Mitchell Hora named in Forbes 30 under 30

Continuum Ag CEO and founder Mitchell Hora was listed in the Forbes 30 under 30 “social impact” list announced Wednesday.

“I’m very surprised and honored and humbled to be picked and to represent my company and my generation and my family and where I come from,” Hora said.

The achievement recognizes Hora’s years of work pushing the envelope on new sustainable and regenerative agriculture.

“The main impact that I want to drive is a revitalized family farm and rural community,” he said. “Agriculture has one of the highest suicide rates of any industry, and a key thing that we want to bring is a message of hope and opportunity for family farms through regenerative ag … that ends up improving sequestering carbon, improving water quality, feeding the world better, there’s a lot of great things there, but for me, I like to start with that specific value.”

Hora said the recognition would help accomplish his goals of pushing for better agricultural practices.

“It just validates we’re doing the right thing, we’re being recognized, we have real opportunities here, so we need to deliver … to be part of solutions that are bigger than ourselves,” he said. “It definitely provides us good leverage for communicating with our customers and providing new opportunities to grow the business and … showcase that from super small-town Iowa, you can make (an) impact at a very large, global scale.”

As it turns out, Hora is not the only one at Continuum Ag recognized by Forbes.

“My COO (Brad McDonald) of my company was already named to the Forbes under 30 list a couple years ago,” he said. “To have more international recognition is great and appreciated and just good validation that we’re doing the right thing, but it’s also really cool for our team to have two of us now.”

While the selection process required Hora to fill out a range of forms, he had to be nominated first by someone else.

“I have no idea who nominated me,” he said. “I need to find out though, and thank them. I’m assuming it’s through some of the startup programs that I’m involved in … but I am not fully sure.”

The social impact category contains a range of innovative software developers, company and nonprofit founders, and forward-thinking engineers. Among the array of professional photos with subjects dressed in their best, Hora’s picture stands out: a selfie taken giving a thumbs up, with a farm field and ATV in the background.

“I like that my picture is different and that it’s me out there, working, and actually creating the social impact,” Hora said. “I don’t know where many of the other awardees are from, I haven’t dug much into it, but I think my picture and my role represents small-town Iowa and that I’m a farmer who’s being innovative and taking things to that higher level.”

Comments: Kalen.McCain@southeastiowaunion.com