There seems to be a resurgence of retirees wanting to get back to a ‘simple’ life of growing their own garden and/or raising their own animals for food, milk, and/or fiber. Interestingly, it also seems to attract the young set as well with high hopes of being self-sufficient on the land. Nothing wrong with those ideals, but our American culture and requirements are different than what they were 100 or even 50-60 years ago. Many of our expenses are out of our control (health insurance, liability insurance, our reliance on electricity, phones, internet, medical expenses are out of sight, vehicles, petrol, etc, etc), so the ‘farm’ whether it is a hobby size or much larger needs to not only cover these expenses, but operating expenses as well. In other words, one must turn a profit to be sustainable. Don’t forget that ‘simple’ certainly does not mean easy.
I’ve blogged on this before, but one thing that is a killer to many striking out in an agrarian lifestyle is to get FAR TOO MANY irons in the fire. Focus on what you like to do and that which will also turn a profit quickly. After you become financially successful as to being out of debt and putting away a bit of savings, find other ‘holons‘ which will complement or add value to the core activity. Don’t be distracted by get-rich schemes – they do not exist in agriculture. If you have a town job – hang on to it until the farm is a going concern. Doing both is hard – no doubt – but staying out of debt is tantamount to being successful.
This type of operation is typically termed ‘holistically managed’ and there are resources to help you determine a course of action. Our first introduction to this type of thinking was through Holistic Management Resources now known as HMI, Holistic Management International. This link will take you directly to some free downloadable planning tools and and teaching materials. Allan Savory and his wife, Jody Butterfield, started HMI, but have now moved on to start a new organisation called Savory Institute. The Savory Institute website has numerous videos and papers for your perusal.
Considerations:
Marketing – where will you sell your product?
Equipment – how much will the initial investment be? How often will it be used? Does it have multiple uses? How can you make money with what you already own? If there is equipment you don’t use, consider selling it.
Time – when will the cash start flowing back to you?
Weather – Ag enterprises look so easy on paper, but consider that you have no control over the weather and inclement extremes can bring diseases in both plants and animals as well as drought and flooding, damaging hail can destroy thousands of acres of crops in just minutes. Be prepared, both financially and mentally, for complete failures and steep market price declines.
Government – you also have no control over government policies as it picks winners and losers.
Don’t spread yourself out to a lot of enterprises – especially those that are not related – you’ll be exhausted all the time and seldom see a financial reward. Also try to purchase multi-purpose equipment.
Learn from others’ failures, mistakes, and accomplishments. Your situation may be different, but there is no use setting up the same hurdles others have taken down. Some practices simply DO NOT WORK in some or all locales and situations.
Hindsight, of course, is much clearer as to making business decisions, but there are basic principles to be followed.
What is your dream job/career/life? And how are you moving towards it? Have you already experienced your dream job and found it wanting? Why?
Tannachton Farm 