COLUMBUS, Ohio – Brent Nemeth, of Rayland/Dillonvale, is Ohio Farm Bureau’s new organization director for Carroll, Harrison, Jefferson and Tuscarawas counties.

The area is where he was born and raised. “I grew up basically 200 yards off the banks of the Ohio River – in the foothills of the Appalachians,” he said.

Nemeth graduated magna cum laude from Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology in Terre Haute, Ind., with a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering. He’s also a graduate of West Virginia University College of Law.

While at Rose-Hulman, he developed a keen interest in cattle and farming.

“My roommate was from Nebraska, and I was always with him. We were the best of friends,” Nemeth said. “His dad was a large animal vet, and his family had a couple of thousand head of cattle. We’re just talking cattle all the time, and I started going to Nebraska with him on weekends and in the summers. Next thing I know, I’m into cattle, and I’m into farming.”

That wasn’t his first exposure to farming and livestock. As a child, he sold eggs from chickens he raised on an inactive dairy farm his parents owned.

“They didn’t farm it, but it had the workings of the dairy on it,” Nemeth said. “I took advantage of an old chicken coop/spring house on the property.”

His grandmother’s local church group’s baking events provided a market for his eggs.

“I had 50 laying hens, and the women’s auxiliary always had baking events, and they were talking one day about how they wanted fresh brown eggs off the farm for their baking, Nemeth said. “So, I started peddling eggs around town to these ladies who liked to bake.”

Early in his career, he worked as a data analyst for Consol Coal and later transferred to Michael Baker Jr., Inc. in Pittsburgh, where he performed in the design and construction of water resources, environmental engineering, and water and wastewater treatment plant projects.

He then served as general counsel for his family’s concrete and river unloading businesses in Jefferson and Belmont counties.

Nemeth’s passion for animals, combined with his civil engineering and legal backgrounds, spurred an interest in the public policy side of agriculture.

In January, he was appointed to the Jefferson Soil and Water Conservation District’s board. That, in addition to his role as organization director with Ohio Farm Bureau, gives him a platform to promote agriculture.

“Now I have two things where I’m involved with public policy,” he said. “I want to use all those tools and all of those experiences I have formulated over the years, and I want to advocate for farming.”

A lifelong resident of Jefferson County and former Jefferson County Conservation Farmer of the Year, Nemeth runs a seed-stock cow-calf operation on land he purchased in 2000.

“I turned this place into a 30-paddock rotational grazing farm,” he said. “I’m very much a fan of the benefits of rotational grazing. Not just for the benefits to the ground and the environment, but to the livestock itself.”

Nemeth runs a 75-head cow-calf operation of purebred Angus with some Simental crossbreds on 90 acres. He grows hay on an additional 140 acres and is in the process of acquiring another 30 acres contiguous to his cow-calf operation to support residual grazing for his cattle.

I’ve got somebody that’s going to plant that, and I’m trying some different things too,” he said. “I always believed in diversity, but one thing I’m understanding now, more than ever, is diversity of my forages for my cattle – we’re going to give that a try.”

Due to topography, the main farm focus of Ohio’s Appalachian counties is on beef cattle and sheep because of the region’s capability to produce forage grasses and legumes, essential to feeding livestock.

Coal and steel, which were the driving economic forces in the region for so long, eclipsed farming as a primary source of income. Farming was something coal miners and mill workers did to provide additional income.

Nemeth wants to make farmers in his area more efficient and increase their knowledge about new and better ways of running their operations.

“During that era, men and women were part-time farming, and they didn’t keep up as much with the knowledge and the science,” Nemeth said. “That’s part of what I’d like to bring to the table – helping people to be more efficient and be able to embrace this way of life and get excited about it.”

Being new to the position, Nemeth is deliberate about how he familiarizes himself with what it takes to do the job.

“I’m learning to do things the Ohio Farm Bureau way,” he said. “I’m trying not to go too quickly because I don’t want to overwhelm myself. It’s going to take me a little time to grow and adjust.”

Nemeth is devoted to this part of the state, and he’s an ardent proponent of what agriculture can look like in Ohio’s Appalachian counties.

“To get that passion up about these grazing farms and this forage production around here,” Nemeth said. “We have the people – we have to invigorate the passion and to get caught up on the science. I think we can get there.”