Women gain momentum in agriculture

For Mary Ann Henriquez the road to farming began in grade school with 4-H and FFA. But it was as a student at Modesto Junior College that she committed to it as a profession. “My brother took over dad’s dairy operation and because I didn’t want to see the beef cows go, I got a loan – which wasn’t easy – and bought them,” Henriquez remembered. “I’ve been running cattle since 1987: Holstein steers, cows, calves, stockers and Holstein feeders.” Henriquez is part of an influx of women farmers, making a foray into an industry that has long been considered a man’s occupation. Now women work in a wide range of agricultural jobs including farming, sales, working for cooperative extensions, research and teaching agriculture in high school. There are other opportunities in the mix via farm to fork; food safety as well as manufacturing and packaging. The 2012 USDA Census of Agriculture found the number of women farming in California has increased steadily from 6,202 women farmers in 1978 to 13,984 in 2012. Nationally, there are about one million women farming either primary or secondary operations in the United States, according to the USDA report “Characteristics of Women Farm Operators and Their Farms.” That’s 30 percent of all farm operations. In fact, in the 25 years between 1982 and 2007, the number of women-operated farms more than doubled, with increases in all sales classes. The number of men-operated farms, on the other hand, declined by 10 percent, with declines in most sales classes...more