Source: MICHIGAN STATE UNIV submitted to NRP
LATINO FARMERS AND THE ADOPTION OF TECHNOLOGY (LAFAT) PROMOTING SMALL LATINO FARMERS IN THE ADOPTION OF APPROPRIATE TECHNOLOGY
Sponsoring Institution
National Institute of Food and Agriculture
Project Status
ACTIVE
Funding Source
AFRI COMPETITIVE GRANT
Reporting Frequency
Annual
Accession No.
1030690
Grant No.
2023-68006-40290
Cumulative Award Amt.
$649,036.00
Proposal No.
2022-10368
Multistate No.
(N/A)
Project Start Date
Aug 1, 2023
Project End Date
Jul 31, 2026
Grant Year
2023
Program Code
[A1601]- Agriculture Economics and Rural Communities: Small and Medium-Sized Farms
Recipient Organization
MICHIGAN STATE UNIV
(N/A)
EAST LANSING,MI 48824
Performing Department
JSRI
Non Technical Summary
The Julian Samora Research Institute (JSRI) at Michigan State University and Michigan Food and Farming Systems (MIFFS) are partnering on "Latino Farmers and the Adoption of Technology (LAFAT)" project, a pioneering, bilingual integrated project (Research, Education, and Extension) aimed at integrating small-scale Latino farmers in Southwest Michigan into the agricultural industry through research, Extension activities, and educational workshops centered on the adoption of appropriate agricultural technology. The project aligns with the AFRI RFA Strategic Goals 2, 4, and 7, and is submitted under the Small and Medium-sized Farms Priority Area of the Agriculture Economics and Rural Communities Program. It promotes diversity and inclusion by focusing on underserved producers and will include a focus on the impact of the SARS-CoV2 pandemic (COVID-19) on farmers. The proposed budget allocates funding as follows: approximately 35% research, 50% Extension, and 15% education. The adoption of appropriate technology will assist small-scale Latino farmers improve their profitability, sustaining their farming operations, strengthen local food systems, and contribute to farmers' and their communities' quality of life.Our project is framed within the social capital paradigm. While there are many definitions of the concept social capital depending on the disciplinary perspective, in its simplest form it consists of relationships within networks that facilitate cooperation among the members. It is embedded in networks that can have both strong and weak ties among members and across networks themselves.
Animal Health Component
40%
Research Effort Categories
Basic
20%
Applied
40%
Developmental
40%
Classification

Knowledge Area (KA)Subject of Investigation (SOI)Field of Science (FOS)Percent
60153103010100%
Knowledge Area
601 - Economics of Agricultural Production and Farm Management;

Subject Of Investigation
5310 - Machinery and equipment;

Field Of Science
3010 - Economics;
Goals / Objectives
Goal 1. Produce knowledge on how social capital motives among Latino farmers influences and facilitates their adoption of appropriate production technology as a key step toward improving their financial viability, and study how the SARS-CoV2 pandemic impacted their operations (Research).Goal 2. Facilitate the adoption of appropriate agriculture technology among small-scale Latinos farmers as a key step toward improving their financial viability, and study how COVID-10 impacted their operations. (Extension).Goal 3. Explain, demonstrate, and offer opportunities for small-scale Latino farmers in Southwest Michigan to learn personal computer skill sets, financial analysis, and about agricultural technologies, how they work, and how they can enhance productivity and efficiency (Education).
Project Methods
The proposed research component will examine the social capital motives these farmers have relative to adopting new and appropriate technologies and how their social capital influences and affects the adoption of new and appropriate technologies. The research will be based on focus groups and a survey of producers; data to be analyzed using AtlasTI and Stata software. The Extension component will familiarize project participants with the different technologies and their uses appropriate for sustainable, small- and medium-sized farms and their uses. The education component will teach them how to use personal computers, how to do farm financial analysis, and the steps in applying for credit. A big recruitment push will be made on a face-to-face basis, visiting farmers to promote interest in participating in the project to set expectations and discuss the advantages of their participation in this project for their agricultural operations. The selected participants will complete project forms, including an agreement committing to participate in all project activities and the informed consent form. As part of the project's activities, participating Latino farmers will complete a questionnaire asking about their knowledge, perceptions of, and motives related to the adoption of new and appropriate production technologies and the importance they give to their social and business relationships for their farming operations. We will also use a field instrument to evaluate, check, and assess the performance of the different crops in the high tunnel hoop, which will include the best practices in sustainable irrigation and types of fertilizers and their uses. We plan to develop an instrument to monitor on a weekly basis the development of the different crops. Additionally, we will have participants evaluate the utility of the field and demonstration site visits, as well as the workshops on computer function and financial analysis and credit applications. Finally, we will use a mixed methods approach and appropriate statistical techniques to shed light on the factors that influence the adoption of appropriate agricultural technologies. We expect to learn if increased understanding of how such technologies can improve farm productivity and profitability contributes to their adoption. Analyses will involve a mix of statistical approaches, including descriptive statistics, factor analysis, logit, and spatial econometrics using SPSS Statistics software. These will allow us to examine key relationships among the variables and identify those with the greatest influence on motives.The Research ComponentThree questions that must be addressed to identify the role of social capital in technology adoption in agronomics include: first, who is within a producer's social capital network? second, how well do they know and trust one another--what is the strength of their social capital? Third, how does the distribution of social capital influence the relative importance of the grower's technology adoption motives?Social Networks StudyWe will follow a methodology similar to that of Richards, Hamilton, and Allender (2014), who analyzed how a consumer's decision to try a novel product is influenced by their social networks. To measure the strength of social ties prior to and following the project, we will ask participants to identify how strong they consider their ties with one another. One core issue with many social network studies is that popularity with one's peers is not the same as influence on one's peers (Banerjee et al., 2014). As such, we will ask a battery of questions designed to measure the trust between individuals in each treatment.Online StudyWe will conduct two online studies in which participants are asked to visit a webpage where they will choose between producing in hoop houses and open fields and/or acquire standard agriculture equipment or small equipment more suitable to their size of operations (i.e. a tractor with 60 hp vs. small tillers). Upon collection of these data, participants are then provided information about what their news sources recommend. They are then given the opportunity to update their decision.The Extension Component The experiential learning and Extension component of this project will utilize an agriculture demonstration plot on the property of Lake Michigan College (LMC), a community college in South Haven, Michigan, where a hoop house will be erected. It will be used to demonstrate production of different vegetables (tomato, diverse types of peppers, cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli, and greens) and fruits (cantaloupe, watermelon, cucumber, and others). The hoop house will have electrical and water supply services and appropriate drainage to facilitate production and demonstration processes. The site will engage both farmers in the area and students at LMC. Additionally, we have established relationships with seed and fertilizer dealers who are willing to describe their products at the demonstration site. We will also rent and demonstrate at key stages of the production processes appropriately sized equipment for use on small and medium sized farms from the Van Buren Conservation District in Southwest Michigan. MIFFS will lead delivering outreach to the Latino farming community in MI. Filiberto Villa Gomez, Director of MIFFS Spanish Speaking Farmer Network, Agricultores Latinos Unidos, is a boots-on-the-ground, technical assistance provider who has identified over 634 Latino owned farms in Michigan and has been working to develop and solidify trusted relationships in the community for over 15 years. One-on-one interactions and use of multiple methods of communication are absolutely crucial to engage Latino farmers (Lopez Arizpa, 2007; Martinez, 2011). One-on-one recruitment and consistent interaction will be the primary outreach strategies for this project. MIFFS will also work with members of Agricultores Latinos Unidos to develop a phone tree system to assist with disseminating information in a community that is not always able to make full use of internet technology. Social media and digital technologies are widely utilized by younger generations of Latino farmers, providing an opportunity to encourage adoption of newer technology through facilitation of interactions between younger and older farmers, with younger farmers acting as technology ambassadors. MIFFS will leverage social media and digital networking platforms, such as Basecamp to engage younger Latino producers. MIFFS will also further develop and utilize an online training resource repository or Recursos en Español (https://www.miffs.org/recursosenespanol); resources created through this project will be housed at the MIFFS website to expand the potential reach of the project beyond Michigan through a National alliance of other Latino and immigrant farmer training organizations.?The Education Component The education component will teach participants the importance of social capital, how to use personal computers, how to do farm financial analysis, and the steps in applying for credit. Producers have asked for support in developing computer skills, including the use of Excel for recordkeeping. Workshops will be conducted annually in one of the computer labs at Lake Michigan College. A workshop will be provided to producers so they can assess the financial well-being of the operations and consider the adoption of appropriate technology. This, too, will be delivered in at Lake Michigan College. Finally, we will present the steps required in applying for credit. We will have bankers located in South Haven, Michigan deliver presentations on applying for credit. We will also invite presentations by FSA and other USDA agencies on achieving sustainable operations.[1] The are small networks organized along "communities of origin."

Progress 08/01/24 to 07/31/25

Outputs
Target Audience:The target audience of the LAFAT project is mainly Latino and small farmers with agricultural operations in Southwest, Michigan. We reached the target audience for its participation in the Education, Research, and Outreach components fo the project. To recruit participants for the focus groups and workshops, we did the following activities: i) designed, produced, and distributed fliers announcing each of the activities. These fliers were posted at laundromats, supermarkets, bank halls, stores that sell agricultural products, and others; and ii) we used a snowball method to encourage farmers to spread the word among their peers about the upcoming event. At all the activities cited above, we offered light refreshments to participants that helped us to recruit farmers and their families for the next activities. At the educational workshops, we provided incentives to participate, offering them a gift card of $30. The evaluations by the workshops' participants were excellent, people asked to have more of these types of events in the future since they were very informative. To increase the number of farmers filling in the research survey, starting August 2024, we provided each participating farmer with a gift card of $25 and that helped us to reach our objective of 50 completed surveys. For the operations inside the hoop house, we contacted a group of farmers interested in working in this type of environment and paired them with farmers with experience working in hoop houses. To maintain their interest, we provided each of these farmers with a gift card of $75 for their work on planting different types of flowers, fruits, and vegetables, we plan to provide another card with the same value for their work during the harvest. Changes/Problems: Nothing Reported What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided?As stated above we offered two educational workshops to small Latino farmers: The first focused on an introduction to social capital and its five motives. This was attended by 16 farmers who enjoyed the presentation. Their evaluations were excellent and a couple of them stated that they would like to have more opportunities like this one. At the end of the workshop, we introduced a practical example called the Circleof Reciprocity in which each participant writes on a 3x5 card what he/she would like to achieve and a problem that he/she would like to solve. The instructor then select a card from the pile of cards and the participant which name appeared on the card goes to the center of the circle, read what he/she wrote and the rest of participants give feedbacks on what he/she wrote. This is a practical example of how an extended network could facilitate information or give clues about the solution of a particular problem. One by one of participants go to the center of the circle and received the assistance of the rest of participants. Farmers participating in this workshop really enjoyed this exercise. The second workshop was about the importance of Record Keeping. This emphasizes the collection and organization of receipts of all expenses incurred on farm operations during a calendar year. We presented ways how to save the receipts and organized them in a way that could be used for overseeing the farm budget, loan applications, and payment of taxes. On the outreach component, we met with farmers working at the hoop house at least once a month to explain them the advantages to work within a hoop house, use the new technology, and increase production yields. Most farmers show high interest on this discussions, got attached to this type of operations, and told us that this project cannot stop since they are learning new production techniques that could be used to improve the production yields and their financial solvency. How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest? Nothing Reported What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?In the education component, we plan to offer two workshops on computer skills, basic Excel operations, how to set budgets, and how to develop and understand financial statements. In the research component, we plan to finish the paper based on the survey and focus group research and submit them for publication to a professional journal. If possible we are expecting at least have one presentation about this research. Finish the data analysis for the Michigan and Tennessee data sets and make the corresponding comparisons. Write at least two papers from each data set and one about the comparison analysis of both data sets, submit these papers to professional journals for publication. Make at least one or two domestic and oneinternational presentation at appropriate conferences. Start developing a project's website to include data, letters from participants, all the papers produced by the project, photos of the different events, and other information relevant to the project. Produce newsletters with information relevant to the project and distributed them to interested farmers, community organizations, and general people. Write a couple of short articles to be published in NEXO newsletter from the Julian Samora Research Institute. For the outreach component, we are planning to incorporate a heating system inside the hoop house to make possible the production of agricultural products year around. Select two or three products with the highest yields and market possibilities to recomend to participants. Continue the bi-weekly meetings at the hoop house to evaluate the production of the different planted fruits and vegetables. If there is an RFP from USDA-NIFA, we plan to submit a proposal to continue the different activities included in the current project.

Impacts
What was accomplished under these goals? Goal 1. To introduce the concept of social capital and its motives to Latino and small farmers, we conducted a workshop on Introduction to social capital and its five motives on October 10, 2024 at Lake Michigan College. The workshop was attended by 16 farmers who were impressed by how social capital could help them on their agricultural practices. We started the presentation emphasizing the importance of social and business relationships as key tools for business development. Since there are three main types of social capital; bonding, bridging, and linking social capital, the first one (bonding) focuses on relationships with close and extended family members. The second one (bridging) is related to relationships with friends, neighboors, other farmers, , while the third one (linking) correspons to the vertical relationships with community organizations such as religious, sports, and business relationships, university, and/or state institutions. The main characteristic of bonding social capital is the exchange of socio-emotional goods; care, love, support, help, and others. Non or very few monetary transactions are performed within thistype of networks. On the other hand, the main purpose withinlinking social capital are the exchange of information that could be about inputs (seeds, fertilizers, irrigation systems, and others) and marketing opportunities. We pointed out to these farmers the importance for expanding their networks to obtain information for their farming activities and opportunites for new businessses. Most of these farmers are currently producing old varieties of blueberries who havevery limited marketing opportunities. In additioin, prices for blueberries are low due to domestic and international products enteringto the market. These constraints are causing huge financial problems to small farmers, some of them already sold their farms, while others stopped farming and moved to other sectors searching for job opportunities. All these factors are inducing Latino and small farmers to look for other agricultural products, new production, and marketing technology, to keep their farming operations. After learning about social capital and its motives, they realize how important is to work together and expand their networks, which would facilitate them to learn about new and appropriate technology that could facilitate their agricultural practices and improve the financial viability of their farms. Another effort aimed at introducing social capital concepts was to advise them to complete the survey questionnaires using in-person interviews. We carefully explained farmerseach of the survey questionsand how the results of the data analysis will explain their perceptions for the adoption of appropriate technology. The initial results of the research survey confirm our hypothesis that social capital influences Latino and small farmers' adoption of new technology. We found that the first social capital motive, "Selfishness and Preferences," account for only 35.2%. This is well below the 95% considered by neo-classical economics. The other four social capital motives account for 25.2% for " International Validation ," 16.5% for "Sense of belonging," 12.1% for "External Validation ," and 11.0% for "Community Altruism," respectively.. Considering the current financial constraints Latino and small farmers with agricultural operations in South West Michigan face, the initial results presented above could be explained by indicating that these farmers are willing to adopt new and appropriate technology for their agricultural operations not only for the convenient price, but more importantly, because adopting new technology will have a direct impact on their internal validation. They will feel that these motives could facilitate the adoption of new technology to improve the financial viability of their operations. After conducting two focus groups in Spanish,we translated the recordings in order to facilitate the analysis using a qualitative software program (ATLAS.ti). The qualitative study focused on how theSARS-CoV2 pandemic impacted their agricultural operations, some of the most important effects are the following: i) high costs of materials and inputs, ii) lack of farmworkers, iii) high marketing costs especially for travel to take products to the markets, and high farmer'smarket fees, iv) there were not consumers willing to buy their products, v) low turnout of consumers and other producers at farmer's market, vi) water shortages, and vii) pests and plant diseases. In addition, participants of the focus groups indicated that climate change such as excessive rain or drought was the main challenge they faced during the pandemic and currently continue to deal with that problem. Finally, participants indicated that government support programs were very helpful during this time. Some farmers could not have been able to continue farming during these difficult time without receiving these support programs. We are currenlty in a process of writing papers from survey and qualitative research to submit to professional journals for publication. We are also planning to present the findings at professional conference meetings. Goal 2. To facilitate the adoption of appropriate technology among small-scale Latino farmers, we hired a especialized firm to assemble a hoop house at Lake Michigan College, which is considered a new farming technology under a weather control environment. We also installed an automatic irrigation system inside the hoop house to regulate the supply of water to all the crops planted. For the soil preparation, we bought a rototiller at a cost just over $5,000, which is way below a medium tractor cost of close to $30,000, and performs all the work that the tractor does. Finally, we bought small tools usually required for agricultural work. With the facility, equipment, and tools cited above we are demostrating to small Latino farmers the advantage that these new and appropriate technologies have for their agricultural practices andwill also help them to improve their crop yields, and financial viability. Participating farmers the focus groups indicated that they face problems with climate change. Working inside a hoop house deals with this issue. They also cited high costs for materials and inputs. This issue can also be dealt with using the new technology working inside the hoop house that is cheaper than conventional agricultural equipments (rotatiller vs tractor). Goal 3. During next period, we plan to have two workshops on computer skills starting with introduction to Excell and its applications for budgeting followed with introduction to financial statements such as Balance Sheets,Income Statement, and basic statistical analysis including means, medians, and standard deviations. The two workshops will run for three hours each since they need to be hands on at one of the computer labs at Lake Michigan College. During the current period we show the addvantages to adoptnew and appropriate technologies for agricultural work. We explain and discuss with small Latino farmers how each of the new technologies cited above work and how they could enhance their farms productivity and efficiency. Some of the farmers participating in the program expressed their interest to adopt these technologies buying a hoop house for their farms, for this purpose we contacted a local bank and GreenStone Bank who are willing to finance this operation.

Publications


    Progress 08/01/23 to 07/31/24

    Outputs
    Target Audience:Latino farmers located in Southwest Michigan are the project's target audience. These farmers are currently operating farms with small acreage. Most of them are blueberry producers and some produce vegetables. To work with this group of farmers, we posted advertising fliers, both in English and Spanish, in grocery stores, laundry mats, and churches. We also visited some of them at their farms, while others were contacted by phone Changes/Problems:The project had a slow start due to different issues: a) The recovery of a post COVID-19 pandemic; b) farmers experiencing research exhaustion; c) some farmers were retiring, d) time needed to obtain city approval. Ended the subcontract with MIFFS due to differences in the objectives of the project and the steps taken in the implementation process. What opportunities for training and professional development has the project provided? Nothing Reported How have the results been disseminated to communities of interest? Nothing Reported What do you plan to do during the next reporting period to accomplish the goals?Convene a Latino farmers advisory group to provide guidelines to the project's team. Complete the construction of the Hoop house and have it functional by September 1, 2024. Conduct demonstrations of new agricultural equipment within the hoop house. Continue data collection for the survey through year two of the project and utilize findings to inform project. Complete the quantitative and qualitative analyses of collected data. Offer the following educational workshops: Three Excel training courses. i) A basic explanation of this software program, columns and rows for data entry. ii) Introduce the four basic arithmetic operations and other functions. iii) Record Keeping and Budget Analysis. Record keeping shows the advantages of having a well-developed program for their farming records, its importance for farm management, taxes, access to credit and to government programs. Social Capital i) Introduction to social capital and types of social capital. ii) The five motives of social capital.

    Impacts
    What was accomplished under these goals? Preliminary findings show that 28 percent of Latino farmers currently own or rent a hoop or green house. When asked if they consider adopting new tools and appropriate technology for their farming operations, 72 percent of them responded positively. More specifically, Latino farmers indicated, in ranked order, that they are willing to adopt the following technologies for their farming operations: An irrigation system (52.0%), followed by a small tractor (44.0%), new machinery with improved capabilities (40.0%), new improved varieties of blueberry plants (36.0%), an improved chemical applicator (32.0%), a hoop or green house (28.0%), a refrigerated truck (24.0%), and a hydroponic system (16.0%). They also indicated the reasons for adopting new tools and appropriate technology which are as follows: Making their operations more efficient and productive (84.0%); increasing production (72.0%); reducing production costs to become more competitive (56.0%); extending the time of cropping season (40.0%), facilitating the elimination of pests (36.0%); becoming a member of an efficient and productive farmers network (24%); diversifying production (24.0%); feeling good about self as a producer (12.9%); supporting dealers that sell tools and small equipment (8.0%); showing other farmers how successful he/she is (4.0%); and other reasons (8.0%). Attachment to farm/tools and equipment The majority have a sense of attachment to their farm (88.0%), and the remaining (12%) indicated that they are moderately attached to their farm. Among the reasons they for their attachment include: their enjoyment of the landscape around it (76.0%), the ownership provides validation (64.0%), they enjoy living in a farming community (56.0%), and it fulfills a long-held desire to own a farm (40%). When asked the reasons for their attachment, they indicated really enjoy the landscape around their farm (76.0%), it makes them feel great to own a farm (64.0%), they love living in a farming community (56.0%), and they always wanted to have a farm, and that it is their first farm (40%). About 68% of them indicated that their current attachment to tools and equipment will influence their decisions for not adopting a new technology. The results also show that 44.0 percent of Latino farmers consider themselves successful and are willing to adopt new technology. About 76.0 percent of Latino farmers indicated that they are willing to incur debt to adopt new and/or appropriate technology for farming operations. When asked how they are planning to pay for the adoption of new and/or appropriate technology for their farming operations, they indicated as follows: using funds generated by farm operations (56.0); personal and family savings (36.0%); loans from banks and credit unions (16.0%); loans from money lenders (12.0%), loans from close friends and extended family members (8.0%); loans from friends and/or extended family members (8.0%), and other reasons (28%). Current equipment used Most Latino farmers use manual tools (84.0%), an irrigation system (64.0%), medium and big tractors (64.0%), rototiller and other smaller equipment (48.0%), computers (28.0%), greenhouses or hoops (20.0%), equipment shared with other farmers (16.0%), equipment operated by computer (12.0%), and a hydroponic system (4.0%). Medium and big tractors (56.0%) and irrigation systems (44.0%) are the equipment that for which they require external help. Motives The following are the motives these farmers have for making important investments or buying equipment for agricultural operations. Out of 100 percentage points, 35.4% indicated that finding the lowest price when buying big equipment accounted for of their motive; to be viewed as an innovative farmer accounted for 24.8% of their motive, to feel included in a network of agricultural producers accounted for 17%, to support the local business that sells the equipment accounted for 13.4%, and to win the approval of my relatives, friends, and other farmers accounted for 9.4%. ?Social networks Preliminary results show the average size of participant farmers' networks consist of about 6 persons from both close and extended family networks, and close friends' networks consist of about 5 persons.

    Publications