ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, January 22, 1996 TAG: 9601220087
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-7 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: WAYNE PURCELL
``THE UNIVERSE is change; our life is what our thoughts make it.''
So the second-century philosopher and Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius Antonius tells us. It was true 18 centuries ago; it is true today.
A case in point is the future of Virginia's tobacco farmers.
Tobacco is intimately entwined with the modern history of Virginia. It was the first cash crop for struggling colonists, a crop that set the fledgling colony on a firm economic footing and made a worldwide reputation for Virginia. Tobacco remains the top cash crop in Virginia today.
But change for tobacco growers is just around the corner. The future for tobacco growers will indeed be what their thoughts - and the thoughts of elected officials - make it.
Off-farm developments appear to be accelerating the need for adjustment and change by farmers whose primary income source is tobacco. Use of tobacco products in the United States is trending downward, and the future of the U.S. tobacco industry rests in a significant way on the export market. But production in other countries is growing rapidly.
In this setting, the inflation-adjusted prices farmers get for tobacco have declined significantly since the mid-'80s. Higher prices in 1995 appear to be due to a short crop and the fact that manufacturers had reduced purchases in 1994, when they feared a sharp increase in federal tobacco taxes.
Tobacco is more than a commodity in many Virginia communities. Tobacco growing is part of a historical pattern of family and community activities. It is part of a culture in which families grow and in which communities prosper. It is also a culture that is seemingly under attack from a variety of directions.
Today, tobacco use is a highly controversial public-policy issue. The international market is changing. Tobacco growing and manufacturing abroad, and importation of foreign tobacco for domestic manufacture, place pressures on domestic growers. For all these reasons, Virginia's tobacco farmers should expect to have to make adjustments.
Forced adjustment brings with it social and economic costs. Tobacco producers' quality of life could decline, and there will be a corollary effect on the entire rural community. It would be naive to say all the pain of this adjustment can be avoided. Planning ahead, however, can greatly reduce the impact of this inevitable change on individual farmers and on communities. There may, therefore, be a ``public good'' component to such strategic planning, and therein lies a possible role for state and local governments.
The Virginia General Assembly in 1994 established a joint legislative subcommittee to study this very issue. Virginia's institutions of higher education stepped forward with their own effort, called the Tobacco Communities Project. They not only have developed objective, research-based information, but have also worked with individuals and communities to develop practical recommendations for strategies and programs to help tobacco growers and tobacco-producing communities cope with the coming adjustments.
Four roundtable meetings brought together a broad and diverse group of interested persons. Moderated by the Institute for Environmental Negotiation at the University of Virginia, the groups used economic analyses conducted at Virginia Tech and at the University of Virginia.
Tobacco farmers, warehouse operators, representatives of tobacco manufacturers, elected officials of the tobacco stabilization corporation, experts from the Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, faculty from Virginia Tech and Virginia State University, Virginia Cooperative Extension Service personnel, administrators and faculty from the Virginia Community College System, economic development officials, and representatives from Virginia Farm Bureau and Virginia Agribusiness Council were all involved.
This process showed there is widespread understanding and concern that tobacco growing is in a highly uncertain climate that can threaten the welfare of individuals, families and communities.
Growers have a sense of this situation, but they are pessimistic about effective substitutes for tobacco on the farm. They are eager to find supplements, but they doubt any one alternative will replace tobacco. They want and understand the values of diversifying from several perspectives, but they are concerned about their future. For many producers, the first priority is to increase Virginia's competitiveness in tobacco production.
Also emerging from this effort was the bedrock fact that tobacco producers want decision-making about their futures in their hands. They don't want a solution imposed upon them by Washington, or Richmond, or special-interest groups.
The recommendations of the Tobacco Communities Project took this into account. The recommendations call for a menu of services and programs from which farm families can pick and choose to suit their individual needs. The emphasis is on research and education - providing farm families with solid information upon which they can make decisions. Governments, too, are given information concerning the types of programs that should be put in place to help these families make the transition from sole dependence on tobacco.
The broad recommendations are:
Provide the latest technology in production to tobacco farmers whose age, interests, management skills, farm size and other factors suggest they will continue growing tobacco as their primary crop.
Develop a matrix of practical and potentially competitive on-farm crop and livestock enterprises that is available to those tobacco farmers who opt for ways to stay in farming and who want to supplement their income from tobacco.
Help entrepreneurs interested in new and expanded agriculture and agribusiness activities, whether on-farm or off, with access to financing for their entrepreneurial efforts.
Ensure that off-farm employment will be available to members of farm families seeking to supplement family incomes, and take steps to ensure applicants have the work-force skills needed by the employers interested in locating existing or new business in rural communities.
This issue is bigger than the individual producer or the farm family. It is wise and appropriate that the state get involved in providing information and in ensuring that adjustments will be orderly and will help maintain the quality of life in our rural communities.
These recommendations are with the General Assembly now.
There is much work to be done. Perhaps the first step is to accept that change is coming. In 10 years, I believe we will find the economies of the state's tobacco-producing regions markedly different from what they are today. We can prepare now and make the transition as easy as possible, or we can wait and pick up the pieces later.
To quote Marcus Aurelius Antonius again, ``Observe always that everything is the result of change, and get used to thinking that there is nothing Nature loves so well.''
Wayne Purcell, who grew up on a tobacco farm in Patrick County, is a professor of agricultural economics and director of the Rural Economic Analysis Program at Virginia Tech's College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.
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