that you grow is operating at a loss.”

During her presentation, Shoffner mentioned the recent congressional testimony of the Riceland Board of Directors and the U.S.A. Rice Board of Directors and also a Newport farmer Jennifer James informed the Senate Ag Committee in D.C. that rice farmers are losing $320 per acre and over $200 for soybean farmers.

A reason for food insecurity in the Delta, according to Shoffner, is that in her town of Newport, there is a Walmart Supercenter. She stated that if something happens to Walmart, the next closest market for fresh produce is nearly 36 miles away.

The State of California is considered the specialty crop hub in the country, as they grow lettuce, nuts, grapes, and oats. The Midwest has primarily corn, and the Delta grows corn, cotton, rice, and soybeans.

Shoffner added that the Midwest and Delta regions are doing the worst in diet-related and metabolic illness compared to California due to the foods grown in different places.

Loss of industry is also a big issue.

Rice is processed in Jonesboro at Riceland and in other towns like Stuggart, but beans are sent to the Midwest or overseas to be processed.

“We don’t have the businesses here that process the crops that we grow, and that leads to loss of industry,” said Shoffner. “Arkansas and Mississippi have less than 300 food processing businesses each, and California has between 4,000- 6,000.”

Shoffner continued, “Those are businesses that employ people, contribute taxes to the economy, contribute to their communities in any way. That is money and jobs that we are losing in the delta, and we really can’t afford to do that.”

Educational programming is important, and the Arkansas Legislature is currently running a pilot program to put agricultural education in elementary schools.

Shoffner mentioned, “That’s a great idea; getting people reconnected to where their food comes from and having them connected to the actual food and the actual farmers is an important piece of that.”

Delta Harvest has worked with local and large farmers, creating a food hub.

According to the Delta Harvest website, “Delta Harvest has partnered with farmers and leased portions of warehouse space in a rural area of the Arkansas- Mississippi Delta to build a food hub. The food hub will provide processing and storage for viable specialty crop markets and access and infrastructure for Delta Farmers.”

Shoffner pleaded with Rotarians to talk about supporting local farmers or seeing if they could grow different products in the delta.

The Farm Bill was also mentioned and Shoffner expressed the need to talk to local representatives, Congressional leaders, U.S. Rep. Rick Crawford (R- Arkansas) and Sen. John Boozman (R-Arkansas) about concerns with the bill and the need to help farmers in the delta.

A Blytheville Rotarian mentioned solar panels, and after a lengthy conversation, Shoffner replied, “I don’t think we should be taking productive land out of production for solar panels, but I think part of the problem is that it’s so unprofitable to grow commodities.”

Blytheville Rotarian Lowell Walters mentioned seeing an article in foreign countries that are farming in the solar panel fields and asking what was stopping the research from being done to allow that to happen in America.

Walters added, “The United States is evidently behind Europe on some of that.”

Shoffner responded, “We are, and that’s just because we aren’t a producer of specialty crops. So there’s no interest in doing the research.”

She added that she believes that Europe would be on board to share the research, but she is not sure if America or universities would be open to it.