Agriculture

Agriculture Stands As One of Montana’s Most Enduring Industries

Agriculture is one of our district’s and state’s most storied and important industries. According to a 2021 Montana State University Extension circular, net cash income of agricultural operations in Beaverhead County were $28.2 million in 2017. Agricultural land comprised 12% of the county’s taxable value, and livestock breeding and feeding operations consisted of roughly 127,000 cattle and 13,000 sheep in that year.

According to the Pacific Northwest Region Economic Analysis Project, agriculture, as direct employment, accounts for about 8.61% of all jobs in the county, behind construction (10.37%), retail (9.8%) and medical/social services (8.81%). The aforementioned MSU Extension circular estimates that agriculture’s employment impact is roughly 24% of all employment, when factoring in direct on-farm employment, indirect impact jobs in industries such as equipment sales, and induced impact jobs in industries such as retail sales. The District is also home to the largest U.S. Department of Agriculture National Forest in Montana, Beaverhead-Deerlodge. The Beaverhead portion consists of over two million acres. Because our nation’s national forests are part of the USDA, public multiple use for grazing and logging are also important contributors to our community’s economy.

Improvements in forage land and water sources also benefit local wildlife populations, which improves hunting throughout the region.

Appreciation and Respect for Our Ranchers and Farmers

Holding a degree in animals science, with a minor in agricultural economics, I recognize agriculture as not only a predominate driver of our local economy, but a significant part of our collective character and wellbeing. Farming and ranching require rigor, dedication, endurance and risk-taking to navigate elements and natural biological processes that are often beyond the producer’s control. Producers rise early and turn on the tractor or side-by-side lights for long nights of harvesting or calving and lambing.

As a fortifier of our social fabric, farming and ranching help develop a strong work ethic, from which employers in other industries benefit when workers and farm/ranch kids transfer that ethic to other jobs, such as banking or nursing or driving a truck, to name a few.

Tech is Beneficial, but High Costs Exacerbate Risk and Stress in Agriculture

It’s true, even in the world of the buckaroos who ride summer permits, technology in agriculture has significantly improved the odds of success. From GPS tracking in the high country to variable rate technology on tractors, these technologies increase safety, reduce loss and maximize labor, allowing farmers and ranchers to produce more food and fiber out of fewer head or on fewer acres. But the costs of technology present new challenges to the input side of the ledger. Tech is expensive. And skyrocketing fuel and fertilizer prices do little to lessen the stress of being a part of the U.S. agricultural producer community that literally feeds over 150 people worldwide per farm/ranch per year. Nonetheless, such a noble endeavor has a dark cost for many producers. Suicide rates in agriculture are five times higher than the national average and double the rate for military veterans. “Among the reasons: net farm income worries (the leading cause), social isolation among farmers, pesticide-induced health issues, and the ever- present stigma related to mental health,” according to The Farm Progress Network.

Advocating For A Robust Agricultural Sector in Our State

Such a grim statistic compels me to work for the good of agricultural producers in our community and state. As lawmakers, our policies and laws should advocate for low energy costs, offer balanced and fair regulation for natural resource use, protect private property rights and use, ensure that our agricultural lands remain the property of U.S. citizens, protect against bio-insecurity through disease management and rapid-response plans for plant and animal disease outbreaks or bio-terrorism, manage predator populations to eliminate livestock losses, and advocate for free and open markets. Young farmers and ranchers can benefit from rural development supports and red-tape cutting to encourage innovations, such as niche market development or farm-to-fork production pathways.

As a state representative:

• I have an opportunity to address the ever-present balance of water use in Montana and to protect, conserve and store this essential agricultural resource as populations concentrate in towns and cities, as more homes are constructed and wells are drilled on small acreages, as agricultural holdings become smaller, and as water supply remains variable through regular precipitation-drought cycles.
• I have an opportunity to encourage global market opportunities for Montana commodities. In fact, history shows that diplomacy excursions for U.S. agricultural commodities by state officials is highly productive for developing markets internationally.
• I have an opportunity to advocate for vigorous forest management through tree harvesting and grazing (agricultural activity on the USDA forest lands), which provides wholesome food and fiber for Americans, and importantly, reduces forest floor fuel load, for sound, economically effective, property and life-saving forest fire suppression strategies.
• I have an opportunity to advocate for food safety and security based reliable scientific research, not on policies or programs such diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) or Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG—also known in agriculture as “transformative investment”), which diverts resources from profitable food, fiber and fuel production toward these socialist programs—many part of a current partisan agenda at the USDA.
• I have an opportunity to advocate for a diversity of production systems, which rely on the farmers or ranchers who are best able to assess the need of land or livestock based on each operation’s specific environment or ecosystem, and protect agricultural producers from drastic climate crisis policies or agendas from the globalist United Nations and World Economic Forum, non-governmental organizations/environmentalist extremists, and left-leaning politicians.
• I have an opportunity to work with other lawmakers to safeguard against federal government schemes devised by special interest groups who are far removed from the local community—schemes aimed at government takings or regulations that undermine local citizens’ private property rights and authority to manage and steward their own farms or ranches. Some of these policies or initiatives include the Missouri Headwaters Conservation Area, Waters of the U.S. (WOTUS), 30X30 (a maneuver for the federal government to take ownership of 30 percent of American’s land by 2030), introductions of predators and other non-native species, and, recently, a plan by the Biden and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to enter into a secret Columbia River Agreement to decommission four dams on the Snake River, affecting not only rural energy supplies but affecting irrigation in our neighboring Western states.