Farming Game Provides Learning Opportunity

Farming Game Provides Learning Opportunity

While there are several different apps tests people's skills as a farmer —- the original Farming Game is a board game that was created in 1979 by Washington Farmer George Rohrbacher. The locations in the game are based in the Yakima Valley of Central Washington. Rohrbacher explains how he initially thought his idea was for a book about how to farm

Rohrbacher: "Five years later, while I'm baling hay all of a sudden this book in my head turns into the farming game and 12 hours later, I've designed the face of the box, I've designed the game board, its entire contents, how it is balance in the components. I had no idea but I had been working on it for years doing something else."

If you have ever played the game, it does provide a glimpse of the economics of farming as you take turns going around the board. To make the game even more believable, Rohrbacher says as new ag issues came up, the next edition would use those situations. For instance,

Rohrbacher: "In 1980 the Russians invaded Afghanistan and President Carter's response was a grain embargo. The farming game was invented before that and as new editions came into being we added the grain embargo."

This updating of the game, made it even more educational for those teachers who use it as a learning tool. In 1985 the American AgriWomen provided a copy of the Farming Game to every member of Congress. More than one million copies of the Farming Game have been sold since its debut 37 years ago.

Previous ReportRegional Weekly Hay Report
Next ReportHow to Pay Your Children For Farm Work