[blockquote cite=”Jean-Martin Fortier” type=”center”]”The goal is to increase production and have more of a life every year. When we produce more, we want to work less.” [/blockquote]
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Right now there is a romanticism around farming out there.
Working the land, boots on the ground carving a living out of a piece of earth. It harkens back to a time long ago when things were simpler. When small family farms were more of the norm. In 1900 there were almost 6 million farms in the US, now there are about 2 million. Yet today there is a huge growing demand for locally produced organic food.
There is a need and there is an opportunity there. And in today’s busy technology fueled world there are a lot of people out there that want to take Facebook from the cubicle to the field and get their hands into the soil and get into farming.
But if you are one of the ones that decide to go for it and head down that path of farming, then the one thing you are going to hear a lot of is – how the heck are you going to make a living doing that? You should look for a real job. Although there is some ignorant assumption underlying that warning, a lot of that is based in fact.
Most U.S. farms are small: 75 percent had sales of less than $50,000 in 2012. Sales. Sales. Not profit, sales. The truth hurts, and it is hard to make a living and support a family on $50k in sales. Just that stat diminishes hope and puts some tarnish on that shiny dream. The low income projection and then you add in the common reasons that come up in terms of why they someone can’t get into farming – I don’t have access to land, and I don’t have a lot of capital. And the road to your little family farm looks tough. And if you are going the traditional route it is, the odds and stats are against you.
So if you want to go into farming what should you do? Suck it up and try to get by on $50k in sales? Should you just give up on that dream?
My guest today, would say don’t give up, just adjust your model – farm better, not bigger. He is an advocate of farming small and farming smart. Aspiring farmers take note, it can be done, and it is being done. No tractor required.
Today I am talking to someone who killing it farming 1.5 acres. He is doing over $140k in sales on that 1.5 acres, supporting himself and his family in the process. Of that $140k 40% is profit. Compare that to corn and soybeans which net about $280 an acre. And he is grossing that $140k working 9 months a year and average length works days. We aren’t talking about burnout workload here. Think about that. $800 per acre versus $90000.
I am happy to welcome Jean Martin Fortier, the author of The Market Gardener to the show.
Jean Martin is a great example of someone who is out there maximizing efficiency and productivity on a small piece of land. His whole grow bigger, not better philosophy echoes this. Jean Martin focuses on growing biointensive and the use of appropriate technology to work with his permanent raised beds. And he designed the farm with the intent of keeping it manageable for the scale that he was at. He maximizes productivity and quality of life.
For anyone that wants to get into farming, but is having trouble getting the numbers to work, this is the episode for you. This is a model that works. This is a paradigm shift.
[blockquote cite=”Jean-Martin Fortier” type=”center”]”You need to grow your own pie. And not always hear that the pie isn’t big enough. You need to start your own pie.”[/blockquote]
Key Takeaways:
- Realize the importance of taking good notes this year to help increase efficiency and productivity next year.
- Focus on making sure 100% of the harvest is prime stuff. When choosing between two otherwise identical products, customers will always choose the better looking one.
- Don’t try to do it all at once. Master some crops before moving to the next.
- Focus on building soil. It is really important for healthy crops to grow in soil with a good soil structure and healthy soil biology.
- Focus on being effective and efficient. Use the farm design to limit foot traffic. 15 minutes here and there adds up.
- Utilize hands-off processes that work with little to no input 24/7. For example the tarps controlling weeds and maintaining soil moisture.
- Don’t neglect your intention. What is your goal? What is your objective? Then plan for that.
- Work at least one full year at another farm first.
- Rented land allows you to get some experience and make mistakes without a lot of financial pressure.
- Buying land might not always make sense.
- How much can you actually manage? Plan according to that, not bigger. Dangers of farming too big include higher costs (labor), possible need for a tractor, and larger farms are often scaled for specific crops, not diversified production.
Quotables:
- “Grow better, not bigger.”
- “The goal is to increase production and have more of a life every year. When we produce more, we want to work less.”
- “One aspect of our farming success is keeping things small and manageable.”
- “You need to grow your own pie. And not always hear that the pie isn’t big enough. You need to start your own pie. “
- “If you want to have a small farm you need to be focusing on quality because that is how you beat the bigger farms.”
Les Jardins de la Grelinette
Important Tools:
The beds are sized to the tools, and the tools are gentle on the soil.
- Power harrow.
- Permanent raised beds.
- UV Treated Sillage Tarps
- Drill Powered Salad Harvester
- A full list of Jean-Martin’s favorite tools are here..
Growing Intensive Benefits:
- Spend less time walking around.
- Less actual space to maintain.
- Crowds out weeds.
- Row covers, tarps, and netting can cover more crops with the same amount of area.
Winter Planning:
- What to grow, exactly.
- Where to grow it, exactly.
- When it is going to be ready.
- With what to replace it with. And when to start the replacement.
Take the summer heat and move it into the more idle winter.
Know what to do every week. During the busy summer season it helps to simplify things. They always know what to do. There is no guessing or scrambling.
Les Jardins de la Grelinette
[blockquote cite=”Jean-Martin Fortier” type=”center”]”One aspect of our farming success is keeping things small and manageable.”[/blockquote]
Bed Preparation for Precision Seeding
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Jean-Martin Fortier on Starting a Farm
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Curtis Stone interviews Jean-Martin Fortier
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[blockquote cite=”Shannon Jones” type=”center”]How do we encourage a new generation of ecological, small scale farmers? By showing that farming can be a viable, stimulating, and respected career choice. This book offers the hope that a small scale diversified market garden can be both profitable and personally fulfilling and then goes on to give practical advice on just how to do it.[/blockquote]
The Market Gardener by Jean-Martin Fortier
The New Organic Grower by Eliot Coleman
Other Permaculture Voices episodes related to this episode..
Starting a farm and living the happy farm life. A conversation with farmer Shannon Jones.
Joel Salatin Talks to the Next Generation of Farmers
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More information on Jean-Martin Fortier
Jean-Martin Fortier – The Market Gardener
The Market Gardener on Facebook
You can contact Jean-Martin HERE.
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It seems that JMF is in hot supply! I just found out about their operation about 3 weeks ago stumbling through YouTube and have been hoping more would turn up soon. Everything I’ve heard and read from JMF has continued to inspire me in my persuit of starting my farm within the next year =)
Thanks Diego and Jean-Martin, I can’t wait to listen!!!
-Riley_P
Just curious if the numbers include labor to the owners or not?
It includes the labor of paid help, that is subtracted off as an expense. So his profit is his pay for his labor.
Note to market gardeners, vegetable farmers, CSAs, etc: there is no such thing as benign plastic. All plastics are produced via synthetic petro-chemical processes that produce negative impacts on the environment every step of the way from sourcing the raw materials, to manufacture, through use, and disposal. *Whenever possible, please avoid the use of plastic.*
Plastics transfer synthetic chemicals and/or heavy metals (lead, antimony, mercury, cadmium, chromium and god-only-knows-what) to food, water (including beverages in plastic containers), and soil that it comes in contact with. Few, if any, of these toxins are, or can be, rendered harmless by the activity of soil biology on farms or in gardens. These toxins can be taken up from water and soil into food plants and are ingested by those who eat the food.
There are times when plastic, at least in the short-term, seems like the practical solution to a particular challenge, especially when the impacts off the farm are not taken into account (environmental destruction & pollution of air, water, and soil by the manufacture, use, and disposal of plastic).
There ARE viable alternatives to plastic for most applications. To suppress weeds and retain soil moisture, biological mulches – cover crops, mulches, even rolled down cover crops – can be just as effective as plastic, and feed to soil biology in ways that plastic never can. Some plants, even some commonly labeled as ‘weeds’, if managed appropriately can be synergetic with crop plants.
And many volunteer plants (aka ‘weeds’) are edible – and delicious! Purslane (Portulaca oleracea)will not shade out any crop, and is more delicious and nutritious than many common vegetables. Lambsquarters (Chenopodium album) is another tasty vegetable that shows up with no effort on our part – except to harvest and prepare. Plantain, dandelion… the list of tasty edibles that just show up is long, but varies from one region and climate to another. What is it about human nature that resists this ‘manna’ that comes as a free gift from the bio-sphere, but prefers food plants that must be cultured and coddled by humans?
The concept of intensive production on a small scale is one with a long history of success. I know people who had been doing this for over 60 years, most of them without the use of a tractor, or the sparing use of an old smaller model cheaply acquired and easily maintained (simpler design than tractors manufactured today). The tractors were used as much or more for clearing driveways of snow in winter, and other farm chores, and for moving large amounts of compost materials – almost never for plowing or tilling.
These people, in some cases, had learned the techniques – like close planting in enriched soils with no discernible rows, raised beds mostly in the form of long mounds, etc – from their parents and grandparents. Many incorporated edible plant cultivation into the microclimates of various corners of their yards, either among or doubling as ornamental plantings.
The potential is nearly limitless!
Jean-Martin Fortier’s success is laudable! He offers many valuable tips, and inspiration.
That said, the thought that ‘we don’t need large farms’ strikes me as naïve. Can he produce oils and protein sufficient for the families he ‘feeds’? Humans can live without carbohydrates, but cannot survive without fats and protein. (Of course, high-quality complex carbohydrates, not so much starches and simple sugars, are important to human diets, too!) And what about fruits and nuts? Mark Shepard sheds a lot of light on this topic.
Or meat, (for the majority of humans who eat it as their ancestors have for ‘billenia’, and with no apologies for taking this role in the biological cycle)? Certainly chickens, rabbits, pigeons, and other animals can be integrated into small-scale intensive ‘farming’ operations, as smallholders have done for centuries – with benefits to the plant crops seldom imagined by those who have not tried it.
Some family-farm size farmers are even producing sufficient oil-seed crops to provide for most or all of their energy needs by using the oil they grow and press on their farms to power their diesel tractors, cars, and electric generators. Can this be done on an acre and a half?
The bottom line here is that this is not an ‘either-or’ decision. Between mega-CAFOS and multi-thousand acre mono-crop chemical-dependent factory farms on one end of the spectrum – and small-scale intensive home and market gardens on the other, is a wiiiiiide range of possibilities. For those seeking an ecologically sound approach, the possibilities are truly limitless. The challenge of finding the right mix of crops & techniques to fit the piece of land we are working with and our own lives is part of the fun! Finding the best way to market the fruits of our labors may be less fun for some of us…
This was EXCELLENT! Shared on my facebook page. 🙂
I just received the Market Gardener for Christmas and I’ve read it twice since. We’ve been pondering over starting a CSA farm or market garden and I’m really appreciating Jean Martins advice. He was here in Nelson last year and I’m so bummed I missed the workshop so listening to this podcast was awesome, thank you.
This is my first time on this website, I’m looking forward to listening to many podcasts! Keep up the awesome work.
Solid interview. I’d be eager to volunteer on a farm like his for a few weeks.