This piece was originally published on Agri-Pulse.

Editor's note: Agri-Pulse and the Chicago Council on Global Affairs are teaming up to host a monthly column to explore how the U.S. agriculture and food sector can maintain its competitive edge and advance food security in an increasingly integrated and dynamic world.

By Trent McKnight, Founder, AgriCorps

“Last year, no students signed up to study agriculture in high school; today, 40% of our students stated their intention to do so.  They did not believe Americans were farmers until Kelsey moved to this village.  When they learned that she came from a family of farmers in America, it gave our students permission to be farmers, too.”
 
The comments from the headmaster at the Gbuluhagu Junior High School in Ghana’s poor Northern Region grabbed my attention.  He reiterated a popular myth I had heard over and over again:  If farmers are poor and Americans are rich, there must be no American farmers. 
 


For much of the developing world, farming is not a career option but a socio-economic condition.  As a matter of fact, “farmer” is often viewed synonymously with “peasant”.  Schools reinforce the denigration of agriculture by using school farms and gardens as a form of punishment or detention.  The message to young people is clear:  farming is your penance for being poor.  Why would any young person choose that?

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