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CapitalPress.com
Friday, January 14, 2022
People & Places
Instructor helps farmers harness finances
By MATEUSZ PERKOWSKI
Capital Press
Established 1928
SALEM — Farmers fre-
quently needed help catching
up on basic computer literacy
during Phil LaVine’s early
days as an agribusiness man-
agement instructor.
More than two decades
later, he’s encountering a dif-
ferent challenge with the next
crop of growers.
While they don’t need
assistance setting up print-
ers or overcoming other tech-
nical hiccups, young farm-
ers often aren’t familiar with
compiling and analyzing
financial records.
“When I first got here,
mom and dad didn’t know
how to turn on a computer,”
joked LaVine, an instruc-
tor at Chemeketa Commu-
nity College in Salem, Ore.
“The new generation knows
how to run a computer but
they don’t like to work in the
office at all. Nobody got into
farming to keep records.”
Laboring over expenses
in an Excel spreadsheet isn’t
the most enjoyable aspect of
farming, but it’s just as nec-
essary as scouting for pests
or tilling the soil.
“People who aren’t pay-
ing attention to their records
are setting themselves up for
failure,” LaVine said. “Treat
it like it’s a business. It’s easy
to get sucked up in the life-
style of it, but it’s tough to
maintain the lifestyle if you
don’t maintain the business.”
Chemeketa’s
agribusi-
ness management program
was started in 1970 to pro-
vide farmers with bookkeep-
ing skills, rounding out the
agronomic knowledge they
gained from Oregon State
University’s Extension Ser-
vice, he said.
Proficiency with finan-
cial records is crucial when
farmers must deal with the
bank or the accountant, but
it’s also key to operating their
business more efficiently, he
said.
‘Lean’ businesses
LaVine teaches farm-
ers from the perspective of
the “lean” business theory,
which focuses on continu-
Capital Press Managers
Joe Beach ..................... Editor & Publisher
Western
Innovator
PHIL LAVINE
Mateusz Perkowski/Capital Press
ously improving productivity
while conserving resources.
“You try to eliminate
waste and get the biggest
bang for your buck,” he said.
“That new combine has to
pay for itself. That extra
ground has to got to pay for
itself.”
Growers who enroll in the
program learn basic financial
practices, such as reconciling
their bank statements with
their records of expenses and
revenues.
With that understanding,
they can then understand the
strengths and weaknesses of
their farm operations — and
how to adjust spending and
investments accordingly.
“You want to be able to
manage the farm based on its
successes and failures,” he
said.
More profit, less work
LaVine gives the example
of a farmer who was able to
double his profit while reduc-
ing his workload.
The problem was sim-
ple: An unproductive tract of
leased land was costing more
to cultivate than it was gener-
ating in revenue.
Until the farmer analyzed
his records, though, he didn’t
realize it made sense to stop
farming the parcel.
“He was losing money on
the lease,” LaVine said. “He
was taking good money and
throwing it after bad.”
There’s more to wise
financial decision-making
than just crunching numbers.
Growers enrolled in the
program are taught to set
longer-term goals — envi-
sioning where their farms
should be in five or 10 years
— instead of just reacting to
immediate needs.
“Everything should be
goal-driven,” he said.
On the same page
Farms are generally
family businesses, which
requires that LaVine take
on a role similar to that of a
therapist: Helping husbands,
wives, children and other
family members understand
the company’s priorities.
LaVine gives the analogy
of two donkeys tied together,
each pulling toward a differ-
ent pile of hay.
“If you’re working against
each other, it’s going to be a
wiggle. If you’re working
together, you can have both
hay stacks,” he said. “It’s bet-
ter for us to ensure everyone
is working together on the
same page.”
Tracking trends and ana-
lyzing past expenses is espe-
cially important at a time of
steep inflation for fertilizer
and other agricultural inputs.
For example, farmers who
understand how much the
cost of nitrogen has affected
their past profits will be better
able to anticipate the impact
of a major hike in price.
“How can you possi-
bly forecast if we can’t see
what’s in the past?” LaVine
said.
A solid grasp of finances
enables growers to know
how much they can gamble
on a new crop, such as quinoa
or hemp. It can also prevent
unwise investments, such as
overpaying for property.
“I’ve seen some really
smart people be pretty silly
with their farm business
management,” LaVine said.
“You’ve got to know when to
hold them and know when to
fold them.”
Grew up on a vineyard
Having worked at Cheme-
keta since 1999, LaVine is
now teaching farmers whom
he first met as “baby bumps.”
LaVine’s own experi-
ence with agriculture began
in Modesto, Calif., where he
grew up on a vineyard man-
aged by his father, Paul, an
extension agent.
After participating in FFA
as a youth, LaVine went on
to study agribusiness man-
agement at California State
ROSEBURG, Ore. —
In his 21 years as the Oregon
State University Extension
Service horticulture agent for
Douglas County, Steve Ren-
quist has seen a major expan-
sion of the area’s agricultural
industries.
Renquist was hired for the
position in 2000 and since
then he has helped large and
small crop and orchard grow-
ers while visiting their proper-
ties, providing written infor-
mation from Oregon State
University scientific research
and by teaching educational
classes.
In those 21 years, wine-
grape acreage in Doug-
las County has grown from
400 acres to 3,800. Hazel-
nut orchards expanded from
25 acres to almost 600. Blue-
berry acreage increased from
about 75 to 800.
Renquist said there’s also
been growth in nursery and
greenhouse production, and
the Master Gardener program
has increased to a member-
ship of about 250.
“My role has been to help
out in the fields with informa-
tion, but also in marketing the
area,” Renquist said. “There’s
Craig Reed/For the Capital Press
Steve Renquist, the Oregon State University Extension
Service horticulture agent for Douglas County, helped
the county Master Gardeners develop the Discovery
Garden. The garden has several areas, including a Jap-
anese garden.
been bumps in the growth
along the way, but we’ve
worked those out.”
At age 71, Renquist has
decided it’s time for a younger
person to advise and help crop,
nursery and orchard growers
in Douglas County. He retired
at the end of December.
The horticulture agent said
there have been many devel-
opments in agricultural pro-
grams and equipment that run
off technological advances.
“A guy like me, when I
was in college, we didn’t even
have a computer, we wrote it
down on paper,” he said. “It’s
time to turn this over to some
young person who probably
has some technology in their
skills that I haven’t had.”
Before Renquist came to
Douglas County, he had earned
a bachelor’s degree in tree fruit
science from Cal Poly-San
Luis Obispo in California and
then a master’s degree in pest
management from that same
school. His first job was with
the Cornell Extension Service
in Wayne County, N.Y.
In the mid-1970s, he was
selected to a 12-person team
for an exchange program in
agriculture with the Soviet
Union. He spent 2½ years in
that country, studying differ-
ent crops and orchards on a
variety of farms in different
regions.
After returning to the U.S.,
he worked as a crop forecaster
and traveled in the states and
to Europe and South America
to look at crops and make pro-
duction estimates.
When Renquist and his
wife, Cida, were ready for a
more settled life, he saw the
listing for the extension posi-
tion in Douglas County.
“I liked what I saw out
here,” said Renquist of his ini-
tial thoughts about the county.
“When I looked at the job
description back then, this
county didn’t have a very sig-
nificant horticulture industry.
It was diverse, but production
was pretty small.”
Earl Jones, co-owner of
Abacela Winery near Winston,
Ore., said he appreciated the
knowledge Renquist brought
to the county.
“He has a world of experi-
ence and to bring that kind of
perspective from those other
countries to Douglas County
was of great value,” Jones
SUNDAY-TUESDAY
JAN. 16-18
NFU Women’s Conference:
Holiday Inn and Suites Nashville
Downtown Convention Center. Top-
ics will include business manage-
ment, leadership, community build-
ing and more. Website: https://nfu.
org/womensconference/
MONDAY-THURSDAY
JAN. 17-20
IWUA Annual Conven-
tion: Riverside Hotel, Garden
City, Idaho. Population growth
and its impact of the water
supply and the need for infra-
structure improvements are
among the topics that will be
covered. Contact: 208-344-
6690 Website: www.iwua.
org/85th-annual-convention/
ogy to address the dynamic recent
advances in technology, systems
and platforms enabling intercon-
nected solutions from farm to retail.
Website: http://www.thevisioncon-
ference.com
TUESDAY-WEDNESDAY
JAN. 18-19
2022 Northwest Hay Expo:
Three Rivers Convention Cen-
ter, Kennewick, Wash. Spon-
sored by the Washington State
Hay Growers Association, this is
a one-stop information center
for all things hay. Website: www.
wa-hay.org
The VISION Conference
2022: Renaissance Phoenix Glen-
dale Hotel and Spa, Glendale, Ariz.
The conference engages leaders
throughout agricultural technol-
WEDNESDAY-THURSDAY
JAN. 19-20
Entire contents copyright © 2022
EO Media Group
An independent newspaper
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dba Capital Press
Capital Press (ISSN 0740-3704) is
Age: 67
published weekly by EO Media Group,
Education: Bachelor’s
degree in agribusiness
management from
California State Universi-
ty-Fresno, in 1976. Dual
master’s degree in eco-
nomics and agricultural
economics from New
Mexico State University
in 1999.
2870 Broadway NE, Salem OR 97303.
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POSTMASTER: send address changes to
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University-Fresno.
He then took a job with a
lender in the Farm Credit Sys-
tem network, which took him
to Hawaii for more than 20
years.
LaVine went back to
school to obtain a master’s
degree from New Mexico
State University before join-
ing the faculty at Chemeketa.
The diversity of Hawaiian
agriculture is similar to that of
Oregon agriculture — though
with mostly different crops,
he said.
The experience as a lender
also prepared LaVine for his
career as an instructor, since
both jobs involve navigating
complex financial situations
with farmers.
Growers can be intimi-
dated by the superficially dif-
ferent questions asked by var-
ious lending institutions, he
said.
If they keep good records,
though, the process is easier
to negotiate, regardless of the
lender, LaVine said. “It’s been
fun teaching over the years
that they’re all asking for the
exact same information.”
said. “Steve’s greatest value
was one-on-one, standing in
your vineyard, trying to figure
out what was going on. That’s
where he was extremely
useful.”
The horticulture agent also
proved to be a valuable men-
tor to the county’s Master Gar-
dener program and its mem-
bers. He and the gardeners
developed the Discovery Gar-
den and the Victory Garden on
county-owned ground. Ren-
quist used the Discovery Gar-
den and its different areas of
focus as a classroom with sub-
jects such as plant identifica-
tion, soil testing and pruning.
There are educational signs
throughout the garden.
“Without a doubt, it’s the
nicest Master Gardener devel-
oped garden in the state,” Ren-
quist said. “People walking
through can stop, look and
read, and learn something.”
The Victory Garden
focuses on growing veg-
etables. Those gardeners
donated 9,000 pounds of
produce to a food bank in
2021.
“I’ve been able to be here
during a time of nice growth
in the agricultural industry
and in the Master Gardener
program,” he added. “I’ve
thoroughly enjoyed it.”
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Samantha Stinnett .....Circulation Manager
Hometown: Salem, Ore.
OSU Extension agent helped cultivate growth of county’s ag
By CRAIG REED
For the Capital Press
Carl Sampson .................. Managing Editor
Occupation: Agribusi-
ness management
instructor at Chemeketa
Community College
Family: Wife, Jill, and
three grown children
Phil LaVine, an agribusiness management instructor, teaches farmers to compile and
analyze their financial records at Chemeketa Community College in Salem, Ore.
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Index
2022 Idaho Potato Confer-
ence: Idaho State University, stu-
dent union building, Pocatello.
The conference includes educa-
tional presentations and a trade
show. Website: www.uidaho.edu
FRIDAY JAN. 21
SAIF Agri-Business Banquet:
6-9 p.m. Salem Convention Cen-
ter, 200 Commercial St. SE, Salem.
The SAIF Agri-Business Banquet
is a celebration of the agricultural
community and its impact on the
mid-Willamette Valley. This rich
and proud history is honored
through special entertainment
with a message. The speaker will
be Terry Tymchuck from the Ore-
gon Historical Society. We will
also recognize an outstanding
FFA student for leadership in
shaping the future of the indus-
try. Contact: 503-581-1466 Web-
site: https://bit.ly/3sJlPsS
Farm Bureau ............................................4
SUNDAY-WEDNESDAY
JAN. 23-26
Accuracy is important to Capital Press
staff and to our readers.
Dairy Forum 2022: J.W. Mar-
riott Desert Springs Resort & Spa,
Palm Desert, Calif. Presented by
International Dairy Foods Associa-
tion, the forum will feature what’s
new, now and next for dairy foods.
Website: www.idfa.org
Markets .................................................10
Opinion ...................................................6
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