Incubator farms nurture agriculture entrepreneurs

ITHACA, N.Y. (AP) - A physicist from Armenia, a juice-maker from Bermuda and a Burmese sushi chef are crafting new careers in agriculture under a program that applies the business incubator model to farming.

The Groundswell Center for Local Food and Farming is one of dozens of incubator farms springing up around the country to nurture the next generation of agricultural entrepreneurs. The projects help would-be farmers get started by providing a plot of land, shared equipment, mentoring on business planning and marketing, and the opportunity to build a track record of success that will help them qualify for startup loans when they're ready to launch their own farms.

"It's giving me an opportunity to implement business ideas that I hadn't had a chance to before," said Damon Brangman, 43, an immigrant from Bermuda who wants to grow his own vegetables for the mobile juice business he runs with his wife in Ithaca. "I'm looking to buy or lease land, but there's more risk and cost involved. This was more within my reach."

The 10-acre farm in Ithaca, in New York's Finger Lakes region 140 miles west of Albany, is now in its second growing season with Brangman and two other farmers tilling quarter-acre plots that they can use for three years.

There are about 105 incubator farms in 38 states, many of them still in the planning stage or just a few years into operation, according to the National Incubator Farm Training Initiative at Tufts University in Massachusetts. The program, launched in 2012, advises new incubator farms and helps farmers connect with them.

More than half the farms serve immigrants and refugees, but others nurture a range of new farmers including young people, career changers and retirees.

In 2008, new grants from the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Beginning Farmer and Rancher Development Program spurred a number of incubator programs into existence.

The USDA program was a response to the rising average age of U.S. farmers and the 8 percent projected decrease in the number of farmers from 2008 to 2018. The 2014 farm bill includes $100 million for the program.