Last week LSU’s College of Agriculture celebrated Ag Week with events, activities and speakers to highlight the impact agriculture has on Louisiana and the world.
The week was filled with activities for students and staff like volunteering at the food pantry and a tie-dye event. The College of Agriculture also hosted informational events during the week, including a panel celebrating women in agriculture and a symposium focused on the future of the field, to underscore the $12-billion industry’s impact to the state.
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On Thursday the LSU AgCenter held a panel highlighting career opportunities in agriculture and extension with its Cultivating Success: Women in Agriculture panel. This panel of diverse women highlighted the role women play in agriculture and their importance to the advancement of the field.
Shannon Coleman, a state extension specialist and an associate professor with the College of Agriculture, believes despite the rise in women in agriculture, there’s still a need for more.
“… As I started going into agriculture for my degree and at Colorado State our bathrooms sucked because guess what? There was no female bathroom in the animal science building,” Coleman said. “So that is why I see us as being important. There is an increase of women producers, but when we go to conferences there are still not that many of us there.”
Donna Gentry is the coordinator for the Louisiana Master Farmer Program and has worked with different farmers about best management practices for conservation. With her lifelong career in agriculture she has seen the growth of women in the field in her own lifetime.
“There have been a lot of times in my life where I was one of the few females at the meeting and you just kind of accept it,” Gentry said. “That has started to change because I think a lot of companies are realizing that women play a big part. They realize women are overall more detail oriented and they’re more reliable. There are a lot of reasons that companies are hiring women.”
Many students who were at the event were inspired to pursue a career in agriculture. One student was Lauren Eckert, a junior studying natural resource ecology and management. She looks forward to continuing the work of women in agriculture and pushing the field forward.
“Women in ag are important because it’s a male-dominated industry,” Eckert said. “I want to be a trailblazer and I want to advocate for women having a seat at the table.”
Carollicia Roberts, a junior studying animal science, realized that she can use the lack of women in the industry to her advantage to make herself stand out.
“I was wondering how as a woman we can step up and just get inspiration from different women who work in ag and one of the things that were my main takeaway today was actually using that I am one of the few women in the room to stand out and to network,” Roberts said.
On Friday, LSU alumnus Pete Vegas held a symposium on regenerative agriculture, an approach to farming focusing on ecosystem health and restoration. Vegas, the founder of the rice company Sage V Foods, highlighted how regenerative agriculture can impact the world and explained his plans to help expand the practice.
“Sustainable means you keep things the way they are if you do a good job,” Vegas said. “Regenerative is how you improve it. You’re trying to take it back to where it was, but even better.”
Vegas explained regenerative agriculture has not only the potential to benefit the earth, but also help farmers increase their profit by decreasing the input the farmers give.
“The most important thing I want to leave you with is there are farmers doing this today at scale,” Vegas said. “They are making more money than conventional farmers. This can absolutely be done. It’s our job to teach more farmers how to do this.”
Vegas plans to continue implementing regenerative agricultural practices to expand the field while proving to farmers that regenerative farming is the future of agriculture.
