Catching up with the Council: Doug Albin
The Minnesota Corn Research & Promotion Council (MCR&PC), which oversees the Minnesota corn check-off, is led by 11 grower-leaders from across the state with a wide range of backgrounds and experiences. In our “Catching up with the Council” interview series, we’ll learn about their farms, work with Minnesota Corn, and thoughts on agriculture. Interviews for the project are by Jonathan Eisenthal.
Doug Albin, MCR&PC member
Clarkfield, Minnesota
Tell us about your farm: How long have you farmed, what do you grow, and who do you farm with?
I grew up on a farm near Granite Falls and have been farming since 1976. When my wife, Lois, and I got married, we moved 10 miles to start our own farm. Nowadays, we raise corn and soybeans. She is the bookkeeper, combine operator, and the person I bounce all my ideas off. We have one son who is interested in farming, but right now he works as a precision maintenance researcher. We are trying to work him into our operation, but he really enjoys what he is doing, so it may be a little tough. I’m not ready to retire. I’m still having fun.
What do you like about farming? What do you find to be the most challenging aspects of it?
I just love working with the equipment and the soil, watching things grow, taking care of the crops, and seeing what happens. The most exciting part of farming for me is all the technology and advances we have made over the last 50 years, not only in the precision end of it but in the crops themselves. The advancements in genetics are just truly amazing.
The most challenging part of farming for me is marketing. To make a good living from farming, you need to know your break-evens, and you need to know when you are going to be profitable. If you sell your crop too cheap and prices go higher, then you have remorse and regret. But at the same time, if you hold onto most of your crop thinking prices will go higher and they don’t, you get sellers remorse because you sold too little.
Why is it important to you to participate in the MCR&PC?
The council is instrumental in supporting university-level, peer-reviewed agricultural research that benefits farmers and society as a whole. Each year, the MCR&PC invests more than $2 million in several dozen research projects aimed at advancing corn farming by allowing corn growers to become more sustainable and productive. Thanks in part to these advances, U.S. farmers—a small and declining segment of the country’s population—can meet the country’s food needs, allowing the rest of the population to pursue careers in other fields.
[More: Learn about Minnesota Corn’s 2023 research investments]
What conservation practices have you implemented over the years, and how have they affected the sustainability of your operation?
We have installed grassed waterways and terraces and participated in the USDA’s Conservation Reserve Program. We have taken land that’s subject to flooding out of production, turned away from the plow, and gone to conservation tillage. This year we transitioned to no-till on some of our soybean acres. Next year, we will be at just about 100% no-till for the soybeans. Our farm was the first in Minnesota to put in a saturated buffer, and we also have a woodchip bioreactor to filter water.
Who has inspired you by their example? What did you find inspiring about them?
There have been quite a few. As a whole, I admire how Minnesota Corn as an organization works together to make advancements on behalf of corn farmers. A lot of groups cannot do that.
When I think of inspiring leaders, I think of former grower-leaders Jerry Ploehn and Richard Peterson and former State Senator and pastor Gary Kubly, who was a champion of agriculture in the State Legislature. [Editor’s note: Senator Kubly died in 2012.] Mainly, I admire how thoughtful they were about what they did. They were able to evaluate whether something was a good investment for farmers in Minnesota, and society in general.
How do you like to spend your free time? Do you have hobbies? Play a sport? Like to travel?
I enjoy getting together with other people and corn grower groups. Through my involvement with the U.S. Grains Council, Lois and I meet other farmers and spend quite a bit of time traveling. I really appreciate how welcoming corn grower organizations are to spouses.
What do you think is something about farming that might be surprising to the average consumer?
For people with environmental concerns, I think a surprise is how thoroughly agricultural research has investigated and developed sustainability practices, which growers then take and adopt to their individual family farms. Many growers are eager to implement these practices, but they have to make sense for our operations, and a change doesn’t happen overnight. For Lois and I, in the case of no-till soybeans, it’s been a five-year process and has involved investing $300,000 in equipment. When farmers invest those kinds of sums, we have to be sure it’s going to work so that we can stay in business.
