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Be Bold For Change
Today I am told via social media is International Women's Day. Now I am not sure about you but I didn't have this one on the old holiday calendar between Valentines Day and St. Patrick's Day so I had to use the google machine to figure out what all it entailed ( it turns out no chocolate or green beer :( ). The official website states they have a hashtag which is #beboldforchange and the intent is to celebrate the social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women because visibility and awareness help drive positive change for women. Also they want others to declare bold actions you'll take as an individual or organization to help progress the gender agenda because purposeful action can accelerate gender parity across the world.
So I want to take a moment to celebrate all those women with hustle but more expressly the women in agriculture. Per the USDA's last agricultural census only 14% of the nations 2.1 million farms are run by females.
While our culture has made lots of progress in equality many fields I realized we women have such a small "market share" in farming that there has to be room for improvement.
How do we do this?
I feel that we can all make individual efforts however as the famous quote by Picasso states, "The meaning of life is to find your gift. The purpose in life is to give it away".
My individual contribution to further the goal of getting more women to own farms will be to focus on promoting women in agriculture and continue to show women their oppurtunites in farming. The best way to follow your dreams is to see that they are possible and women who farm have some of the best jobs in the world. I want to continue to highlight these jobs and help show those behind me to path to farming.
While my parents didn't farm I was lucky enough to grow up being close with and work alongside my aunt Kathleen who owned a farrow to finish hog farm. When I told Kathleen I wanted to raise livestock like her she selflessly sacrificed her time and energy to give me and my family a hand up into the business. She patiently tried to illustrate to us the hard lessons from the farm that decades of experience had impressed upon her. As we roll into our third year of operations Kathleen has phased out of Carroll Creek Farms and I think as part of my "weaning" process I need to ensure I am empowering other women who dream of tending the land from generations behind me have opportunities.
That is why I am launching a new and improved blog for our farm, the Brunette with Bovines Blog. I will be featuring articles that tell others more about the story of agriculture as seen by me, the lady boss farmher on our farm. Beyond that I am going have more topics on how to get started on your own small farm, talk about current issues in farming, and feature stories of other women who are awesome farmhers and chronicle their paths to success!