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Deputy Secretary of Agriculture Kathleen Merrigan (left) talked to Hidden Stream Farm's Eric and Lisa Klein about their pasture-based meat operation. Shown with the Kleins is their son Ben. |
“The Beginning Farmer and Rancher Development Program is there to make sure beginning farmers and ranchers have access to the resources they need to succeed,” said Deputy Secretary Kathleen Merrigan after touring Hidden Stream Farm near Elgin. “A lot of this is following in the footsteps of the Land Stewardship Project’s Farm Beginnings program.”
The Beginning Farmer and Rancher Development Program (BFRDP) is a new federal initiative that provides $75 million over the next four years in dedicated funding for community-based organizations and others working with new farmers.
The Land Stewardship Project (LSP), a farm and rural membership organization based in the Upper Midwest, was a leading advocate for passage of BFRDP during the 2008 Farm Bill debate. LSP’s Farm Beginnings program, which was launched in southeast Minnesota in 1997, utilizes a farmer-to-farmer approach in the training and education of new farmers. Farm Beginnings-licensed classes are now offered by various groups in six states, including Minnesota.
Hidden Stream Farms was chosen as the location for the national announcement of the BFRDP grants because the proprietors, Eric and Lisa Klein, were graduates of one of the first Farm Beginnings courses offered by LSP over a decade ago. The Kleins now operate a thriving pasture-based livestock operation that markets pork, chickens and beef in southeast Minnesota and the Twin Cities.
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Deputy Secretary of Agriculture Kathleen Merrigan posed for a group photo with LSP members after making the announcement about the 2009 Beginning Farmer and Rancher Development grants. |
“We can’t keep up with the demand for our products. Farm Beginnings helped us develop the farm and the business that we have today,” Lisa Klein told the approximately 65 farmers and beginning farmers who gathered on her farm for the announcement. “We’re very excited about BFRDP and how it can help create more successful family farms growing local foods in our communities.”
Amy Bacigalupo, Director of the Land Stewardship Project’s Farm Beginnings program, said the key to the initiative’s success is that it takes a community-based approach by relying on local farmers and others to coordinate the program. When she and other Land Stewardship Project organizers traveled across the country to visit other beginning farmer training programs and build support for BFRDP, it became evident that the community-based aspect is critical to success of such initiatives.
“Community-based programs are the best way to train beginning farmers and it is of the highest importance to the success of BFRDP and to the success of beginning farmers in general that the community-based approach is a clear priority,” said Bacigalupo.
Groups in the region receiving initial BFRDP grants include the Land Stewardship Project, Farmers’ Legal Action Group (St. Paul, Minn.) and the Midwest Organic and Sustainable Education Service (Spring Valley, Wis.). The Land Stewardship Project’s grant will be used to coordinate a program for helping various beginning farmer initiatives across the country work collaboratively on improving their training programs.
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The Land Stewardship Project event at Hidden Stream Farm on Nov. 3 received extensive media coverage:
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