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Ensuring the health of our farms and food: A Minnesota chef and farmer’s mission
Farmers and those of us in the food business are the foundation of this nation’s food economy, especially in Minnesota — a state with an impressive and rapidly growing food scene, whose agriculture production generates over $106 billion annually in total economic impact and currently supports 388,134 jobs. And yet we are still awaiting the essential and overdue […]
Digital Fair Repair Act is important to farmers but not enough
Beginning July 1, Minnesotans will gain new options for fixing their smartphones, laptops and even home appliances. This is all thanks to the Digital Fair Repair Act, which is the most comprehensive right to repair law in the nation and was passed by the Minnesota Legislature last year. When the new law goes into effect […]
The Biden administration is right to fight corporate concentration in meatpacking
Corporate monopolies threaten the future of Minnesota’s rural communities. They have decimated local businesses, shipped jobs overseas and driven family farmers from their land. None of this is inevitable. It’s the result of policy choices. One of those choices has been to abandon rules meant to protect family farmers and ranchers from the predatory and […]
A legislative agenda for Minnesota’s family farmers
With the start of a new legislative session comes a once-in-a-generation opportunity. Legislative leaders are faced with a historic $17.6 billion projected surplus — by far the largest in history — and a DFL trifecta for the first time in nearly 10 years. Minnesota Farmers Union (MFU) has been advocating for family farmers and rural […]
Consolidation is driving family farms out of business — Opinion
Every August, Farmfest is a great time to reconnect with farmers and friends and catch up on others we know in common. I was reflecting on some of those people as I drove home from Farmfest this year and started thinking about the “ghost farmsteads.” You’ve likely heard of ghost towns, early villages which have […]