Dear Friend of Lorain County Agriculture,

The ground is still frozen, but spring will soon be here along with the start of another growing season. As we plan for the growing season ahead, I would like to invite you to participate in a conversation about future opportunities for Lorain County agriculture as more interest develops in connecting farms with local markets.

The conversation will take place on Monday, March 15 from 4:00-6:00pm at:
Wellington branch of the Lorain County Community College-
151 Commerce Drive, across from the McDonald’s on Route 58
Wellington, OH 44090

The conversation will be facilitated by Steve Bosserman of Bosserman and Associates and Leah Miller with the Ohio Agriculture Research and Devepoment Center in Wooster. I sit with them on a regional leadership council that is working to build strong and sustainable local economies that protect the natural resources and agricultural lands in Northeast Ohio. The conversation will focus on how we can promote and expand local economic, farm, and business development opportunities in Lorain County.

This conversation is a part of an effort supported by the Northeast Ohio Fund for our Economic Future. The plan is to solicit worthy business ideas and to flush out those ideas into business cases that might be ready for business planning and possible start-up support.

Are you thinking of starting a local food or farming-related business? Are you thinking about new markets or ways to support your current food and farming activities? Are you interested in seeing more market connections between rural and urban communities in Lorain County? Do you know someone who might benefit from this conversation?

The end goal of the project will be to build a Lorain County investment portfolio and a resource pool based upon opportunities identified through county meetings and discussions such as this one. Considering that there is about $625 million spent each year on food in Lorain County alone (with about $65 million on fruits and vegetables) and $10 billion spent in Northeast Ohio, there is significant growth opportunity in local food systems development.

Whether you are an educator, urban market gardener, a rural farmer, community development specialist, business owner, or institutional representative, your participation in the discussion may help us accelerate opportunities in the local food system, increase the number of potential enterprises or full or part-time jobs in Lorain County, and increase the land-base devoted to the cultivation of crops for direct marketing.

I hope that you can join us in this important and exciting conversation!

-Brad Masi,
Founder, New Agrarian Center
Oberlin, Ohio