On Thursday, March 31, the community is invited to participate in a virtual event that will shed some light on the importance of saving farmland, while increasing access to fresh, local food. The live-streaming will also introduce people to the two host organizations – Western New York Land Conservancy and Providence Farm Collective (PFC) – that have partnered together to preserve regional farmlands.
PFC is a not-for-profit organization that leases farmland in Orchard Park where nearly 300 refugee, immigrant, and Black farmers grow healthy food for their children and their communities.
In order to best serve the community, the mission is to raise funds that will allow PFC to purchase the land that they are now farming. The funding will also go towards additional infrastructure that is required to make the property better suited for farming.
“Land Conservancy will permanently protect the farm with a conservation easement, and the farmers will always have land to call home.”
Anyone interested in learning more about this new arrangement, and the future of farmland in WNY, is invited to participate on Thursday, March 31, between 7:00 and 8:00 pm.
The event will feature presentations by:
- Jajean Rose-Burney, Deputy Executive Director of the Land Conservancy
- Kristin Heltman-Weiss, PFC Executive Director
- Hamadi Ali, PFC Markets Manager, who spent years at Kakuma Refugee Camp in Kenya after fleeing his war-torn native country, Somalia, in the early 1990s
This event is free and open to the public. To receive the YouTube link to attend, registration is required. Link to register: www.wnylc.org/events
Click here to learn more about PFC.