Nevada agriculture has traditionally focused on the growth and production of alfalfa hay for feed. Nevada farmers dedicate more than 90 percent of the state’s irrigated acres to alfalfa production. The reliance on alfalfa puts producers at risk in times of drought or low commodity prices.
For John Getto, owner of Desert Oasis Teff, growing teff came from his efforts to find a good rotation crop to work in with his alfalfa. Jay Davison, a forage and alternative crops specialist at the University of Nevada Cooperative Extension, had been working on introducing northern Nevada farmers and ranchers to the crop. He connected Mr. Getto to a grower from Idaho interested in running test plots of teff. “We [Mr. Getto and his business partner] watched the test plots and thought teff would be a good rotation crop. We started 20–30 acres and worked our way up from there.”
While Mr. Getto has been farming in Fallon, Nevada, for more than 20 years, his new crop required new gear. “We had to buy special swathers for harvest. Teff is a tall grass that lays flat. You have to swath it in a windrow, let it dry for a few days, bring in a combine to pick it up and thrash it, and then haul it to a facility and bag it. We store it all here.”
In fact, Desert Oasis Teff built a whole new facility for cleaning teff. “We keep track of each grower’s seeds; the growers gets paid on a clean grain. We clean it on size and then by weight. Then the clean product goes back into a big polywhite bag.”
Desert Oasis Teff ’s customer base is growing. Mr. Getto first began selling to an Ethiopian restaurant in Reno. From there, the company staring selling to natural foods company Bob’s Red Mill, based in Portland, Oregon. “Now, we are starting to get some other outside people interested. We are going to try and market this ourselves—bag it and brand it. It is a good product, and we would like to get it moving.”
