KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Mike Rollen grew up as a farmer, helping his grandmother on their family farm when he was a child.
“I spent the summers with my grandmother. I tended her garden," Rollen said. "She gave me an incredible work ethic and it really inspired me, when I had kids, to give them the feeling to know where real food came from."
Rollen started Ophelia's Blue Vine Farm in the 18th and Vine District as a way to continue the legacy of his grandmother and their family farm.
He hopes to create a life in a farming industry that has had issues with diversity.
Rollen is part of a non diversified farm industry: only 1.4% of all U.S. farmers identify as Black or mixed-race. It is down from 14% a century ago, according to McKinsey and Company.
"It comes down to racism and access to capital, access to funding,” Rollen said on the issues.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture has faced lawsuits in the past over discriminatory practices.
Just last year, minority farmers sued the federal government over the restructuring of a debt relief program that was supposed to help farmers of color.
To close the gap, the National Minority Supplier Development Council created the Black Farmers Equity Initiative.
The group chose 11 farmers from across the country to participate. They will receive six weeks of training and access to capital, networking, certification opportunities, and the chance to work with NMSDC's 1,700 corporate partners.
"The goal is that the scale of these farms will grow and increase because they have access to these contracting opportunities at this level,” Jetheda Hernandez, Senior Director of Strategic Partnerships and Programs at NMSDC, said.
Rollen was selected to participate in the first cohort of the Black Farmers Equity Initiative.
Rollen is hoping the program will help him expand his farm and create generational wealth that was denied to his ancestors.
“It’s not that African Americans can’t farm, you know, because the country was built on African Americans and farming," he said.
Rollen also wants to expand to help his community and neighbors like Caleb Rollins.
"To have fresh fruit and vegetables is a wonderful thing, especially if you don't have to go too far out of the neighborhood to get it. It's right here in your backyard," Rollins said.
Rollins said Ophelia's has been a blessing for the neighborhood.
“[Before], I would just have to do the best I could,' he said. "But with him here now, it saves a lot. It saves the neighborhood a lot.”
More resources for Black and minority farmers are available on NMSDC's website and the National Black Farmers Association website.
