Farmers and ranchers depend on labor, as do many vocations.
Generations ago most farm labor was confined to the family unit and neighbors. While that still remains on many agricultural operations, all one has to do is travel to a large-scale grain, feedlot, swine or dairy enterprise to see that it takes skilled employees to make a venture successful and that applies to ag manufacturers, too.
Today’s equipment from planting, harvesting, storing, and marketing requires trained operators. It also requires a workforce that can meet expectations not only on the farm and ranch but also to those who provide the equipment.
In this week’s cover story, Web Editor Shauna Rumbaugh notes that in Kansas, farm and agricultural equipment manufacturing industry contributes to $2.9 billion and 5,277 jobs to the state’s economy. Those figures were cited by the Kansas Department of Agriculture’s 2022 Economic Contribution Report.
It comes at a time when the Association of Equipment Manufacturers, citing the 2019 report titled “Strengthening Workforce Development in Rural Areas” by Ashley Bozarth and Whitney Strifler and published by the Federal Reserve, stated one out of every four businesses located outside metropolitan areas struggle to find qualified workers, compared with one out of six in metro areas. Adults age 65 and older average 25% of rural populations, versus 19% in metro areas.
Those statistics have been a constant for many areas in the rural High Plains and it has been stretched even thinner by the COVID-19 pandemic and exacerbated by the lack of broadband technology. Although there has been headway made—we have a long way to go.
In Rumbaugh’s cover story, she writes the Kansas Department of Agriculture had a key finding, “Establishing a reliable workforce is difficult in many agricultural sectors and can be particularly problematic in this field that relies on specific technical knowledge.”
Her story describes how one Kansas institution—Barton Community College in Great Bend—has ongoing projects that can help students and employers in the agricultural manufacturing sector. The college works with industry in a partnership that offers an opportunity for a win-win proposition for agriculture.
Other institutions have also adopted programs to identify a need to help young men and women find attractive careers, allowing them to work with agricultural technology, which benefits farmers and ranchers. Those programs range from records and human resources to welders, machinists and farm equipment repair technicians that are all found in communities across the High Plains.
The work of college administrators and instructors willing to work with agricultural executives requires candidness by those in private industry so there is incentive to keep this vital stepping stone in place.
Agriculture is big business, but it continues to have its roots where deals are made in the atmosphere of a handshake. That works because of the trust between the parties knowing mutual good occurs for both entities. Feeding the world takes a commitment from farmers and ranchers who have the resolve to do so and they need to do it in an efficient manner that allows them to stay profitable. That commitment requires a well-trained workforce and we are seeing positive steps that will benefit producers and consumers in partnership with those who are the spokes of the wheel.
Dave Bergmeier can be reached at 620-227-1822 or [email protected].
