Pepper and Crystal Roberts, in addition to growing cotton, corn, and soybeans on their Belzoni, Miss. farm, also want youngsters in their community to know the role agriculture plays in making their food and clothing possible.

For their efforts in educating the consuming public about agriculture and for their farming innovations, leadership skills, and involvement in their community, they have been named state winners of the 2010 Mississippi Farm Bureau Federation Young Farmers and Ranchers Achievement Award.

The announcement was made at the organization’s recent annual meeting at Jackson, Miss.

“Most people don’t understand the process that takes cotton from the field to the store — that cotton is grown somewhere, then spun into cloth somewhere, then made into clothes somewhere,” Pepper says.

“Each year, we have the second-grade students from our local schools come out and we do a cotton-picking demonstration for them, trying to instill in their minds that, hey, the guy who sits on the end of the pew with you at church also helps to put the food on your table and the clothes on your back.”
A fourth generation farmer, Pepper farms with help from Crystal, who is handles the accounting/bookkeeping side of the operation.