Befriending a homeless Veteran compelled T.C. Beckett to serve his fellow military brethren in a greater way.
That initial helping hand to a Veteran named “Tony” led to the creation in 2018 of Veterans Produce, which grows large quantities of food out of six greenhouses in the Dallas-Fort Worth area using hydroponics and aquaponics and directly feeds homeless and food-insecure Veterans.
It also provides training for Veterans who get to work alongside other Veterans again, to learn new skills and grow healthy organic food with their own hands.
The retired Navy chief petty officer notes that he’s “a farm boy from Indiana” who understood where healthy food came from and wanted to pass on that knowledge first to his children and now to others.
Beckett also appreciated the importance of water at a young age from having to send a bucket down a well to provide water on his family’s farm. But he also learned how traditional farming in soil had its limitations.
“I divorced myself from dirt in 2014,” he said, and embraced hydroponics, which uses circulating water with fertilizer and minerals in a soil-less setting, and aquaponics, which has fish and plants growing together in a closed-loop system.
Growing Faster
With hydroponics and aquaponics, the greenhouses cut the growing time considerably in a smaller space. He said they are able to grow eight to 10 times more food per square foot.
Beckett said he can get 13 to 17 harvests hydroponically versus the two a year that planting in dirt provides.
“You get more food, using less water, and it grows 30 percent faster,” he said.
Using raised growbeds in the greenhouses keeps it from back-breaking work, especially important for Veterans who might have physical challenges. The greenhouses also provide a cooler setting for plant growth.
Hydroponics and aquaponics aren’t the only answer to the nation’s future food challenges, he said, but “it can help get us there.”
The Veterans Produce model involves Veterans learning how to build and maintain the greenhouses. Beckett said the program’s interns essentially get a six-month class in about six weeks.
“It’s like drinking from a firehose,” he said, “but we train from an operational perspective more than an academic one.
“The goal is to take homeless Veterans, get them back in society, and give them a skill. It’s a win-win. It gets me people trained in running our greenhouses.”
Air Force Veterans John Koch (left) and Tim Greene add plants to the elevated growbed at the Frisco, Texas, greenhouse. Photo by Ken Sury.
Veteran Involvement
One of the greenhouses is behind New Life Community Church in Frisco, Texas. Former Army Staff Sgt. John Strachan attends the church and became interested in the program as the greenhouse was getting started. He talked to Beckett and others to learn more.
“I saw them down here doing this,” he said “So I just came and spoke to them and wanted to get into it and learn how to do it. I’ve always wanted to get into the aquaponics and the hydroponics aspect of it because it’s something that I could take to my family, teach my children, and become self -supportive for my family as well as feed the community.
“We can take out quite a bit of food out of here, every harvest, a lot more than what we can get out the dirt.”
He said knowing the right things to do to get the plants to grow properly was a bit intimidating at first, but he’s getting more comfortable with it.
He encourages other Veterans thinking about getting into agriculture to do it.
“Not only is it mentally helpful, especially for Veterans who’ve been to places that may need something to occupy their mind or find a hobby, but it’s also fulfilling to know that you can feed people in need and feed your family,” Strachan said.
Learning More
For Air Force Veteran John Koch, getting involved with Veterans Produce was a chance to expand on his own knowledge of hydroponics.
“I did my own hydroponics for approximately five years,” Koch said. “Everybody does it a little bit different and I can always learn from that.”
He said he appreciates learning about aquaponics even if he may not use it in the future.
Koch said he is building a retirement house in Michigan and hopes to volunteer at a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) after he moves there. He also advocates getting involved with agriculture.
“You do it yourself and when you grow this stuff it’s a totally different taste than what you get at the grocery store,” he said. “And the thing is it lasts a lot longer. When really think about it, it may have come from California … how many days before you get it as a consumer?”
Volunteer Efforts
Air Force Veteran Tim Greene got connected with Veterans Produce through his involvement with a volunteer program at Bank of America, where he is a vice president.
“It’s been excellent because we’ve been able to bring people out from the bank, learning what aquaponics and hydroponics are all about, and learning how to use tools,” he said. “It’s been an exceptional adventure.”
Greene is thrilled to see how the nonprofit helps fellow Veterans.
“There’s a lot of veterans that are either homeless or basically suffering from the lack of nutrition or the fact that they just can’t get the produce that they need,” he said. “With this adventure, we are able to basically assist the community all together.”
Beckett envisions Veterans Produce eventually deploying Veteran teams to build community gardens for homeless Veteran communities, first in Texas with Veteran support partners, and ultimately nationwide.
Online: www.veteransproduce.org
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/veteransproduce
