In Tough Times Minnesota Family Farm Defies The Odds

The VanDerPol family. (Photo courtesy of Pastures a Plenty Farms via Minnesota News Connection)

(By Mike Moen. Minnesota News Connection) – The annual Farm Aid concert and its mission to elevate the nation’s family farms will be held in Minnesota this weekend and with producers in a crisis similar to the 1980s, an operation in the western half of the state might give hope about ways to survive hardship.

Tariff uncertainty and a rise in farm bankruptcies are among the pressures ag economists cite as they monitor the unfolding crisis.

Jim VanDerPol, co-owner of Pastures a Plenty Farm near Kerkhoven, which has been in his family for multiple generations, said for a long time, it was mostly corn and soybeans and a small hog outfit. But over the decades, the farm has expanded what it raises and grows, while emphasizing soil health.

“There’s not much hope in farm country these days,” VanDerPol observed. “But what we’re practicing diversifies our income, and so I think for that reason we are in a little better shape than what we would’ve been had we not done these things.