Progress report for ENC20-190
Project Information
The Mansfield Microfarm Project (MMP) is a community-university collaborative to create economic development through sustainable microfarming (small-plot, high-intensity organic agriculture) in post-industrial urban spaces. Piloted in Mansfield, Ohio and in its second year, MMP cultivates a cooperative urban production, aggregation, marketing and advocacy system that enables small-scale producers to compete in wholesale specialty-crop markets. With initial funding from the Foundation for Food and Agricultural Research (FFAR), MMP leveraged OSU expertise to develop, research, and implement the production system of microfarm-based specialty-crops in various settings. Now, the Richland Gro-op (RGO), a cooperative of microfarmers established in 2019, seeks to partner with Ohio State and NECIC to create a training program for low-opportunity novice producers in order to grow co-op membership in the future. This proposal would provide the personnel and supplies to formalize a comprehensive training program, develop it into a module to train additional trainers, implement it with at least two cohorts of beginning farmers in Mansfield, and formally evaluate the program’s efficacy and impact. Anticipated outcomes include increased knowledge and skills regarding sustainable microfarming, organic farming and business management skills among participants and trainers; creation and implementation of farms by program graduates using environmentally sustainable and sound business practices; and a durable new urban food production system, through the marketing cooperative with new farmer-members equipped with the training and support to succeed. This funding will enable MMP project staff to hire and train the appropriate partners to develop, deliver, and disseminate a sustainable microfarming training program.
The Curriculum Development phase will result in a replicable curriculum for entry-level microfarmer training and a train-the-trainer module. We will create internet and hard copy versions, as well as a catalog of training materials, that include best practices for small-plot sustainable agriculture, food safety guidelines (GAP), recordkeeping templates, and worksheets for crop plan, budgeting, and business plans.
Recruitment activities will target 20 applicants each for years 2021 and 2022, and we aim to accept ten entry-level farmers into the program each year, targeting individuals who live in low-economic opportunity areas in Mansfield. Outputs will include the program application and a rubric for evaluating/assessing applications.
Programmatic outputs include implementation of two years of a ten-month training program for entry-level farmers that include regular (minimum: bimonthly) workshops and a mentored production experience (ten participants each year), as well as a minimum of twelve continuing education trainings for RGO growers (target attendance: ten growers per workshop). Partnerships will also be outputs of the training program implementation. These partnerships include OSU-Mansfield, OSU Extension, the Ohio Ecological Food and Farm Association, the Richland Gro-op, IdeaWorks, and Business mentors (from the USDA, Farm Bureau and Farm Credit).
The program process and outcomes evaluation will have the following outputs: pre-, mid-, and post-assessment materials and results for program participants and training educators for each implementation year. Additional outputs will be interview protocols and interview results for program participants and training educators for each implementation year, to serve as tools for the ongoing feedback loop for continued program improvement. There will also be annual program evaluation reports, including recommendations for curriculum and programmatic improvements, program process, and outcomes evaluation. These outputs will provide current team members and future adopters with tools and resources that will inform the annual refining of the curriculum, resulting in updated curriculum and program materials each year and for other groups seeking to use the content. This is an iterative process that will repeat each year by any user.
One last output relates to developing the ongoing support for the microfarm system and practical agricultural knowledge exchange within the Mansfield community and its related entities — local governments, school systems, and potential business buyers such as healthcare systems. One challenge is the need to sustain the education program coordinator in the long-term beyond this grant; this will require collaboration, built upon the open-door inclusion of these audiences. When this occurs, the following partnerships will be the main output from this activity: Richland County Extension office, State Extension leadership, Richland County Commissioners and other local governments, NECIC, Mansfield City Schools and OSU Mansfield.
Cooperators
Education
The curriculum being developed and field tested is designed to provide new and beginner farmers with a foundation in small business development and management, cooperative membership and management, and commercial crop production such that they can launch their own microfarm business and participate in a crop-plan-based aggregation cooperative. This is approached through a combination of classroom, field-based, and hands-on activities. Classroom work provides an overview of the microfarming system and several of its critical components -- commercial production, farm and business management, and cooperative farming -- before students move to a "farming bootcamp" comprised of three consecutive seasons of crop production during which they become responsible for cultivating ever more challenging crops on an increasing scale each season. Hands on lessons in use of small farm tools and implements, farm site management, mechanical planting, irrigation systems, integrated pest management, cultivation tools and techniques, harvesting practices, and more take place throughout each growing season confronting students with real life crop management problems and challenges with measured results. Students learn together on a large training farm to help cultivate a community of practice around microfarming where future members of a shared cooperative developed knowledge, skills, language, and experience together to acquire a shared repertoire and a living context for mutual engagement. We aid them in creating business plans and incorporating microfarm businesses and we facilitate their creation of a farmer-owned cooperative in order to help them into the institutional architecture that will them succeed as farmers.
Education & Outreach Initiatives
Community event designed to be informational about microfarming system and potential for interested families and individuals to participate in training and the potential for partnerships development around system needs and assets.
More than 100 community residents and local businesses joined the event which consisted of an overview of microfarming and training and three sets of break-out sessions organized around the community needs to launch the training program.
Community members learned about the microfarm training opportunity, several businesses and the public schools became key partners in acquiring land access and training site. Several participants expressed an interest in undertaking the training.
To recruit up to twenty interested new or beginning farmers to participate in the microfarm training program.
This event featured a dinner provided by local restaurants and caterers interested in becoming buyers from a local produce cooperative, a detailed overview of the training program, it's components, and its time commitments, and a lengthy q&a with several of the working microfarmers who participated in the first round of trainings in Mansfield. More than 130 people attended, over half expressed an interest in participating in the trainings. Since then, and as expected, that number has been reduced to 15 committed participants.
We learned that in order to find enough people for whom a small farm business seems appealing we needed to cast a very wide net. However, the result exceeded our minimum expectations for ultimate enrollment.
To train a cohort of microfarmers to operate their own microfarm business and participate in and help manage their own member-owned cooperative in Marion, Ohio.
This was our opportunity to field-test our curriculum revisions.
Community members learned about the microfarm training opportunity, several businesses and the public schools became key partners in acquiring land access and training site. Several participants expressed an interest in undertaking the training.
We learned that in order to find enough people for whom a small farm business seems appealing we needed to cast a very wide net. However, the result exceeded our minimum expectations for ultimate enrollment.
Educational & Outreach Activities
Participation Summary:
Learning Outcomes
Project Outcomes
Based on interviews with working microfarmers, we learned how to revise the curriculum to provide the right knowledge at the right time and to integrate practices for successful farming and cooperative membership directly into the training protocol.
We completed a revision of the curriculum and have begun offering it to a new cohort of microfarmers in Marion, Ohio.
All of the microfarmers who participated in our first training program in Mansfield are still working commercial farmers (https://richlandgro-op.com).