Microfarming takes tenuous hold in the Central Valley

My article on Central Valley small-scale farming versus industrial agriculture is up on HealthyCal.org, a nonprofit, public policy reporting website. Here's an excerpt; I also shot photos for the piece, which are running in March at the top of the main site.

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Despite increasing demand, small farms face disadvantage

By Todd R. Brown

Rancher Maria Abuelas of Madera County talks grass-fed beef with
a shopper at a Fresno farmers market. Photo by Todd R. Brown.

Maria Abuelas is off to a modest start as a rancher in the Sierra foothills, where she keeps a herd of about 20 grass-fed cattle on 200 acres.

“That’s my passion these days,” she said with a gleam in her eye, “growing good grass.” For ranchers in her field, alfalfa is their herd’s prime indulgence.

For generations, most American meat eaters have supped on grain-fed beef, which some of today’s connoisseurs say lacks taste and nutrition compared with the grass-fed variety.

Consumers are more and more concerned with such food production matters as supporting sustainable farming, buying from local growers and avoiding genetically modified fare. That trend encourages small-scale producers like Abuelas, who are connecting with customers alarmed by bioengineered foods making their way to the table and who pine for a more time-honored approach to their sustenance.

Yet for the most part, food distribution remains dominated by quantity-driven corporations, and some small farmers in the Central Valley struggle with a food system controlled by a few distributors and dominated by larger-scale producers who are jumping on the green bandwagon for a piece of the $30 billion industry.

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Read the full story on HealthyCal.org. They do good work, including recent stories on child abduction relating to the Steven Stayner tragedy and nuclear power in California.