USDA officials visit Morgantown farm to better understand needs of West Virginia farmers

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. (WBOY) — In hopes of learning more about the region, the USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) Chief Terry Cosby and his political staff paid a visit to Mountain Harvest Farm in Morgantown on Tuesday.

Cosby’s visit, alongside many local farming partners like the WV Department of Agriculture, Conservation Agency and many others, welcomed an open discussion on what’s working with West Virginia agriculture and what can take place federally that would help make a difference.

Chief Cosby stated that he hoped to learn more about the region’s essentials in farming to help achieve policies to better suit local farmers.

“We were able to get urban agriculture into the 2018 farm bill so that farm bill dollars can be used for urban agriculture and the Biden-Harris Administration is really taking this to heart and we’re really doing a whole lot of things now with urban agriculture. There’s no size limit, you find it where you find it, but we’re here to help people,” said Cosby.

Urban agriculture has grown significantly in places like Cleveland, Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, and though its name doesn’t make it sound applicable here in West Virginia, there is a benefit to its expansion.

NRCS State Conservationist Jon Bourdon works with plenty of private landowners and local farms firsthand and was along during the tour to help provide insight from his perspective.

“West Virginia traditional agriculture looks a lot like urban agriculture, it’s utilizing a limited amount of acres. It usually doesn’t have to do with a lot of livestock. If more opportunities are put to community-scale agriculture in Appalachia, I think we would have opportunities to do even more conservation to establish these local markets. West Virginia has many food deserts throughout the state, and I think the best way to overcome is not to bring more food from outside, it’s to grow that food within and have places that can support a community,” said Bourdon.

You can learn more about the USDA’s NRCS by clicking here , and the statewide Natural Resource Conservation Service by clicking here.

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