Program seeks to draw women to farming

OXFORD – Jessica Carter plans to leave her family’s 12-acre farm in September to finish work toward her degree at the University of Maine. But when she returns in May, Carter will become the seventh generation in her family to tend the farm.

A program offered through UMaine’s Cooperative Extension is helping women like 23-year-old Carter who dream of owning their own farm.

The Women’s Agricultural Network helps them develop business plans and secure loans. WAGN was spearheaded by Vivianne Holmes, an extension educator in Lisbon Falls and a small-farm owner herself, with geese, ducks, turkeys, sheep, goats and a cow on her farm in Buckfield.

Holmes said the program addresses the different needs of female farmers. She said many of them work on a smaller scale without loans and have to work off the farm as well.

Carter has shared responsibility of the family farm with her partner, Erik Person, and they have had help from apprentices and a small work force.

After Carter leaves the family farm to complete her degree in art education, her parents will resume the farm’s management until Jessica returns in May.

During the winter, Carter said, they plan to work out the details of the transition from the sixth generation of Carter farmers to the seventh.

Holmes said WAGN collaborates with the Small Business Development Center and Women, Work and Community to provide assistance that helps women look at their business plans and what they want to accomplish. They help established as well as new farmers secure loans.