New Video: Reclaiming Agriculture for Family Farms in Oregon
Posted in Local Food, Videos on 31. Jan, 2010
I’ve been in Oregon for almost nine months now and have learned a great deal about direct farm marketing and local food in this part of the continent. Along the way, I have found myself in the company of some good folks here at an organization called the friends of family farmers.
Specifically, I have connected with Michael Moss and Megan Fehrman who are responsible for facilitating the Agriculture Reclamation Act (ARA). The purpose of the ARA is to organize and mobilize family farmers in Oregon to have a greater say in the future of agricultural policy in the state of Oregon. Powerful agribusinessesspend a great deal of resources to ensure their voice is herd loud and clear at the Oregon legislature and the result here, like elsewhere, is that policy is increasingly geared towards larger, more centralized and increasingly industrialized forms of agricultural practices.
Megan Fehrman Taking Notes
Yet agriculture is still largely practiced at a family scale in Oregon and a growing contingent of urban citizens are looking to reconnect with and to support the people on the land. The trick is setting up a regulatory climate that is amenable to agriculture at a “sane” scale. Sane policy is a term that I heard at a few of the ARA meetings that I attended. Indeed, I checked out five meetings in the densely populated and fertile Willamette Valley to the vast expanse of dryland agriculture in eastern and central oregon.
Clearly, each group of farmers have their own unique issues. But what was striking was the commonality in barriers that folks were facing across the state. From meat processing regulations to water rights and access to affordable health insurance all the way to a more fundamental concern – feeling as though they were not adequately represented in the decision-making process around agricultural policy. The ARA has come to be at a time when family farms are in great need of collective political action and the ARA has the potential to be both a process that crystalizes a desire for change and a platform upon which family farmers can articulate their needs to policy makers in Salem.
Tangent Grange Hall
To hear more about the ARA process, check out he short video that we made above. I have much more to learn about the ARA and family farming around the State of Oregon. I feel truly fortunate to have been embraced by the good people at Friends of Family Farmers. A new community to be a part of. A new opportunity to learn and contribute. I’m looking forward to watching and participating in the process of the ARA.
Dear Mr Anderson;
Well done Colin.
Your father was here.
Hi Colin,
A great post. I came across the Friends of Family Farmers just over a year ago and have since had several interactions with the organization as well as local landowners who are interested in partnering with someone to farm their land. It is such a great organization that I am glad to see someone else is spreading the word about them and the problems that small farmers are facing here in Oregon.