Diversification of Daviess County agricultural enterprises has been an ongoing effort the past 20 years following a period of enterprise consolidation.  Farms spent much of the 1980’s and 1990’s transitioning from multiple livestock, grain and tobacco enterprises to concentration of resources of only two or three grain crops in rotation, an expansion of tobacco production following the introduction of the H2A guest worker program, or expansion of beef or hog capacity.  

                The diversification effort underway has been to reverse the trend of resource concentration in one or two enterprises and expand revenue streams while lowering farm business risk.  Commercial broiler and turkey production enterprises have been key to diversification of beef, grain and tobacco farms in our area.  Commercial horticultural crops, agritourism, and value-added beef have been important as well.

                Despite an effort to diversify, hundreds of farms in Daviess County still rely on production of burley and dark air-cure tobacco as the cornerstone of net revenue for their farm.  Profitability of tobacco has been on a steep decline that past three years, but still generates more than $8 million in gross farm revenue for Daviess County.  Labor and production expense has been steadily increasing while prices remain stagnant.  A lucrative quality insurance opportunity is no longer an available resource to increase revenue.  Conforming to corporate requirements is requiring increased time devoted to record management while providing nothing in return. The past four growing seasons have endured well above average rainfall totals, lowering yield and quality to provide returns below production expense.  

Daviess County tobacco dependent leadership approached extension with the desire to attend a back to basics production and economic outlook for the future of tobacco production in Daviess County.  In January, plant and soil sciences and agricultural economics extension specialists lectured at the “Make Tobacco Great Again” conference.  During the half day event, growers heard the latest in UK research and demonstration data related to tobacco production and revisited older data suggesting a need to revisit the fundamentals of production during the pre-buyout era which might be necessary to accomplish yields and quality needed to outpace the increasing production expense and flat prices.  Following the workshop, growers expressed a desire to implement some of the suggested practices and indicated it was an informative meeting addressing their needs and concerns in an era when much is required to conform to purchasing company suggested agricultural practices.