Farms First! No Farms – No Food – with Stephanie Nash – [Ep. 210]

Linda J. Hansen:  Welcome. Thank you for tuning in to this episode of the Prosperity 101® Breakroom Economics Podcast. My name is Linda J. Hansen, your host and the author of Prosperity 101®- Job Security Through Business Prosperity: The Essential Guide to Understanding How Policy Affects Your Paycheck, and the creator of the Breakroom Economics Online course, the book, the course and the entire podcast library can be found on Prosperity101.Com. I seek to connect boardroom to break room and policy to paycheck by empowering and encouraging employers to educate employees about the public policy issues that affect their jobs. My goal is to help people understand the foundations of prosperity, the policies of prosperity, and how to protect their prosperity by becoming informed, involved, and impactful. I believe this will lead to greater employee loyalty, engagement and retention, and to an increased awareness of the blessings and responsibilities of living in a free society. Listen each week to hear from exciting guests and be sure to visit Prosperity 101.com

Thank you so much for joining with me today.

Linda J. Hansen:

I know you'll appreciate this episode, especially if you like to eat. But before we begin, I'd like to invite you once again to become a Prosperity partner. Prosperity Partners provide financial support of any amount to help keep this podcast on the air, and your support would be most welcome. Just visit the Prosperity partner link on our website, Prosperity 10 one.com, to sign up and show your support today. There's another way you can show support by engaging with our strategic partners. The US Christian Chamber of Commerce, Christian Employers alliance, and Red Balloon links to each organization will be in the show. Notes please consider joining those fine organizations and supporting Prosperity 101® by using the code P 101 when joining. And stay tuned each week as I will be announcing exciting new strategic partners coming soon. So now on to today’s interview, listeners I'm going to ask you a couple.

Do you like to eat? Do you like to drink clean water? While we all have different taste buds preferences and specific nutritional needs, we all need vitamins, minerals, protein and water to sustain life. While many people just go to the grocery store or do an Amazon food Delivery order without giving thought to the Source of the food, millions of people work to make sure food is on our tables in homes and restaurants around the world. I believe God provides what is needed through his creation, but we would not have such abundant access to it if not for the farmer. Our food supply starts with a farmer or with a rancher. Having lived most of my life in the Midwest, I have a deep appreciation for farmers, especially for those who run family farms. We raised our kids in a rural area on a simple four acre hobby farm, but it provided resources and land to grow most of our food and to raise livestock and poultry. While many people are unaware there is of an assault on family farms, locally owned farms, and our food supply in general, you may have seen countless horrific reports of fires or other tragedies occurring at food processing facilities or large farms or ranches. My guest today is Stephanie Nash. Stephanie is an agricultural advocate. Her mission is to inspire and educate regarding the farming industry and to share the stories that need to be told on what is happening to our family, farmers and ranchers. We must be honest and brave to fight for the people that feed us and support American agriculture. I'm very thankful to have Stephanie joining with me today. Thank you so much, Stephanie.

Stephanie Nash:

Yeah, thank you for having me, Linda.

Linda J. Hansen:

Well, I think this will be a great interview, and I'm so excited to focus on this industry and to have someone such as yourself to be sharing your own experience, experiences and your passion for this. How did you get involved in passionately advocating for family farms and ranches?

Stephanie Nash:

So that everybody knows a little bit about my background. We are originally from Fresno, California. Our family fought there for 85 years to keep our dairy farm. And unfortunately, we saw a trend coming in California politics. And so we decided to get out of California in 2013, and we moved here outside of beautiful Nashville, Tennessee. And we just educate and inspire so many in the community, I believe, to know where their food is coming from. What really did it for me was COVID. It was a blessing and a curse. At the same time, so many people were on social media sharing their life, and I saw a need for people, especially consumers in urban area residents, to understand where their food is coming from. Because as we get further and further away from the farm, as generations are dying off, we really need to educate ourselves through family farmers and ranchers that have the education that do this every day and really value their livelihood.

Linda J. Hansen:

That's so inspirational, and I'm so grateful to see someone so young, you’re fairly young, and it's just exciting to see a new generation rising up to speak truth, and you're speaking truth to power. Tell us some examples of how you use your voice to promote the family Farm and the family ranches across the nation.

Stephanie Nash:

So I think the biggest, I would say, positive thing about my voice is I'm not bought. I don't accept sponsorships. I don't listen to what the normal is of following in line to make sure you're falling behind big corporations and big politicians. If anything, my dad always says you're very honest. And you fight for what you believe in, and that's true. I fight for family farmers and ranchers on a daily basis when I'm on national news or when I'm in front of a conference, in front of a lot of people. I do my research, and I understand what farmers or ranchers are going through, whether it's labor laws in New York, whether it's climate regulations in California, whether it's the fires in Texas. I asked farmers or ranchers their opinion and their education on the topic because I think my voice has gotten so strong and advocating. I can't do it alone. I need our farmers or ranchers to advocate with me, and I need people, especially consumers and people sitting at home, to believe in agriculture again.

Linda J. Hansen:

That is great and the farmers and ranchers, they are the ones that are so close to the problem. And as my former boss and mentor, colleague, friend, Herman Cain used to say if you want to solve a problem, go to the people closest to the problem, and that's where we'll find the solutions. So the way to find the solutions here are listening to those farmers and ranchers about what is happening and as I've often shared on this Podcast, policy is so important and the policies that we have now that are affecting farmers and ranchers across this nation and across the world really are just so detrimental to not only. The production, but the quality of our food supply as well and we see these horrific fires, these explosions at processing plants. I personally don't think all of them are accidents. I’m sure maybe some are, but I don't think that they're all accidents when we see elitist, globalist elitist buying. Up thousands and thousands and thousands of acres of America's farmland and buying up some of our biggest meat producers, things we, you know, you just put two and two together and you realize something is going on that is not necessarily on the up and up. So how do you think about all of these tragedies that have happened with farmers and ranchers around? And what are you hearing from those People, the ones closest to the problem, the farmers and ranchers themselves?

Stephanie Nash:

I don't think it's a coincidence. You know, when I started my platform five years ago, people are like, oh, and she’s just a conspiracy theorist. She's trying to create fear. I wasn't ever trying to create fear. I was trying to educate you about bills, regulations, certain events that that is not normal to our industry. I'll tell you one thing that agriculture is really good at, and that is making sure our food is safe. And so when these explosions and fires and now that you're seeing sicknesses in Texas and dairy cattle are happening and, you know, remember Kansas, all 5000 of those cattle died, it's not a coincidence. It's an attack on our food supply. And not only just with our animals and livestock’s in general, but our constant, constant just listening to the Biden administration about selling off our land. You know, the USDA used to keep a tight ship of China or Bill Gates or any other foreign investments coming in and buying on American soil. And they don't do that right now because if they did, we, the American people, would be hearing about it. And there are deals being done behind closed doors. And it's absolutely disgraceful for our country and what God has provided for us, for Americans to live off of. It's very scary to know that 35 million acres is in the hands of 60 plus farmers’ age wise, 60 age wise. So in the next 20 years, where are these farmers going to go? Well, you know, they're all going to die off. And who's going to get that land? I'm going to tell you right now, unless we protect that 35 million acres, it's going to be in the hands of foreign countries, it's going to be in the hands of our government, and it's going to be in the hands of housing developments and Bill Gates to make sure that this energy infrastructure is being pushed to bring in this fake meat into our country.

Linda J. Hansen:

That 35 million acres is dwindling as we speak. I mean, if you think back to. What it was, say, two years ago Five years ago, ten years ago, I.

Stephanie Nash:

Can tell you, you know, from 2003 till now, we've lost over 46,000 dairy farms, which is absolutely, oh, just disheartening. And the thing you have to realize, you know, that agriculture companies will say, well, we haven't lost cow numbers, we haven't lost the ability to produce. Yeah, but we've lost the family farm aspect. That's the big thing. But the problem is moving forward is that percentage is family farms going under. It's not the big corporations or the big elitist, it's your family, farmers and ranchers that truly value the food supply and truly want to protect what american grown really needs .Exactly. And not only does it affect the.

Linda J. Hansen:

Family farm, but it affects the family. So those family farms go under I mean, as I said, I live in the Midwest. There's a lot of century farms, right. But I've watched those disappear. I have literally, you know, wept when I've had family friends that have had to sell the farm that's been in their family for generations, and they just can't do it anymore and I think there's got to be a better way. And you brought up a really good point about how, you know, we'll be told that there's still the same number of cows or the production, and it's like, maybe so, but what is that? And we support those families as well, and when we support families, we support communities. A lot of these farming communities are dying and speaking of farming communities, we know just recently in Iowa, Tyson Foods laid off, you know, so many people, like most of their labor force, they fired them. They didn't just lay them off. They let them all go and they hired illegals and so this is just a horrible tragedy that is happening and American citizens are suffering not only. With our food supply, but with the health and safety and well-being of our families, our communities, our states, and, of course, our nation.

Stephanie Nash:

Yeah, it's really devastating to see how the government has crippled rural communities. It doesn't take much. I mean, you, you talked about Tyson. I mean, that was almost half of the population of the city that got laid off. What do you think that city is going to look like in the next two years? People are going to move out. Businesses are going to close. And again, big corporations cripple a city. It happened all over Oklahoma as China and Russia have came in and invested. You see abandoned towns, you see abound, abandoned trucks and tractors on the side of the road. It's absolutely disheartening. And that's something we have to be aware of. And I just want to touch on something really quick about our farmers, ranchers, because I am a bigger farmer for the state of Tennessee. I'm a small farmer compared to California. But I will say that I don't really think it matters the size of the farm because I came from a lot of families. I mean, take Harris Ranch. What a beautiful family. And they have thousands and thousands of acres and they're producing a great product. And they farm like the west should be farmed. Obviously, they don't have grass available.

They're in a drought most of the time, just like Wyoming and Montana. So they have to use the resources available because if we look at it, nobody wants to sit calf on the side of the road. Right. Nobody wants to see somebody struggling, just like we don't want to see our kids struggling. Right? So every part of the United States farms differently. And that's okay. We just have to educate ourselves correctly of why they're giving back to the food supply. Because at the end of the day, we do need the bigger farmers and ranchers that have been in that industry for a long time that are supplying to a lot of stores because not everybody can afford to go cut their own cow because it's kind of expensive. So we need to be able to feed our country. But just growing up in such a great community, I mean, I could tell you farms and ranches that owned 50,000 cattle that are sometimes better than the guys that own ten down the street. So just remembering to get to know your farmer rancher before you make an opinion, because I think our world does that a lot with every industry. You know, we're not all bad. We love our farms and we love our ranches, and we love giving back to the food supply.

That's such a good point. And, uh, yes, they're not all bad.

Linda J. Hansen:

And just because there's a big farm doesn't mean its bad farm you know, it can be a small. Local farm or it can be a very large farm that is very concerned about the food supply and it doesn't even have to be a family farm you know, like I mentioned at the beginning of the episode, it can be A privately owned, you know, we just don't want our farms owned by the government. We don't want them owned by foreign governments, and we don't want them owned by people who want to change the fabric of our food supply or who are in collusion with foreign governments. and so, you know, we want, there's nothing wrong with having a large corporation that farms and may farm in several states, may provide food or milk or whatever for millions of people. But it's just a matter of how. It's done and the processes and then also the freedom they have to do It in a sustainable way that actually Provides quality products for the consumer.

Stephanie Nash:

Yeah, absolutely. I think the biggest thing of why I'm so passionate about what I just said is because we're really going against each other. That's the biggest thing. And I know we talked a lot in the beginning of, like, why you chose to fight and what God was telling you to do with your life. I think we talked about this. Both sides need to do a better job because you have the liberal side that is so green, new deal hungry that they're making so many federal regulations that don't make sense to our food supply. Because again, like I said earlier, you can't farm in Montana like you can in Tennessee, just like I can't farm in Tennessee like California can. Everybody should have their own state laws and regulations based on what their state is going through. But this, this administration has not protected that. They're just creating federal regulations against our food supply. And it's diminishing our family farm or rancher aspect. And that's the truth. And so I think both sides need to take a step back and let the farmers and ranchers come in and educate them correctly on what, why they do practices. Because you have a whole bunch of politicians and people that have never stepped foot on a farm, but want to get on YouTube and tell us about it. And I don't think that's safe either. I mean, we need to protect that, right, Linda?

Exactly, we do. And I really appreciate how you bring.

Linda J. Hansen:

That up, that there's two sides to that, the point is having healthy food that is raised in a sustainable way And you mentioned the environmental activists and you know, the green movement and things. And you know, again, if you really want to know how to take care of the land, ask somebody who's been running a family farm for generations. I mean, that is their livelihood. Of course they will take care of the land. They know how to manage their forests. they know how to revitalize their soil. they know what to do so they're just ignoring this. And before we recorded, we brought up something that I'm sure the listeners will be interested in. We hear so much in the news now about the mRNA vaccine being injected into pigs and chickens and beef cattle all over. And we just know that the mRNA Vaccine is not a healthy vaccine. and that's been proven in human experience. But you said that it's not everywhere. and not every vaccine is bad. So we don't have to be afraid of any livestock that has been vaccinated. It just depends on the vaccine. So could you explain for the listeners a little bit about why a farmer rancher would choose to use a certain vaccine, and why you believe the mRNA vaccine is not something good? And then, you know, so we have the distinction. But then how can consumers know what type of product they're getting if they don't want that mRNA vaccine in their food?

Stephanie Nash:

Yeah, so I'm really passionate about this subject because I, again, like I said earlier, we are so divided, people are so scared. And if you're a consumer listening, just give me a chance to educate you correctly, and then you can make your own opinion once I get done. But let's look at a couple of things. You know, mad cow disease, pneumonia, strands that have killed off cattle you're seeing in Texas right now, they have a very bad strand of pneumonia that is killing off cattle very aggressively. And then you also look at stuff like brucellosis, you know, especially in Montana and Wyoming that have free range cattle with buffalo. And that is also a sickness that humans can get. So we go back all the way to the fifties and sixties of farming and ranching, and how veterinarians were educated to do studies for years of how we could protect our cattle and really how we could protect our food supply moving forward. And so there's different strands, you know, you hear of mRNA vaccine and then you see RNA, you know, and you, you think it's the same thing, but it's not. And so there's a lot of different RNA strands that are used, and have been used for generations, that cattlemen will give, whether it's a pink eye vaccination so they don't go blind, or it's a brucellosis vaccination, so the whole herd will not be contaminated and they'll have to isolate and kill off thousands of cattle. Or maybe it's pneumonia, which we deal here in Tennessee. It's very, very aggressive. If you've ever been to Tennessee, it can be 31 day and 79 the neck.

So we have to protect, just like I say this on my tours, just like a little kid with a runny nose, right? If he's got a fever at daycare, you're not going to keep the kid at daycare to infect the whole herd of children, right? You're going to take him out of daycare and isolate them. And so when you're talking about sicknesses, that's exactly what we do as family farmers and ranchers. If somebody's infected, we take them out, we isolate them, we treat them correctly. And when the veterinarians and our protocol say when it is time, whether it's milking out a cow, making sure the antibiotics are completely out of the cow, or whether it is making sure that that beef cow is done with her withdrawal periods of the vaccination or the antibiotic, we are very regulated in that, and I'll tell you how regulated we are. If you are so afraid of vaccinations and antibiotics, I want you to understand my industry. If any vaccinations or antibiotics are detected, which it is tested four times before it gets off the milk truck, they will dump all 9000 gallons that I shipped to Kroger. That's how serious it is. And so when you're on tick tock or YouTube or wherever you might be, and people are feeding you, that we are just pumping all of this stuff into food. I need you to stop believing that. Because it's, it's hurting our industry, it's hurting American grown and giving a propaganda from our government.

So you fear our food. And I'm saying this with 100% confidence of my advocacy. That's exactly what the government is doing. Because they're bringing in fake meat, they're bringing in higher imports from other countries, and selling it to you 30% to 40% more. And gaining marginal profits for the last two years. That's exactly what they're doing. And so that's why I'm so passionate about that. And if you guys want to talk about the mRNA vaccine, I'm not for it. I don't believe in it. The cattle in general, cattle have not been approved for the mRNA vaccine. Just pigs. So I just want you guys to know that moving forward, mRNA vaccine, you can look it up in the NCBA, you can look it up at other beef farmers. It has not been approved. But again, going back to that conservative company, they're saying that has. That's a lie. Okay? That's a fear magnet. To make sure that you guys are buying their product. And I do not believe in it. Um, the best way to know where your product is coming from again, go to a farm and ranch down the road, go to a farmer's market, get to know your farmer. I value more going on the farm personally, because we're in this weird era where COVID scared a lot of people. So now people are raising their own animals to sell, which I think is great, which I think is great. But don't get stuck on the label too much, because I think my product is very good. And we're conventional farm, and that's how we've been for 96 years. And we do a pretty good job at it. And I could sell my product, it's not legal here, and we don't do it. We sell ice cream and cheese. I ship to Kroger, but really go on the facility, because I think that changes your mind. I do tours all the time. And I truly believe just learning about a person, I can't tell you more. In general, I feel like I'm just, I just ooze with passion because I love it. I love it so much. And I have people leave here that go to Kroger and buy milk because they believe in me and they believe in my operation. I think that's such a beautiful thing. And going back, I'm a Christian going back to that aspect. God gave us to use and to nourish our bodies. And don't let the government scare you to think that your food is not safe, because I know guys, and again, I'm all for buying local, but if you're financially not there and you have to go to Walmart or Kroger or whatever, Costco, I know guys that are supplying that beef and they do one heck of a job as supplying that beef and chicken and pork. And I know it's scary. It's a scary world we live in, but please trust agriculture, because what's killing us the most is social media and people not believing in us. And so I need you guys to believe in the farmers and ranchers again that is so important. Believe in the farmers and ranchers again. And I loved how you mentioned that it's, it's all about fear, you know.

Linda J. Hansen:

Whether it's our government or whether it's someone that just wants you to buy their product, of course they want to install the fear propaganda. And if the government can get us. to believe our food supply is not Safe, which there, you know, really helping It to not be safe in some ways, I believe that, you know, then, then we will be more in fear and more dependent on them to provide the quote unquote safe, which may actually not be safe. And so when we look at how, you know, the foreign governments are buying up our land, people like Bill Gates are buying up our land, other things You know, is that food going to be safe? I don't think so. Like you said, it's bioengineered or we just don't know and I think it's so important. Ability to have choice and to know that, like you said, go visit the Farm, see what their practices are, see how they care for their animals, how they take care of their farm how they process their materials and things. And so I just think it's so important that consumers pay more attention. I just really appreciate what you're doing. Oh, there's one other thing I wanted to ask you. You had mentioned the NCBA. Now I know what is, but I want you to explain to people what that is so that they can go there for information I'm sure that that is an organization that has a lot of information that consumers could access and that might be a good resource for the listeners.

Stephanie Nash:

Yeah, absolutely. I'm going to talk about that and then I'm going to give them a couple more because I want you to have reliable resources. And I'm my platforms big on that and people trust me with that. So NCBA is the national cattle Beef association. They are head over all of the beef cattle. They also have their own lobbyists that go and fight against regulations or for regulations that make sense for our country. And so they do a lot of things for beef and they are very knowledgeable and lots of advocates. There's a couple that actually work up in Washington, DC right now for policy and lobby. So great resource. Farm Bureau is another good resource. This is something that I think consumers should really get used to. Even if you have ten minutes, you can get on the farm bureau email list. They will send you an email each week of events that they're doing January to April. A lot of their events are based off of policy because that's when representatives meet. So it's really cool to see, oh, hey, maybe you're Wisconsin, and maybe this bill is being passed. You're like, I don't really know what that is. I want to learn more. Okay, click. And it'll take you to a reliable resource where farmers and ranchers will give you their feedback and also give you kind of an overview of that bill. So it's not just based off of, again, social media, it's really coming from a reliable source. And then on the other side that I really, really value is protect the harvest is a great resource to learn kind of what's going on with agriculture issues and devastation that you guys can follow and how to give back to agriculture.

Linda J. Hansen:

That's so helpful I'm sure the listeners appreciate that. And so if employers, you know, I've talked to you before about how this podcast, we often talk about how employers need to educate employees about all of these issues. Now, obviously, every single business has people who need to eat, who need to drink clean water, who, you know, go to the grocery store and get their food, whatever. And so what would you say to employers who need to educate their employees about why farm issues, paying attention to issues for farmers and ranchers is so important to not only their own personal life, but even their livelihood and the business?

Stephanie Nash:

Well, I think the biggest thing, especially for employers, is, you know, agriculture spreads very wide. I mean, it's, its supplies, its clothing, its customer service. I mean, I could go on and on. And so you might just have 1% of agriculture in your business, but, man, that 1% probably matters. And if, you know, inflation is infecting you like it is agriculture, you know, I really, truly believe that more people deserve to know where they can get safe and reliable food from and how that inflation has affected our whole country and how they can provide for their families. I think that's a big one. It breaks my heart. That's a big thing, too, is not only invest into your employees, but invest into their life and the way and pretty much what they have on their dinner table and how they know where it got there. That's big. Like knowing where your food comes from, I think, can change our country. I believe that. And I also think you mentioned something else about just the ripple effects in a sense that the supply chain is, it affects so many industries. We have food service that's affected. We have farm equipment, we have accountants, we have lawyers, even. We have fuel suppliers, electricity suppliers.

Linda J. Hansen:

We have builders, contractors all these things that go into building farms, building ranches, supplying the materials and machinery needed to take care of these animals, to milk the cows, to process the beef, you know, whatever it is. I mean, those are industries in and of themselves So we lose that and, you know, just like that little town in Iowa with the Tyson foods. You know, the town just dries up, and we don't want to see that happen. So, Stephanie, do you have any other closing thoughts before we close the interview and let people know how they can contact you?

Stephanie Nash:

We're outside Nashville, so if you come, come for a tour. We're opening this weekend. Get on my John Deere with my trailer in the back, and we'll, I'll take you to the dairy farm and you guys can learn about my operation and why I'm so passionate. We have a creamery as well. We do lunch and dinner, eleven to seven or nine on the weekends. It's called Nash family creamery. So anytime you have questions, please reach out to me on my Instagram, Stephanie Nash Farms. Or you can email me through the creamery link if you guys have any questions or want to take a tour.

That is really great information.

Linda J. Hansen:

So, listeners, if you're going to be in the Nashville area, please check out, Stephanie’s information and get the details about attending when she is speaking but also take your family to go visit their farm. I think it would be a great thing. I know here in Wisconsin we have the June dairy days, and, you know, it's a great thing that family farms open up their farms, and we have a pancake breakfast, and kids get to go see the cows get milked and everything. And it's a great way to let the community know what the farmers are doing, what really happens on a family farm. And, you know, sometimes it's a very, very big operation Sometimes it's a small operation, but it's really important that people really understand where their food comes from and Stephanie, I'm just really encouraged to see such a beautiful young person so vibrant and passionate about sharing truth and really protecting an industry and a food supply for people all over the world. So thank you so much for joining with us.

Stephanie Nash:

Yeah, thank you so much,

Outro:

Linda J. Hansen: Thank you again for listening to the Prosperity 101® Podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, share, and leave a great review. Don't forget to visit Prosperity101.com to access the entire podcast library to order my newest book, Job Security Through Business Prosperity: The Essential Guide to Understanding How Policy Affects Your Paycheck or to enroll you or your employees in the Breakroom Economics online course. You can also receive the free e-book, 10 Tips for Helping Employees Understand How Public Policy Affects Their Paychecks. Freedom is never free. Understanding the foundations of prosperity and the policies of prosperity will help you to protect prosperity as you become informed, involved, and impactful. Please contact us today at Prosperity101.com to let us know how we can serve you. Thank you.