Civil Eats

DECEMBER 10, 2024

When the owner of the land where Byron was sharecropping died, he willed Byron at least 10 acres. When he was nine, he started trucking the tobacco, or driving the loaded tractor from the fields where the hands were harvesting the leaves up to the barns where they were flue cured. It really is modern-day sharecropping.

Plantation 139

Plantation Farming Farming Acre 139

Food Environment and Reporting Network

DECEMBER 20, 2024

Theyre as fertile as can be. The history of how this happenedhow one of the countrys most fertile farming regions became a knot of poverty, hunger, and racial injusticeis complicated and painful. They till less, plant cover crops after harvest, and have drastically cut their use of fertilizer and insecticides.

Acre 89

Acre Farming Farming Crop 89

Civil Eats

OCTOBER 24, 2023

The 29-year-old grower has carved a successful niche at local farmers markets selling unconventional crops such as Caribbean red, striped, and fish peppers, stinging nettles, and flowers, all grown using a home-brewed, brown sugar-based fertilizer. He uses a home-brewed, brown sugar-based fertilizer instead of commercial fertilizer.

Cultivation 125

Cultivation Acre Farming Farming 125

Food Environment and Reporting Network

DECEMBER 31, 2024

The company has replaced its trucks and tractors with mules and water buffalo and has vowed not to expand its operations into standing forest. To skirt the reputational risks of buying more land directly, his employees had begun selecting parcels for homesteaders to clear themselves, then lending them money for fertilizer and seedlings.

Plantation 115

Plantation Acre Cultivation Crop 115