Posts tagged local food

Film Screening on Opportunities for Food and Farming Livelihoods

Finger Lakes Bioneers, Cornell Small Farms Program, and the Glen Theater will co-present the Watkins Glen premiere of The Greenhorns, a 60-minute documentary film directed by young farmer-in-training Severine von Tscharner Fleming. Audience members will take an inspiring journey across the US to explore new food and farming enterprises, rural and urban possibilities, and diverse producer and consumer initiatives. The film-making team, based in the Hudson Valley, celebrates the hopeful new generation of young farmers – especially important given that the average age of American farm owners is around 57.

Released in Spring 2011, this inspiring movie is now being shown around the country by community-based organizations and innovative venues to help promote and build a more sustainable economy. Citizens around the state of New York understand that this is not just a long-term quest because they can see that local solutions are being developed and implemented now.

The Greenhorns (http://www.thegreenhorns.net/) film screening is on Tuesday, December 6th at 7 PM. The Glen Theater is at 112 North Franklin Street in downtown Watkins Glen. Refreshments will be available at 6:30 pm.  After the screening, panelists and audience members will share comments and ideas related to the vitality of the Watkins Glen, Montour Falls, and Schuyler County economy, and explore how residents of the Seneca Lake watershed can continue to nurture and support current and emerging on-farm and food related businesses. Read the rest of this entry »

Cooperative Movement featured in Ithaca Times


Locally-owned cooperatives are an important tool for strengthening our local economy and building in self-reliance and resiliency.  Thanks to Dana Khromov for her excellent research into this topic for the August 3 Ithaca Times feature article “Cooperative Progress.” Her article does a great job of reviewing the many kinds of cooperatives we have in the Ithaca area, and the role they are playing in building a more just and democratic local economy.

We talked with her at length about the many benefits of worker-owned cooperatives and Sustainable Tompkins’s new study group on worker coops.  If you are interested in joining the Worker-Owned Cooperatives group or our Local Green Investing group, email Gay@sustainabletompkins.org.

The photo features Demarquis Graves of the Youth Farm Project, a collaboration between students from Lehman Alternative Community School, Southside Community Center, and the Full Plate Collective. The Youth Farm Project received a $750 Sustainable Tompkins Neighborhood Mini-Grant in June, 2010. (Photo by Rachel Phillipson)

IthaCan

IthaCan is a web-based social network that connects food enthusiasts, supporters of local agriculture, and people with an interest or question about food and sustainability. IthaCan especially focuses on teaching about and supporting the preservation of food at home. IthaCan organizers hosted a number of events in the last year educating people about how to make the most of our local food bounty.

Get Foodie

A new show, ‘Get Foodie’, is sponsored by GreenStar Co-op. Carisa Fallon is the creative energy behind the show, which is carried on the Pegasys Network. In each episode, Fallon and her two daughters visit a local producer or farm, discuss what food is being served or grown, and then she and her daughters return home to prepare a dish using that food. The focus of the show is in teaching local families about the sustainable and delicious food options that are in their backyards. The episodes air locally and can also be found on youtube.com.

Finger Lakes Cheese Trail

The Finger Lakes Wine Country Tourism Marketing Association was inspired by the success of the Finger Lakes Wine Trail to create the Finger Lakes Cheese Trail. The ten cheese makers featured on the trail all make cheeses from the dairy products they produce on their own farms. The marketing association hopes the cheese trail will raise the visibility of both wines and cheeses within the region and promote buying local, thus helping all these local businesses to become more profitable.

FLORA

Regional chefs now have the opportunity to buy fresh local foods in the quantities they need thanks to FLORA, a new program developed by the Finger Lakes Organics Farm Collective and Regional Access Distributors. With this program, restaurants can buy directly from farms using the extensive FLORA catalogue. FLORA worked with over twenty different farms last season, and is expecting to add more farms from within the region.

Waffle Frolic

The waffles at Waffle Frolic are made entirely from scratch using local and organic ingredients. Also offered is a full espresso bar, featuring Coffee Labs Roasters coffee which is Fair Trade Certified and Bird Friendly; Coffee Labs maintains an overall commitment to sustainability. Waffle Frolic offers a book exchange program for its patrons.

Copper Oven

The Copper Oven, a new addition to the Cayuga Ridge Estate Winery, opened in April, featuring wood fired pizzas crafted from local and homegrown ingredients.The Copper Oven’s organic white clay oven is fired by a local renewable timber source and the disposables used are either compostable or recyclable. In line with Mary Jane Challen and Seth Kircher’s commitment to community, the couple donates 5% of their profits to Healthy Food For All, a locally based program that reduces the cost of fresh, locally grown produce for low-income families in the region.

Brookton’s Market

Brookton’s Market, which had its Grand Opening in June, joined the “buy local” movement, offering local food products to shoppers in Brooktondale. The grocery features natural and organic products.

Local Self-Reliance Gets a Boost from Sustainable Tompkins

What does growing vegetables have to do with economic security? According to community leaders Kirtrina Baxter of Southside Community Center and Dave Gell of the Black Locust Initiative, teaching young people how to garden is one of the surest ways to build both self-reliance and the entrepreneurial spirit so necessary to creating a resilient and thriving local economy. Sustainable Tompkins could not agree more, which is why Baxter’s Youth Farm Project and Gell’s Trumansburg Middle School Root Cellar were recent recipients of awards from their Neighborhood Mini-Grants Program.

Sustainable Tompkins is eager to support more projects like these and is calling on local citizens and grassroots groups to submit their applications by September 1 for the next round of funding. Over the last two years, the donor-supported program has distributed $14,455 to 35 projects with a goal of encouraging local self-reliance, strengthening neighborhood connections, and promoting long-term community well-being. Read the rest of this entry »