FARMER-DIRECTED EFFORT TO REVITALIZE
LAND GRANTS, INCLUDING 4-H, &
OURSELVES
Gifts to Land Grant faculty/staff
to encourage them to:
DO THEIR COMPARATIVE ADVANTAGE:
UNBIASED
CROP RESEARCH & MANAGEMENT
EDUCATION
Help to couples to start/restart your
own
Farm Advisory Board (FAB)
Hello,
Howard Doster here-we’ve had a great Christmas, even though both Barbara and I
learned this was our last.
The heading
is one side of our current Corn-Belt Top Farmers, Inc. 501-c3 (CBTF) business
card that we incorporated in Ohio in September 2018 and revised this fall after
an Ohio farmer phoned to say he wanted to gift CBTF a lot of money.
While doing
on-farm research in 2018 and 2019, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and perhaps other
Land Grant Agronomists and Ag Engineers found farmers made more money when they
maximized site-specific contribution margin recipes (revenue minus variable
costs), and not yield, for each of as many soil specific sites as they
planned/monitored. When they grew
recipes to maximize yield, the last units of seed, fertilizer, and pesticide
did not add enough revenue to cover their cost.
The cost
of these extra units is an unneeded expense to farmers. It is also a source of unneeded nitrogen and
phosphate in our streams, rivers, lakes, and Gulf of Mexico.
In the
August 2019 American Society of Farm Managers and Rural Appraisers professional
journal article, “Surprise Moment Management, with a Plan”, was published, 15
years after I first submitted it. I am
listed as the first author, and I have co-authors from three land grant
universities. It is vague, and I left
out a paragraph. I want others to learn
the details after Land Grants are helping farmers, and their kids, use it.
About 50
miles north of where I’m sitting, a west central Ohio high school teacher
started a corn club in 1904 for his students, and their parents also learned in
what became the first 4-H club. This is
my/our opportunity to help farmers and others revitalize some Land Grant
faculty/staff, including 4-H.
Many
multi-national companies now offer to pick site-specific recipes for farmers, a
service some farmers like. I don’t like
the consequences for them and their significant others-their spouses, kids, and
key employees.
I want CBTF
to help a farm couple start/restart their Farm Advisory Board (FAB). Each will pick another couple they respect
professionally, like personally, and don’t compete with for land. The couples will commit to meet, say, four
times per year for, say, three years, on each of their farms; to monitor each
other’s production and financial
performances as they share balance sheets and budgets; and do our continuing
education, some online, with their significant others.
When
preparing a balance sheet, American accountants follow their Financial Accounting
Standards Board (FASB) rules. Farm Financial
Standards Council (FFSC) also has rules.
I use a lender’s rule in my Surprise Moment Management software. I think it is the way most persons
think/act; namely, I recognize a change
in asset value when I could realize it by trading the asset, but I trade only
when I think the replacement will make me better off.
When an
Illinois farm software company started to program my budget into their data
base soft09ware several years ago, they promised to give me a 4-H version for
Land Grants to use. If they were now
offered funds, they would complete it.
The company has a new owner-a cooperative of a few farmers. They might sell it.
In the
balance sheet equation, assets equal debts plus equities. If there are no debts, assets equal equities,
including when a new balance sheet is calculated after each transaction between
entities and each event between balance sheet accounts. I have invited an Ohio State Farm Management
Specialist to research the usefulness of my Sources and Uses of Equity Report
for a Journal paper.