Exploring the Potential of Cultural Cash Crops and Cover Crops in Specialty Crop Production

Commodities

Practices

Small-scale specialty crop production
presents many sustainability challenges, including creating crop
rotations that are fiscally responsible, suppress weeds, and
maintain or improve soil health. Additional challenges are
experienced by refugee and immigrant farmers, including language
barriers and a need to adapt production methods for culturally
important crops. This project partners with a group of diverse
specialty crop farmers in Southeastern Nebraska to test
innovative cover cropping strategies over two seasons.
Comparative performance of five culturally-important cash crops
and five high-performing cover crops will be examined. The crops'
productivity, weed suppression ability, as well as the monetary
value of the cash crops will be measured. Desired outcome is the
adoption of new cultural cash crops and traditional cover crops
into small specialty crop farmers’ crop
rotations. 

Participating farmers will receive
four education/demonstration sessions annually on cover crops and
related techniques for specialty crop operations. These sessions
will also be open to other area farmers, agricultural
professionals, and the broader public. Educational materials and
research findings will be shared in English and Arabic, with an
emphasis on reaching Midwestern farmers of Arabic-speaking
backgrounds. This innovative approach makes information on
sustainable agricultural practices more broadly available to
refugee and immigrant farming
communities.     

1. 10 farmers will receive technical assistance implementing
   cover crop and culturally relevant Middle Eastern cash crops
   into their farm operations. 
2. 4 education/demonstration sessions
   (15 attendees each) will educate on cover crop usage and
   related techniques. Research findings on effectiveness of the
   culturally relevant cash crop and traditional western cover
   crops will be made publicly available in English and
   Arabic.  
3. Select educational materials related
   to cover crop management and culturally important cash crops
   will be created and shared in English and
   Arabic. 
4. Project representatives will present
   findings at one conference in the North Central
   region.