Supporting agricultural transformation through elderberry production in rural and urban landscapes

The research activities were intended to provide guidance on optimizing strategies for targeting technical assistance, policy, and programs. Data was collected on motivations to grow elderberry, economic, human, and social capitals that were important to elderberry production, along with barriers to the sustainability of growers elderberry enterprises.  Interviews were first conducted with Missouri elderberry growers. In the interviews, information was collected on growers use and access to capital and resources they used to enter and sustain elderberry production and barriers to enterprise sustainability. Insights provided by growers in the interviews were used to inform survey questions disseminated to commercial elderberry growers in the United States.

Growers were motivated to grower elderberry to make land profitable, seize new economic opportunities, and grow a crop with health benefits. Growers specifically cited ease of establishment, profitability on small number of acres, and desire to use elderberry as a way to educate consumers about native medicinal plants as drivers to adopt elderberry as a commercial crop. Interviews indicated that access to labor and economic capital were necessary to continue production, as well as need to increase market connections. These were factors that influenced motivations to continue growing elderberry and optimism about the future of their enterprise.  The survey focused specifically on collecting data on market-related challenges and barriers. In the survey, growers were prompted to rank their experienced market-related challenges on 5-point likert scale: 1 (experience no barrier) to 5 (experience complete barrier). A latent class analysis was used to identify different types of classes of elderberry growers based on experienced market barriers and enterprise outlook. Results showed that elderberry growers experience market barriers differently. As such, two classes were identified. Class 1 had the lowest mean scores for experiencing market barriers for all variables compared to Class 2. Class 1 had the highest mean score for enterprise outlook, with respondents agreeing that sales, profits, information and other variables related to enterprise performance will improve in the future. Therefore, growers in Class 1 experienced fewer market-related barriers and were more optimistic about the future of their elderberry enterprises. Accordingly, this class is called the “Motivated-positives” class. Conversely, Class 2 members experienced more market barriers and had a more neutral outlook for their elderberry enterprises. This class is called the “Motivated-neutrals”.  While still motivated to continue growing elderberries commercially, they expressed less optimism about the future of their enterprise. "Motivated-neutrals" significantly experienced higher inconsistency in accessing markets, more inconsistent market prices, and limited marketing knowledge compared to "Motivated-positives" who were most optimistic about making future sales, profitability, marketing knowledge, new knowledge/technology, and accessing social networks. "Motivated-positives" were more engaged with creating a brand around their product and followed written marketing plans. "Motivated-neutrals" were significantly less likely to engage in these activities. This is a specific area for intervention via education/training programs to help improve the sustainability and outlook of elderberry enterprises among growers who are part of "Motivated-neutral" class.

Results also indicated that younger growers are more optimistic about their enterprises than older growers. Those who have less agriculture experience also tended to be more optimistic about their enterprises than those with more agriculture experience. Elderberry production could be a challenge to traditional farmers who have experience with commodity crops. Commodity crops benefit from a streamlined process. Obviously, selling corn/soy to markets is far easier than a niche crop like elderberry. A few older growers lamented elderberry production being more complicated and expressed challenges with accessing wholesale markets. Several acknowledged the need to transition from wholesale markets to developing their own value-added elderberry products.  These growers noted the necessity of needing to increase marketing knowledge and indicated infrastructure needs to access wholesale markets which includes harvesting and processing equipment that can help production scale-up to access wholesale markets. In the survey, these growers were also in the "motivated-neutral" class that while still motivated to grow elderberries, were less certain about the future of the enterprise.

As an aside, and outside the scope of the SARE grant, a GIS spatial analysis was also done using USDA Census of Agriculture data to identify spatiotemporal trends of elderberry (and other perennial crops) production based on number of operations growing the crop. This helped further theorize about social, economic, environmental drivers and influences on production trends. Addressing these knowledge gaps in the context of different contexts will hopefully improve the efficacy of perennial agriculture as a viable livelihood strategy that continues to spread through US working lands.

Research findings demonstrate that elderberry growers experience barriers differently and that even in the of absence of broad-scale institutional support, agroforestry and perennial crop production are increasing. Not only in numbers, but in regional “clusters” of production. This is encouraging as the study region for the spatial analysis paper and the elderberry interview paper are located in the US Corn Belt, where livestock and commodity production systems dominate agricultural land use. However, there are several mediating variables that influence the overall trends in production, including accessing needed human/knowledge and economic capital to enter and sustain production. There are opportunities to bridge the experiences of different types of elderberry growers with programs and support that can address specific constraints to scaled-up production.

The slower, but sure expansion of agroforestry and tree crop production should be credited to the growers themselves. Using elderberry as an example, one elderberry grower aptly stated, “...you can’t wait for the government to change their mind and figure it out. So, we've done all that on our own”. Out of necessity growers have formed collaborative knowledge-exchange networks and recombined existing assets, resources, and capabilities to enhance elderberry production as a livelihood strategy. This information can be used to design tailored, subregional policies, programs, and strategies to continue building up "clusters" of production and, as identified in the interviews and surveys, specific approaches to build links between growers and institutions that can address market and labor-related challenges.