June Local Food News - celebrating Pride, National Dairy Month and new funding

King County, Washington sent this bulletin at 06/29/2023 10:00 AM PDT

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King County would like to welcome you to Local Food Initiative News. You are receiving this email because you are involved with King County's Local Food Initiative. Please encourage others to sign up to spread the word about local food in King County.

‘It’s all done with a labor of love from the community’: UTOPIA promotes food access and sovereignty from the QTPI community to all

Once word got out that UTOPIA was distributing food, requests for assistance came flooding in from across South King County communities, and UTOPIA responded by opening their doors to anyone in need of food.

UTOPIA has since grown from serving 12 to over 400 households per month. And, UTOPIA now partners with DoorDash to directly deliver food boxes; hosts the Makeki food pantry; serves free monthly hot meals, and farms fresh produce on a quarter-acre of land.

From local grass to glass bottles: Direct-to-consumer dairies innovating to stay on the Enumclaw Plateau

The Enumclaw Plateau has been the epicenter of King County dairy production for over a century. However, the past few decades have seen dozens of dairies close or switch to producing different products. In 2012, when Haylee and Ryan Mensonides began their organic dairy in Enumclaw, there were 22 dairies on the plateau. Now, there are six.

Two of these dairies are direct-to-consumer that sell or will sell products grown, processed, and packaged by the producer: Mount Rainier Creamery and Fantello Creamery.

Leveling the fields in Western Washington: Black Farmers Collective receives USDA grant to lower barriers for underrepresented farmers

“We started out with this idea of looking at health disparities in communities, especially the Black community. We saw that one of the things people could do is go back to their roots and grow their own food. That was kind of the genesis of this idea.”

Ray Williams, director of Black Farmers Collective (BFC), started community organizing with this idea 20 years ago. Five years ago, BFC came into being as an organization to seize the opportunity to lease land from the Washington State Department of Transportation to create Yes Farm, Seattle’s largest Black-led urban farm.

Black Farmers Collective farmers harvesting produce

Announcements

Tilth Conference 2023

Register here by July 28 for discounted tickets

Mark your calendars for this year's Tilth Conference, Thursday-Saturday, October 26-28, in-person at Fort Worden in Port Townsend, WA. Now in its 49^th year, the Tilth Conference brings together hundreds of farmers, food system professionals, composters, researchers and educators for more than 25 lectures, workshops and panel discussions that highlight Washington’s farmers and farm businesses. Requests for session proposals are currently being accepted through July 7th.

SoilCon Field Day

July 27 @ 12:00 pm - 4:00 pm

The Washington Soil Health Initiative (WaSHI) and WSU’s Center for Sustaining Agriculture and Natural Resources are excited to announce SoilCon Field Day 2023! Learn about soil health and new techniques and technologies for soil management.

Learn more and register here.

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