In this episode, Sarah talks with two amazing partners the Ohio Association of Foodbanks works with through the Ohio Community + Agriculture + Nutrition (CAN) Program, funded through the USDA’s Local Food Purchase Assistance (LFPA) program. Jamie Pritchard joins us from WIT Farm and Walt Bonham joins from the Food Lab and the Richland Gro-Op. We talk about the importance of local food systems, the historical context that makes it difficult for BIPOC farmers and other farmers left out of USDA programs to scale and grow, and how local farms are innovatively collaborating with one another to expand their reach and impact.  

Thank you, Walt and Jamie, for joining us and thank you to Carrie at OAF and Ainsley at Ohio Department of Agriculture for listening in and participating in the conversation with us!  

References: 

Check out Jamie’s family-owned business, WIT Farm at their website, on Instagram and Facebook.  

Check out Walt’s business, The Food Lab, and the Richland Gro-Op. You can find the Richland Gro-Op on Instagram and Facebook and the Food Lab on Facebook. 

Visit Walt and other farmers at the North End Community Improvement Collaborative (NECIC) farm and volunteer with them! 

For the farmers listening, here is the podcast Jamie mentioned, My Digital Farmer Podcast, by Corinna Bench from Shared Legacy Farms. You can also check out Corrin’s Farm Marketing School here. 
 

Listen to our previous episode on Ohio CAN with representatives from Ohio Department of Agriculture. 

Learn more about the Ohio CAN program here.  

Find your local foodbank to find help, volunteer, and donate here.      

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Ohio Association of Foodbanks is a registered 501c3 nonprofit organization without party affiliation or bias. We are Ohio’s largest charitable response to hunger and our mission is to assist Ohio’s 12 Feeding America foodbanks in providing food and other resources to people in need and to pursue areas of common interest for the benefit of people in need.