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Going once, going twice, gone! Farm auctions are moving online, and that's changing a rural tradition

Jun 5, 2023
Farm auctions — a marketplace for knickknacks, farm land and everything in between — are often also social gathering spaces for rural communities. That’s changing as more auctions go online.
Auctioneer Ryan Creamer calls a bid from inside the trailer cab, while Austin Creamer monitors online bidding from a laptop. At this farm auction, Creamer said live auctions with internet bidders are the best selling opportunities.
Elizabeth Rembert/Harvest Public Media

2 Black farmers promote resilience for food, land and people

Nov 22, 2021
Ashanti Williams and Arian Rivera of the Black Yard Farm Collective talk about agricultural practices and building community.
Lou Benoist/AFP via Getty Images

Black farmers face a slew of systemic challenges

Jan 12, 2021
Unfair pricing and land loss are just a few reasons the Federation of Southern Cooperatives/Land Assistance Fund formed decades ago.
"We've had co-ops in Mississippi that knew they got less for their collard greens then their neighbor did," Cornelius Blanding says. "So they had to form a cooperative so that they can ship their products to Chicago to get a better price. That's been a reality for Black farmers for centuries."
Joe Raedle/Getty Images

Farmers are struggling in the pandemic economy

Jul 20, 2020
A study finds emergency government money will make up more than a third of farm income.
Dairy cows in a field at Grazing Plains Farm near Newton in central Kansas.
Courtesy of Jason Schmidt

In Nebraska, historic shelterbelts are making way for more crops

Nov 28, 2017
The strips of trees once protected farmers from Dust Bowl storms. Reporter Carson Vaughan wrote about them.
A view of the plains in Sidney, Nebraska.
Spencer Platt/Getty Images