At CattleCon 2025 in San Antonio, Texas, Oklahoma State University’s Dr. Shannon Ferrell addressed cattle producers about the importance of getting their affairs in order earlier rather than later. Senior Farm and Ranch Broadcaster Ron Hays caught up with him to bring the details to you.
Coverage of CattleCon 2025 is powered by Farm Data Services of Stillwater, Oklahoma.
When asked to speak at the event, NCBA asked Ferrell to help position the industry for success in 2050. To Ferrell, that equates to one or two generational changes in many operations.
His presentation began with being ready for change with technological advancements happening so quickly. The next topic he covered was unifying the industry, our families, and communities to ensure that the message of environmental sustainability is getting out to consumers. Lastly, he discussed taking steps to ensure a smooth transition from current ownership to the hands of whoever is to run the operation next.
“We live in a world where we can put fifty billion transistors on a chip,” Ferrell detailed. “We have all sorts of AI innovations that we can apply even on our farms, but if you aren’t adept at adapting to technological change, either you need to get there or you need to start involving young people on your operation that can do that to help you stay ahead of that curve.”
He explained that in order to get the message of sustainability out, producers need to have meaningful conversations with their communities. “We all know how polarized the communications environment is today, and facts and figures are good if the ground is fertile and ready to receive that seed that we are planting,” he said. “To get to that point, we just have to sit down and have face-to-face conversations with folks to understand their concerns because that makes them more receptive to our stories.”
He related how great social media is for broadcasting facts to the public and stories, too. He told how the audience won’t be receptive to the facts until they have a good story to pair them with. Fortunately, the cattle industry is resplendent with good stories to tell. They just need to be told.
He noted that there is approximately a trillion dollars’ worth of farm wealth that will have to transition to new ownership over the next twenty years due to aging operators. A survey found that nearly 64% of farmers and ranchers lack any sort of estate planning documentation.
“That is a recipe for disaster, and for our farms and ranches to get broken apart,” he pointed out. “That has implications, not just for our farm families, but for the structure of our industry and for the structure of our rural communities.”
Acknowledging that planning for one’s own death is scary, he advised producers to begin with one small step. “What we always encourage people to do as that first step is just take inventory,” he said. “Look around and gather all of the pieces of your operation, how they fit together, who is involved with your operation, and look at that. The next small step is talking with those folks and asking what they think the operation’s future is and what they think their role in that future looks like.”
Step three is coming up with the transition plan for the assets that will help smooth the change and increase the chances of success for the operation under its new owner. The fourth step is implementing the intentions into one’s estate planning. Step five is building the professional team that will execute the transition.
“Then you are going to go back, evaluate, revise, implement, repeat,” Ferrell said. “You have to keep that cycle going because things are going to change; people change, the industry will change, laws will change, and so having one plan in place now is excellent, but we have to keep going back and making sure that plan is still working for us.”
Noting how little farmers like to spend money, Ferrell cautioned against going cheap on the professional team that will oversee the transition of such important assets. “We are talking about trying to preserve something that may have been built over three, four, five, six, seven, eight generations. We don’t want to cheap out on it at that point. If you really want to accomplish a successful transition, you need to have an attorney who understands the ag industry, estate planning, and business planning. You need to have a tax professional who gets the ins and outs of agricultural issues, and you probably want to have a business consultant to help you figure out making sure you have the cash flow that you need to support the number of families that this farm might need to support in the future. If we are really concerned about those potentially difficult family conversations, let’s get a family communications specialist to help us or maybe a mediator. If we see that there are going to be contentious issues on the horizon, let’s have someone in there who can at least help us fight fair and have productive conversations that aren’t just shouting matches.”
The Beef Buzz is a regular feature heard on radio stations around the region on the Radio Oklahoma Ag Network and is a regular audio feature found on this website as well. Click on the LISTEN BAR for today’s show and check out our archives for older Beef Buzz shows covering the gamut of the beef cattle industry today.
