COLUMBUS, Ohio — Erik Scott of Georgetown has been named the 2012 Outstanding Young Farmer by the Ohio Farm Bureau Federation (OFBF). This contest is designed to help young farmers strengthen their business skills, develop marketing opportunities and receive recognition for their accomplishments.

Contestants are judged on the growth of their farm businesses and involvement in Farm Bureau and their community. Scott farms with his parents, Fred and Frankie, and his sister, Hannah. They raise corn, soybeans, tobacco, hay and pasture. They also raise beef cattle and market all natural beef direct to consumers.

Scott worked off the farm for three months after college, but said he missed being outside and seeing the farm. “I like farming because I get to do it with my family,” he said. “It’s a kind of freedom. I don’t have a boss other than the checkbook.”

He graduated from The Ohio State University’s Agricultural Technical Institute where he dual-majored in powered equipment and fluid power and motion control. He learned diagnostic skills and problem-solving, which he uses on the farm and in his agricultural consulting business wherein he is “trying to put technology in everybody’s hands.

“My college education is invaluable to me,” he said.

Scott, 27, won 250 hours free use of a Kubota M-series tractor provided by Kubota, $1,000 in Grainger merchandise sponsored by Farm Credit Services and an all-expenses-paid trip to the American Farm Bureau Federation (AFBF) annual meeting in Nashville, Tenn., where he will represent Ohio in the national competition.

He is a member of the Brown County Farm Bureau and has been active in the state’s Young Agricultural Professionals program. He served on the AFBF Tobacco Advisory Committee and is a member of the board of directors for the Ohio Valley Antique Machinery Show.

Jeff and Beth Roehm of Hillsboro were also finalists in the statewide contest.