Civil Eats
DECEMBER 10, 2024
When the owner of the land where Byron was sharecropping died, he willed Byron at least 10 acres. It really is modern-day sharecropping. He sells the hemp to BioPhil Natural Fibers in Lumberton, which processes it into woven materials, textiles, and clothing. The elders refer to the USDA as the last plantation, she says.
Food Environment and Reporting Network
DECEMBER 20, 2024
The soybeans and corn are processed into animal feed and ethanol, mostly outside the region; the cotton is exported to textile mills in Asia. Over the next two decades, tractors, mechanical harvesters, and chemical herbicides made sharecropping obsoleteyou no longer needed much labor to farm cotton or grains. Grocery stores are scarce.
Food Environment and Reporting Network
DECEMBER 31, 2024
It wasn’t much, but they had only to cross the river to hunt wild game, gather native fruits, and harvest natural dyes for pottery and textiles they sold in local markets. Melka had sought to bring another 12,000 acres into cultivation through this sharecropping strategy. Now, those forests were being cleared.
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