Kaine talks agriculture with Culpeper-area farmers

U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine dropped by Culpeper County last week for a discussion on agriculture with local farmers, including the long-stalled Farm Bill, which hasn’t been officially renewed by Congress since 2018.

The roundtable on August 5 at Belair Dairy Farm covered everything from crop insurance to the decline of local dairy farming along with the impacts of tariffs, international trade, the price of land and the price of commodities not keeping up with inflation. The county’s longtime senior extension agent also announced he would retire at the end of the year.

Carl Stafford told the small group gathered in a farm outbuilding he would be ending his 40-year career with Virginia Cooperative Extension.

“It’s been a privilege and an honor,” he said. “I didn’t know anything when I came here but I got some of it down now.”

Various farmers in attendance used to work dairy operations, but not anymore as the price of milk went down and the smaller dairies couldn’t compete.

Madison County Supervisor Jim Jewett attended the roundtable saying he has a grain farm that used to be dairy for over 20 years. Taking whole milk out of public schools and making SNAP recipients unable to purchase whole milk also closed local dairies, he said, calling the federal government decision “a tipping point,” along with the advent of plant-based “milk.”

“The dictionary will tell you what it is and it’s not accurate, the good name of milk has been hijacked,” Stafford said.

A sizeable herd used to be 500-head, the extension agent said, but with such a small margin they can’t compete anymore with much larger operations.

“The big outfits will accumulate more profit, used to be 100, 150 head was normal, but they’re all gone,” Stafford said. “It’s economics.”

Kaine asked about milk prices, saying he never did understand how that works and the farmers agreed.

“The price of the product not keeping up with the cost of inventory, and it’s concerning same thing happening to grain,” a former dairy farmer said. “As inflation increases, the price doesn’t increase, was always the issue.”

Kaine, in an introduction, stated, “One of the things I try to do is sit down with farmers … I do these to hear anything that’s on anybody’s mind, but second we’re kind of in a negotiating mode about the Farm Bill.”

What makes the farm bill such a barrier to get done, the group asked.

Kaine replied, “This will sound like a partisan statement, but it’s just the reality. Last year, there was a Democratic senate and a Republican House and they were working together and normally they try to reauthorize the Farm Bill every five years … so even though the deal was really close, the Republicans said why would we do a deal, negotiate with Democrats, when we can do our own deal next year so they pushed beyond authorization to do it the way they wanted.”

The U.S. Senator said he was not sure why the Republican Congress and Republican president have not made it a priority this year. Some provisions, like the safety net for farmers for prices and crop insurance were included in the reconciliation bill in July, Kaine said, and have bipartisan support. Other pieces of the Farm Bill remain undone, he added.

“I’d love to take your advice on Farm Bill priorities,” Kaine said. “Ag and forestry is the biggest industry in Virginia. A lot of people think it’s computer microchips or ship building, all big, but not as big as ag and forestry combined.”

The U.S. Senator from Virginia said he grew up in Kansas in agricultural communities and has lived in Richmond for the past 40 years. Kaine brought up tariffs on agricultural supplies like fertilizer that use ingredients fro Canada.

“I feel like we should use tariffs very specifically. Canada often puts steep tariffs on our dairy so then we tend to put tariffs against their lumber to try to negotiate. I think that’s the right way to use tariffs, but to put big tariffs on everybody I think that’s a mistake,” he said.

Turkey houses and green houses in Culpeper County are among agricultural endeavors succeeding in the 21st century along with beef, hay and grain.

Rocky Gugino said after he left his family farm in Mississippi, he worked 15 years as a UPS driver in Northern Virginia before moving to Culpeper to become a turkey farmer.

“It was an opportunity to get into farming,” he said. “Cargill was looking for new growers—we started out with nothing. It’s hard to get into farming, everything is so expensive. But they offered a good guarantee on the houses and can do it on a small piece of land. You ain’t going to get rich off of it but you can make a living.”

Stafford remarked it’s a unique situation be in to be able to get into the big poultry industry, saying the county used to have smaller operations.

“He and several other couples borrowed million dollars, the bank says it’s good business we’ll loan you money, get in and do well and make a living,” he said.

Jamie Shenk of Beauregard Farm in Brandy Station raises grain, soybeans, corn and rye with a strong focus on conservation farming. This includes using cover crops for soil health, something he said they do intentionally for the environment. Dave Massey, with Culpeper Soil & Water Conservation District, weighed in on his work assisting farmers in the five counties such as Shenk and Gugino with conservation practices and as a sixth generation farmer raising hay and beef cows in Rappahannock.

Erosion is an issue, Massey said, noting “a lot of increases” throughout the Rappahannock River Watershed.

“On the side of Mount Pony, the soil is starting to shift, and along Mountain Run, the banks are starting to slip due to erratic rain patterns, constant rainfall through spring and heavy rains in summer, tons and tons of metric soil going into the waterways,” Massey said.

The conservation district continues to receive federal support for its work, he said, and local farmers are doing a good job adopting the practices.

Land cost is an issue for farmers who need multiple parcels and are forced to rent since prices are so high. Kaine noted data centers competing for that land can drive up land costs, recalling coming to Culpeper in 2008 during his governorship for the opening of the county’s first data center. He said he talked to a guy at the event and asked why build in Culpeper.

“He said, ‘Because it’s outside the blast zone.’ You want to be near to D.C., but not too near to D.C. They’re coming for that reason and the land is valuable.”

One farmer brought up Chinese purchase of American farmland.

Kaine stated measures had been taken at the federal level to limit land encroachments around military bases as well as state level rules about purchases of land connected to China or Chinese nationals.

“We are their largest trading partner, with Mexico and Canada and there is no close fourth,” Kaine said.

Congress in September will work on the appropriations bill, the senator said.

“I will continue to be a hawk on the tariffs,” Kaine said of Trump Administration policies. “I feel like having lower barriers is generally a good thing … but will continue to challenge tariffs. A senator can challenge most tariffs.”