08/06/08 Finding the Farm

Finding the Farm. I'm Greg Martin with today's Line On Agriculture. Farming is dead. Have you heard that one before? I am curious as to who really believes that. Not Mary Embleton, Executive Director of Cascade Harvest Coalition who oversees the Washington Farm Link Program. EMBLETON: There are way more people that want to get into farming than there are landowners enrolled in the programs. So it's one thing I find really interesting to go, I go and talk a lot to different people and they say "farming is dead," "nobody wants to farm," "nobody can make a living," and it's like well I have a list here in Washington of 300 people that want to get into farming. The program Mary is talking about is Farm Link which helps to pair people wanting to get into farming with farmers and land owners who for whatever reason are looking to try something different. EMBLETON: If you are someone who is looking to find farmland you tell us what your experience and practice has been in agriculture, what your resources might bring to a link or a match, what kind of additional information you would like to have, where you want to farm, what size, what enterprises  things like that. On the other side they provide information as to how much land, where it's located, whether they want to lease, partner or sell. Embleton says the program is nearing 10 years old. EMBLETON: We launched it as a pilot project in '99. It actually transitioned to us; I was actually part of the consulting team that helped develop it for King County. They started it as a pilot program and then in 2002 they transitioned the program to our non-profit which is Cascade Harvest Coalition. Cascade Harvest Coalition oversees a number of other projects across the state. EMBLETON: We are a regional non-profit that works to support agriculture by connecting consumers more directly with consumers. We do that through a number of programs; certainly Farm Link which we've been talking about. We also have a buy local and consumer education program called Puget Sound Fresh that is the 12 counties that touch Puget Sound. We do a lot of workshops and things to try to hook farmers up with new markets, we call those Farm to Table Workshops. We do those around the state. For more information log on to www.cascadeharvest.org. That's today's Line On Agriculture. I'm Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.