National Ag News
Farmer2Farmer network links transitioning farmland in Michigan
A new farmer to farmer network is helping to connect retiring farmers to those seeking to enter the business in Northwest Michigan.
Farmland Protection Specialist Laura Rigan with the Grand Traverse Regional Land Conservancy tells Brownfield more than 83,000 acres of farmland in the region are expected to transition in the coming years. “We get calls on a weekly basis from farmers that don’t necessarily want to sell their land or list their land as open market because they’re afraid it would become a non ag use—a developer would pick it up and they want to see it stay in ag—they just don’t know who’s going to farm it in the future.”
She says partners in the Farmer2Farmer Michigan program looked to other farmer link networks across the country that have been assisting in transitioning farmland before launching the network last month.
