Dine Out for Farms

Dine Out for Farms. I'm Greg Martin with today's Line On Agriculture. The last time you dined out at a restaurant did you think about the fact that the food you ordered didn't just came from the freezer or some supplier...but a farmer? Jennifer Morrill, Director of Media Relations with American Farmland Trust says that's why they came up with the idea of the "Dine Out for Farms" promotion. MORRILL: This is American Farmland Trusts inaugural "Dine Out for Farms" week through the 16th and we were looking for a way to connect some important people and that's chefs, diners or consumers and the farm community. We know a lot of times in agriculture we sit in boardrooms or our association meetings and we kind of bemoan the fact that people think that milk comes from a carton and other instances like that and we're always looking for ways to connect and educate consumers. They have found that a restaurant is a great place to make that connection. MORRILL: At American Farmland Trust we have a saying "No Farms, No Food." And we think that it's very important to bring attention to the fact that we are losing about a million acres of our best farmlands in this country each year to paving over and development and things like that and so we wanted to bring attention to that. The Dine Out for Farms promotion couples local area restaurants with different promotions to help educate the customers. MORRILL: Obviously chef's are absolutely dependent on farmers to provide the ingredients so they can make their dishes and creations and we know that that's a place where the general public is spending a lot of time and a fair amount of money and we felt that it was a great place to bring everybody together so that they can learn more about agriculture, learn more about the issue of how important farmland is and how important farmers are. Here in the northwest there are 7 restaurants taking part through Oregon and Washington. MORRILL: There's just over 40 restaurants nationwide in 17 states and since it's out first year we left it a little bit open and we worked with the restaurants to find different events and mechanisms that worked for them so some of them are having a special event this week featuring say a discussion or an event with farmers and customers. Some have created a special dish for the week. That's today's Line On Agriculture. I'm Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network.