Farmshed’s members have always been a key to linking local communities to local Farmers. Today your membership is innovating the building of a resilient local food economy. Memberships allow Farmshed to keep resources flexible and allow continuity in programs, allow staff to focus on impacts and allow small non-profits like us to be responsive to community needs and not dependent on grant money.
It's because of members we are able to do things like help farmers develop more value added products for example. Kitchen staff this summer have been processing and packaging vegetables into fun bite size snacks. These snacks are then distributed to the Wood county school district for summer school snacks. Staff is also helping farms with an abundance of garlic scapes and producing value-added items pesto for farmers to then distribute at market or within their CSA models.
When you decide to become a Harvester or Barn Raiser, you are helping Farmshed build health equity and are directly supporting our food security efforts, where we are intentional about increasing access to locally sourced healthful food and culturally appropriate food resources. For example when Marshfield clinic came to Farmshed with $2,000.00 in sponsorship to see fresh local foods accompany the senior stockbox program. Farmshed staff could invest time to aggregate food from farms and then deliver it to the stockbox drop site. It's also with these levels of support or program and finance committee can begin allocating funding for scholarships and discounted ticket prices for workshops and education opportunities.
Trevor Drake
Farmshed Executive Director