By Marlee Jackson

With nearly 70 stations that spanned from precision agriculture and paper manufacturing to forestry and floral design, the Southeast Alabama Agriculture Career Expo had something for everyone.

That’s no small feat for a sprawling spring event which served over 600 students, said Ronnie Davis.

“When you say ‘farming,’ farming extends a long way out,” said Davis, the Wiregrass RC&D (Resource Conservation & Development) Council executive director. “It’s not just John Doe and his tractor and his cows. It’s the whole community. The career opportunities in agriculture are as good as they’ve ever been.”

Wiregrass RC&D and a slate of partners like Alabama Extension shared that message during the second annual expo April 16 in Dothan.

Students from every high school in Wiregrass RC&D’s 10-county district attended — at no cost to the schools, Davis said. Those counties included Barbour, Coffee, Covington, Crenshaw, Dale, Geneva, Henry, Houston, Pike and Russell.

Justice Bull attends Wicksburg High School in Dale County. Bull said the career expo helped him think outside the box about careers in agriculture.

“I like the drone technology they were teaching — with infrared, seeing what plants are healthy and which aren’t, all from a camera on a drone,” he said. “We thought that was cool.”

Inside a barn at Landmark Park (Alabama’s official museum of agriculture), students networked with leaders from dozens of local, state and national businesses, associations and colleges. Those recruiters represented land-grant institutions, the Alabama Community College System, commodity organizations, the U.S. Department of Agriculture and other groups.

Young Farmers of Alabama members were on site, too, visiting with students, manning industry booths and helping pack lunches. 

Groups also explored career options through outdoor stations. Career pathways covered veterinary medicine; urban agriculture; Alabama Forestry Commission opportunities; and technical trades, like being a power lineman, operating heavy machinery or driving 18-wheelers.

Several areas touted technology’s role in agriculture. Students rode in a tractor outfitted with autosteer and realized the importance of genetically modified crops.

Life lessons were hammered home, too.

Students who huddled around the InformedAg station heard from company founder Rees Bridges. While Bridges dove into InformedAg’s role as an ag technology consulting group, he also broadcast general advice.

“Being coachable means you take feedback if you mess up,” he said. “I promise you, you will be successful in life if you are coachable…and show up.”

Davis said sharing abundant opportunities in agriculture is more important than ever because of labor shortages and an aging workforce. Agriculture remains vital to Alabama, contributing $77.3 billion — and 273,271 jobs — to the economy every year, according to the recent Grow Alabama study.

“Everybody keeps referring to ‘the next generation,’” Davis said. “That next generation is coming along to take our place. We have got to have farmers, and we have got to have people to support farmers.”

The next generation could include students like Mariah Marshall. A sophomore at Headland High School, Marshall said she was intrigued by technology in agriculture, including genetic modification of crops.

“I was excited because this offers you a lot of job experiences,” Marshall said. “My family for generations has farmed, so I knew some of the stuff they were talking about, but it’s so cool to learn more new things you can do in agriculture.”