Editor’s note: This is the third in a three-part series on the “Living Record: A Church News Documentary Series” on BYUtv called “Harvest of Faith.” Part 1 features welfare farms. Part 2 looks at welfare food processing and distribution facilities owned and operated by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Part 3 focuses on AgReserves, the commercial arm of Farmland Reserve, an investment affiliate of the Church.
From Chile to Brazil to the United States, AgReserves farms and ranches are not only growing food to be sold around the world, they are also growing people.
AgReserves is the commercial arm of Farmland Reserve, a world-class agricultural investment company that is an integrated investment auxiliary of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Doug Rose, the president and CEO of AgReserves and Farmland Reserve, explained: “Farmland Reserve is a nonprofit company that invests in agricultural assets. AgReserves is a subsidiary of Farmland Reserve that operates many of the investments that we make in agricultural assets. We own agricultural land in nine countries and over 30 states. We employ thousands of employees across the globe of all faiths and backgrounds, and the food that we grow is sold into the commercial marketplace.”
Unlike the Church’s welfare farms, the investment farms under AgReserves are operated by paid staff. The company pays taxes and generates profit.
“All of that in the end will be used to support the sacred mission of the Church,” Rose said.
Rose explained that agriculture as an investment is unique because it’s a stable and safe investment.
“If the economy is doing really well, agriculture does well. If the economy is not doing well, agriculture does well. What sets us apart as an investor and as an operator is that we are always looking to the long term in all that we do,” Rose said.
AgroReservas do Brasil
In the countryside of Unaí, in the state of Minas Gerais, Brazil, a group of AgroReservas do Brasil employees forms a circle to begin their day with exercises, announcements and prayer.
This farm grows corn, soybeans, corn seed, soybean seed and cotton, explains Rubens Paim Quadros, general manager. He has worked for AgroReservas for 19 years.
“The farm is my life, it’s my passion, it’s my love,” he said.
The farm Quadros manages covers 30,000 hectares (74,000 acres) and employs 115 people.
“We are leading producers, recognized nationally as one of the best corn seed producers,” Quadros said. “And we are also recognized nationally as producers of soybean seed. And now we are experimenting with growing cotton as a new crop.”
While harvesting machines work in a field to gather corn, a drone flies over other fields to survey and track crop growth. Quadros said a challenge is that technology grows and changes each year — every machine bought comes with embedded technology. But, keeping up with these new tools contributes to increased harvest efficiency, he explained.
The farm offers a leadership program that covers college tuition and professional development opportunities, enabling staff members to advance into leadership positions.
“We work on professional excellence in cultivating the best grains in the field. In the same way we do in field, we want our people to grow too — intellectually and as leaders too,” Quadros said.
Francisco Gonçalves de Souza Neto, the central functions manager at AgroReservas do Brasil, grew up in a poor family with few opportunities. He got his first job at 13 and had no time to learn or study. But he was looking for something more.
Neto started at AgroReservas as a cowboy when he was 18 years old. He had a manager who saw his potential and invited him to join the farm’s leadership program.
“I was able to learn a lot of things about leadership, about planning, about how to treat people, about believing in myself,” he said.
After four years at BYU–Idaho, he came back to Brazil to take on his current position at the company.
“And I asked the leader who saw my potential, ‘What do you want me to do to pay anything back?’ And his answer just changed my life. He said, ‘The same I did for you, you just do for someone else.’”
Something Quadros always emphasizes is that machines don’t work by themselves — farms and ranches need good people who are trained and want to keep growing to reach their potential. “We believe that people make all the difference.”
AgriNorthwest
In the state of Washington, near the Columbia River, potatoes, onions, corn, sweet corn, carrots, peas and wheat are all grown at AgriNorthwest, a large row crops farm that is part of AgReserves.
Pointing to onions being piled high in a storage shed, Blaine Meek, the general manager, said people can find these onions all over — from salsa sold in grocery stores to fresh onions used in national restaurant chains.
Meek said AgriNorthwest irrigates more than 100,000 acres and employs more than 1,000 people at harvest time.
“We want to be a sustainable farm. We’re farming this ground today, but it’s going to be more productive 100 years from now than it is today,” Meek said.
While he is the general manager, Meek prefers to be known as a farmer. He grew up on a family farm in southern Idaho and had his first toy tractor when he was 3 years old. Being a farmer is living his childhood dream.
“As we look at the challenges farmers deal with, we’re dealing with Mother Nature,” Meek said. “About 10 years ago, we had a couple of really good years in a row. I was getting a little cocky. And then we had three or four years where the weather wasn’t as friendly to us. And I got humbled. You quickly realize you’re not in total control.”
Working in onions is a unique experience, says Traci Jensen, general manager of River Point Farms in Washington, a unit of AgReserves.
“We joke about when we bring visitors in our facility, they will be emotional because most people do tear up pretty good,” she said.
Onions go from storage to the packing facility, where employees look for defects and check the size of each onion. Onions that aren’t up to standard are taken to be cut and packaged in a different way.
“We pack around 2 million pounds of onions per day. That’s a lot of onions, right?” Jensen said.
Jensen’s father was in the food business, so she grew up interested in it as well. She also loved science and math. After studying food science and technology at Oregon State University, she went to work alongside her dad for 17 years before joining River Point.
“Being a woman in a male-dominated industry certainly has its challenges,” she said. “But at AgReserves and at River Point, women are really equals.”
Reflecting on the history of AgReserves, Rose said investments by the Church in agricultural land started in the early 1900s and slowly grew over time “until we had this really remarkable, I would say miraculous, portfolio of agricultural assets.”
In this way, he explained, the Church is following the teachings of the Savior as He taught in the parable of the talents (see Matthew 25).
“Instead of just taking that $1 and then holding onto it or doing nothing with it, they entrust that consecrated dollar to us. We’re going to try to turn that 1 consecrated dollar into 4 or 5 consecrated dollars, and then, in the end, those consecrated dollars will be given back to the Church to fulfill its humanitarian and religious purpose,” Rose said.
AgroReservas de Chile
AgroReservas de Chile, located about an hour southwest of Santiago, Chile, has around 88 full-time employees and employs as many as 200 people during harvest season.
The farm grows tree crops, primarily olives to produce olive oil, and also walnuts. The olive fruit harvest lasts two months, while the walnut harvest lasts only two weeks.
General Manager Eladio Arias says, “We are feeding the world, and we understand that as an important task.”
The farm was designed to be more efficient by having long rows for the machines. “The longer the rows, the fewer times we turn, the more mechanized are the activities,” Arias explains.
During harvest, machines drive the rows of olive trees and pour the gathered fruit into a truck driving parallel to it. Among the walnut trees, a shaker with mechanical arms grabs the tree’s trunk and shakes the nuts to the ground to then be gathered.
Guianina Parra, an agronomist with AgroReservas de Chile, explains: “The walnut needs to have a good kernel. … It needs to be a good diameter so it can be put on the market. And we need the shell to be clean and free of any type of blemish.”
As he starts his day, Arias says, he focuses on efficiency and operational excellence. But once everything is up and running for the day, he is able to take time to notice the beauty and poetry of it all — the wind rustling the leaves and branches, the symmetry of the long rows, the bright green of the olive fruit.
While checking on olive trees with the farm manager, Arias sees that some of the olives are ripe while others are completely green, a problem caused by insufficient water. Chile is facing a drought, with hot weather blowing from the north into the south. AgroReservas de Chile is analyzing its water consumption and the effects of the drought and how to adapt accordingly.
“Everything we do, we do thinking ahead,” he said.
Arias grew up in Chile, where his grandparents worked in the fields. His mother encouraged him to pursue as much education as he could.
“My parents and grandparents didn’t have the opportunity of receiving formal education. Given that I have the opportunity, I have a responsibility to pursue it,” Arias said.
After earning an engineering degree, he started at AgroReservas de Chile as an engineer. Immediately the company gave him the opportunity to lead teams and to take care of big projects, he said. It felt humbling — he wanted to prove that he was worth it and he knew what he was doing.
Then, the company asked him to go to the United States and get a Master of Business Administration degree. He took his family with him and also earned a Master of Science in business analytics before returning to Chile.
Arias sees a spiritual element in his work. “This is not just us doing good work; this is something higher. This is something more elevated.” He sees intellectual growth as associated with spiritual growth. Studying the attributes of God and Jesus Christ made him realize They know everything about anything.
“They are the best engineers, the best agronomists,” he said. “So for me it makes sense that if I need help, I need to reach the infinite source of wisdom and knowledge. And They are at the door with open arms. They know my name.
“They take care of me. And They want to help me. So the learning has been constant.”
Now Arias has enrolled in a doctorate program — in part because he wants to keep learning, but also to be an example for his four children.
“It doesn’t make any sense that I am the general manager of a big company,” Arias said. “I’m just a kid from the south of the country. My parents didn’t go to college. My maternal grandfather doesn’t know how to read and write. I’m eternally grateful for that seed of my mother’s heart about the importance of education.”
And every ounce of knowledge he and others at AgroReservas de Chile are developing they know will help in the future.
It’s all about the people
Reflecting on the success of AgReserves and Farmland Reserve, Rose points out that what sets these companies apart in the industry is the people and the purpose: “We not only grow food, we do grow people as well.”
It’s all about people — the right people with the right values, expertise and experience.
Rose says he feels humbled by his job, by much of what he is being asked to do, but he is equal to the task when he trusts in Jesus Christ. “Growing crops, feeding the world, that’s a noble endeavor — and being part of it is really special.”
