AREA GROWERS SHOW INTEREST IN SOY

by Nathan Meunier, Hardwick Gazette

5/3/2006
Page 1-R.C.

HARDWICK — Close to 100 people gathered at the K of C Hall last week to hear about opportunities for growing organic soy beans in the local area. Vermont Soy will soon be producing soy products in Hardwick and is seeking local sources for quality soy beans to make food products.

The farmers forum featured a variety of expert panelists in the area of Vermont agriculture, soy production and organic certification. The event was organized by the Northeastern Vermont Development Association through a grant it received in conjunction with the Town of Hardwick to work with Vermont Soy.

Looking out among the many tables filled with farmers, and other interested parties from the local area and around the state, Town Manager Dan Hill said Vermont Soy fits in exactly with the town’s strong agricultural and forestry base. Hill said the town is excited to be working with Vermont Soy and to have so many farmers interested in the project as well.

Several years ago, Vermont Soy was founded by Todd Pinkham, who has since been given the title of “soy master,” according to Andrew Meyer, Vermont Soy’s manager. Meyer said the company is now located in the Hardwick Industrial
Park and is developing a line of soy products. The first product, a soy milk beverage, will hopefully be available in July in several flavors, he said. The soy products will be distributed throughout the state as well as at farmers markets and food co-ops.

Vermont Soy’s competition is stiff, Meyer said, because it’s a small independent company in an industry where many of the soy products on the market are owned by large corporations.

 

“For us to compete in that market and to meet our vision of what we’re trying to do here in Hardwick we feel that it’s really important for us to connect and source our product locally,” he said. “We also feel that in order to help Hardwick grow in the areas of food products, agriculture, and to help farmers maintain their livelihood, that diversifying those agricultural
opportunities on their farm is important.”

Meyer said the educational forum was organized to provide information and resources to farmers who are interested in potentially growing soy beans locally.

Tom Sterns, owner of High Mowing Seeds in Wolcott, said Vermont has more of its land in certified organic ground than any other state. Vermont also has the highest percentage of vegetable acreage, which is 26 percent, in certified organic as well.

“If you drew a 30 mile circle around Hardwick you would encompass 30-40 percent of the organic farms in the state,” said Sterns. “Hardwick itself boasts quite a number of them and all the surrounding towns do as well.” Sterns began his organic seed company 10 years ago in Calais and has since moved to Wolcott. His role in working with Vermont Soy is to conduct
research projects and this summer they will be conducting a trial of 10 different soy bean varieties to determine which seeds can be grown the best locally. Soy bean growing produces some challenges but there are also many opportunities, he said.

“For soy bean production to be successful here, and especially organic soy bean production, we need to find and identify varieties that are going to work exceptionally well,” said Sterns.”That last thing any farmer is going to want to do is to plant something that’s untested or unproven and have a crop failure. You’re only going to do that once.”

Soy beans grow very well in Vermont and some farmers in the state have had tremendous yields, according Heather Darby, an agronomic and soil specialist at UVM Extension. Organic and conventional soy beans grow well and some
farmers around the state have already done well with them, she said. Darby said the best source of information for farmers interested in growing organic soybeans on their farms in Vermont comes from speaking with farmers who have already begun the process.

“There are a lot of varieties that can be grown here,” she said. “There are a lot of farmers doing this very, very successfully.” Area farmers interested in learning more about Vermont Soy and growing soy beans locally can visit www.vermontsoy.com.

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Soy Beans Can Handle Short Growing Season
Growing organic soy beans in Vermont may be a new concept for many farmers in the state. As highlighted by state experts in a recent soy bean farming forum, there are many things to consider when growing soy beans locally.
There has been great success with growing soy beans in Vermont, according to Heather Darby, of the University of Vermont Extension. One of the primary advantages is Vermont does not currently have many of the pests that affect
the plants in other regions of the country. Darby said Vermont does have some new varieties of pests such as the soy bean aphid. These are currently found only in some regions of the state and haven’t yet come to the Northeast Kingdom,
she said.

“There are some pest issues... that do pose some challenges organically but we’re doing some programs to try to look at controlling that,” she said. Organic certification, a growing trend for many Vermont farmers, requires
some knowledge of what kinds of materials are allowed on the land, said Willie Gibson of the Northeast Organic Farmers Association-VT.

In a nutshell, most commercial fertilizers, which are extract fertilizers, are not allowed, he said. Also prohibited is use of anything petroleum or chemical based in terms of pesticides or herbicides.

“It’s pretty clear what you can’t use,” he said. “You need to have the land free from any of those materials for three years and you need to know when the last application was.”

The three year period also gives farmers an excellent opportunity to build up the health of the soil and the integrity of the land base, he said. Soy beans are an annual crop that need to be rotated and worked together with perennial crops in order to make the land healthy, said Gibson. The climate in Vermont makes this difficult to do without having to use some kind of animal organic matter. This could be as simple as compost, or manure managed from healthy animals, he said.

Chuck Mitchell, a district conservationist from the USDA-NRCS, said soy beans require reasonably fertile soil, which should be well drained but not overly drained. Sandy soils pose a problem during summer dry periods and floodplains are poor choices because soy beans can only last a few hours underwater before being killed.

Soy beans are not a great group from an erosion standpoint, said Mitchell. They leave little crop residue and need to be rotated, preferably with a hay crop, he said.

“After going through and combining soy beans there’s not much left,” he said, “so you want to be thinking about cover crops. In this part of the world cover crops are a little difficult and they have to be timed pretty well.”
Mitchell said farmers will want to consider incorporating soy beans with a crop that will complement their lack of organic matter left in the soil. Growing edible food grade soy beans in Vermont should not be difficult with a proper selection of seeds, according to Steve Justis, from the Agricultural Development Division of the Vermont Department of Agriculture. He said growing organic beans does pose a slightly greater challenge.

The beans do enrich the soil with some nitrogen, which may be beneficial to farmers over the years, he said. Perhaps the biggest problem with harvesting the beans with a combine is the presence of weeds, said Justis. An overabundance of weeds can cause serious problems when harvest time comes. Justis said even if farmers are not considering growing soy beans for a
few more years this and other the issues raised are things to begin thinking about now. One positive aspect of working to grow the beans in the state is the Vermont label. He said the Vermont angle is important and will be beneficial to area farmers and organizations choosing to work with soy beans in the state.

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