Though it’s been around for about 17 years, nonprofit Sharing Our Roots is trying something new this year. It’s creating a support system for beginning, newly emerging, and BIPOC farmers. It also teaches regenerative agriculture techniques while also addressing food insecurity within southern Minnesota.
Madeline Davenport, who grows flowers for weddings and deliveries, installs irrigation hoses on the plot of land she rents from Sharing Our Roots farm in Northfield, Minnesota
Executive Director Rocky Casillas Aguirre said Sharing Our Roots opened up all of its 100 acres this year to prospective farmers in the area.
“Land access is the single largest barrier to emerging farmers and farmers of color,” Aguirre said. “A lot of these farmers can’t afford land in this area and maybe have farmed in other places, but not with a long-term lease.”
He said for farmers to have food sovereignty, the right of people to have healthy and culturally appropriate food produced through ecologically sustainable methods, and the right to define their food and agriculture systems, they need land.
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