SCOTTSBLUFF, Neb. – The face of agriculture is constantly changing across the country and, with it, the roles of women in a variety of agribusiness applications.

Gone are the days when husbands, sons and fathers bore the sole responsibility for the day-to-day operation of the farm. The agribusiness enterprise of today involves the whole family and, in many instances, it’s the women who are running the show.

Those evolving roles are both the topic of and the impetus behind the 34th annual Women in Agriculture Conference, scheduled for Thursday and Friday, Feb. 21-22, at the Holiday Inn Convention Center in Kearney, Neb. The conference brings together agribusiness women from across the spectrum, from sole owner-operators to partners in family operations, to discuss and learn, said Jessica Groskopf, extension educator at the Panhandle Research and Extension Center in Scottsbluff.

“We’re actually seeing a larger number of what we call Principal Operators – which is how the USDA defines who is actually the head of the farming or ranching operation – a higher number of them are women,” Groskopf said. “Plus, the business itself is so much more complex, we’re talking multi-million-dollar businesses, decisions are being made every day that make the difference between making a profit or not.”

This is Groskopf’s second year organizing the conference, hosted by the University of Nebraska. And she knows first-hand about the evolving role of women in the agriculture business through the farming operation she helps manage with her husband, Andy Groskopf, and his family.

“He told me once I cash-flowed,” Jessica Groskopf said. “But no matter where they’re at, we’re seeing those types of relationships growing.

“When we first got married, Andy told me, ‘You teach grain marketing, it’s time to market some grain.’”

That was the real shock, she said, when she realized she’d be responsible for real commodities with real,
cash value.

“It jerks your gut a bit,” Groskopf said. “It’s one thing to think about this, it’s another thing to do it.”

But those are the types of challenges women – and men – in agribusiness, farming or ranching face every day. It’s one thing when someone grew up in a family operation and had that knowledge and experience instilled in them from a young age, as Andy Groskopf did.

“But, for me, it’s not as common sense,” she said. “You look at it and you say, ‘I don’t even know how to ask that question. Do I have the confidence to start making these decisions?’”

And that’s one of the goals of the conference – giving women that knowledge and that confidence, or helping them find a way to find it. To that end, new this year, the conference will feature what’s being called Women in Agriculture Learning Circles.

Based on the work of motivational speaker John Stepper and his Working Out Loud program, Learning Circles are “formalized networking,” Groskopf said. During the Thursday evening session, attendees are organized into groups of five to eight, charged with developing networking relationships. The process will continue for several weeks with the women in the groups maintaining contact, building out those networks.

“We’re trying to get them to be more purposeful in their networking,” Groskopf said. “Get them together, let them go talk, get to know each other, so they’re hopefully creating those networks.”
The process hopefully provides a network of women focused on agribusiness who understand the specific challenges – and more importantly the unique perspective – of their peers, she said.

“I hope whatever challenges they’re facing, they’ll have some sort of resource or some sort of plan they didn’t have before they got there which they can take home, start to make decisions and know they can tackle whatever the challenge is,” Groskopf said. “A lot of things can eat at us in our sleep at night. I hope from the conference, whatever that may be, they’ll have the resources they need to start addressing those challenges and are able to start making the choices in order to make that less of a burden on their family and
their operation.”