New funding for Farm & Food Care Ontario

Apr 14, 2022

OMAFRA to provide $547,200 infunding to Farm & Food Care Ontario.

By Andrew Joseph, Farms.com; Image courtesy of Farm & Food Care Ontario

At the Farm & Food Care Ontario (FFCO) annual conference on April 13, 2022, Ontario Minister of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs (OMAFRA) Lisa Thompson announced a funding agreement to contribute up to $547,200 to FFCO’s outreach initiatives over the next three years.

Farm & Food Care Ontario is a coalition of farmers, agriculture and food partners proactively working together to ensure public trust and confidence in food and farming.

This funding will be put towards supporting five of the organization’s activities to raise awareness and appreciation of Ontario farmers and food producers:

FFCO’s Breakfast on/from the Farm events which provide a unique and personal experience for non farming Ontarians to visit and explore agriculture with working farmers each year;
Farm tours for culinary students which allow them to learn about raising livestock and horticultural products they prepare in the kitchen;
Interviews, photography and videography work showcasing the critical work that seasonal agricultural workers and temporary foreign workers do in Ontario for the More than a Migrant Worker initiative;
The Garden in a Box program that connects home gardeners with Ontario farmers;
Numerous digital consumer outreach activities including virtual field trips highlighting the diversity of farms and food processing facilities to consumers.

“Ensuring Ontarians have the facts on where their food comes from, how it grows, and how it is made is key to growing the next generation of leaders for Ontario’s agri-food sector,” said Thompson. “This important investment will empower Farm and Food Care Ontario to deliver these critical programs.”

As a registered charity, funding for Farm & Food Care Ontario largely comes from farmers, farm organizations, agribusinesses and others through memberships and program partnerships. This funding is the first Farm & Food Care has received from the provincial government for public trust work and will support these initiatives until 2025.

Bonnie den Haan, FFCO’s Chair, stated: “FFCO is delighted by this support from the province. FFCO has always had a reputation for doing great work on incredibly limited budgets. This funding is a huge show of support from the provincial government for the work we do and will really enable us to expand the reach of our initiatives.”

For more information on Farm & Food Care Ontario, visit https://www.farmfoodcareon.org/.

Video: Alberta Honey: A Day at Molenkamp Honey Farms

When was the last time you read the label on your honey?

We spent a day at Molenkamp Honey Farms with Michael Molenkamp, who has been keeping bees for 17 seasons and runs three to four thousand hives. In mid-September, he was finishing treatments and getting his bees ready for winter, and he walked us through how Alberta honey gets made.

Alberta has just 150 commercial beekeepers running 300,000 colonies, and together they produce 40% of Canada’s honey. Long summer days and golden canola fields give Alberta honey a light flavour that’s hard to match anywhere else.

Molenkamp calls Alberta beekeepers some of the most resilient farmers he knows. There’s plenty of Alberta honey to go around, but a lot on our shelves isn’t from here, so his ask is simple. Give the label a second look and choose honey made by Alberta beekeepers, or buy straight from a beekeeper near you.