As 2024 comes to a close, we’re filled with gratitude for all the work we’ve done together. This year has been a testament to the power of community, generosity, and shared purpose. To celebrate, we’ve put together our Top 10 Highlights from 2024. Thank you to all who supported us in this work and aided in our mission of fostering just, vibrant, and sustainable communities. Because of our community, we have a solid foundation and a clear path forward heading into 2025. 

If you’re inspired by our work below, we invite you to make a gift today at  renewingthecountryside.org/donate.

#1. Urban Agriculture

The Urban Agriculture initiative wrapped its first year by awarding micro grants, with direction from a community-based steering committee, to Twin Cities Metro Area urban farmers and gardeners including nine commercial farms, 15 non-commercial farms, 13 educational People’s Gardens, and five organizations that support urban farmers and gardeners.These projects are expanding urban growing capacity by building raised beds and installing irrigation; teaching kids to cook with locally grown food; distributing native seeds; increasing fresh food offerings for food insecure neighborhoods across St. Paul including Rondo & Frogtown; and much more! Learn more here.

#2. Minnesota Women in Conservation (MNWiC)

MNWiC kicked off in 2024, another great example of RTC's core value of collaborative partnerships leading women's education. For the past four years, RTC has served as a founding organizational partner for Wisconsin Women in Conservation (WiWiC), growing it into an award-winning program through the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) and championing women in conservation. With high interest in adapting the WiWiC program in other states, RTC is the first to lead this effort by launching it in our home state of Minnesota. MNWiC has the conservation building blocks of WiWiC yet is molded by four regional coordinators to create programming best suited for MN women committed to conservation. MNWiC held four in-person events this fall in Aitkin, Madison, Webster and Dilworth, bringing women together for conservation conversations. Learn more here!

#3. FEAST! Local Foods Marketplace Festival

The 11th annual FEAST! Local Foods Marketplace was the biggest yet! There was an increased number of food and beverage businesses, 35% of which were new to the festival, and the total attendee count was up by 25% over last year. In addition to samples and sales from 85 businesses, attendees enjoyed five engaging cooking demos, kids' activities that included seed crafts and veggie sampling with nutritionists, and over 300 people voting for their favorite booth. The People's Choice Award was presented by John Monson of Compeer Financial to Josey Chu of Madame Chu, a Southeast Asian sauces company out of Madison, WI who has participated in every FEAST event since 2019 and was runner-up in the 2023 voting. Learn more here.

#4. The State Fair

For 18 years, Renewing the Countryside has curated an interactive, educational food & farming exhibit at the MN State Fair Eco Experience Building. In 2024, we demonstrated how agroforestry systems create resilient food production and explored ways we can all contribute to these sustainable systems.

It is hard to synthesize 12 amazingly dynamic days into one paragraph, so here are some highlights:

• Fairgoers learned about agroforestry practices such as wind breaks, riparian buffers, and silvopasture through our series of educational displays and fun kid activities. Our display reached 218,354 attendees!
• Our daily cooking demonstrations and free food sampling showed fairgoers where they can find local and sustainably grown agroforestry products like maple syrup, apples, elderberry, hazelnuts, and even chickens! Over the 12 days, 95,600 free local food samples were shared.
• We filled 144 volunteer shifts (a huge thank you to all of our volunteers!)

#5. Farmland Access: A Success Story

Vincent Kimaiga immigrated to Minnesota from Kenya in 2008. He had been growing tomatoes, collards, and various herbs in community gardens with his wife and parents for years, but in 2021, when Kilimo Minnesota co-founder Moses Momanyi suggested they rent land and grow a greater diversity of produce, Vincent acted on the encouragement and took up a lease with Kilimo, an organic incubator farm in Lino Lakes, Minnesota that supports African immigrants in land access and farmer education. That first year Vincent sold produce to other farmers who had contracts for markets and in year two, his family secured three contracts with The Good Acre, the largest non-profit food hub in Minnesota. “In 2023 we decided we wanted a bigger piece of land. Something more secure—more permanent—that had water access. We started looking and inquiring. At first, we were just looking to lease. I only needed an acre or two.” Vincent was given a referral for someone to help him find land and Vincent found himself speaking with Farmland Access Navigator and USDA Connector Katie Kubovcik. Read Vincent's full Farmland Access story here.

#6. Farmers' Market Food Hub

In Minnesota, where rich agricultural land meets eager rural communities, a movement is growing - The Farmers' Market Food Hub. The food hubs are connecting more local farmers with broader communities. Farmers' markets serve as vital hubs, bridging the gap between producers and consumers, but they can also provide challenges to growers and makers; too much or too little product, distance to nearest farmers' market, and time. The Farmers' Market Food Hub aggregation project pools products from various local farmers to create CSA boxes, supply to wholesale buyers like schools, and more; bridging the gap for local growers AND local buyers. This project aims to build a sustainable future for farmers and buyers alike. There are nine farmers' markets in MN offering food hub services and a robust website where local food can be purchased as well! 

To learn more about Food Hubs click the image above, visit farmersmarkethub.org or contact [email protected] with questions.

#7. Go Farm Connect

Go Farm Connect is a farmer-led project with a wide network of peer connectors/farmers providing one-on-one support to beginning and historically underserved farmers, helping them understand and access USDA programs. Since it's beginning, connecters have collaborated with over 30 USDA offices across Minnesota and Wisconsin hosting events at farms and bringing farmers into USDA offices. Currently, Go Farm Connect is promoting the USDA's Marketing Assistance for Specialty Crops (MASC) program which provides financial assistance to specialty crop producers to help them expand domestic markets or develop new markets for their crops. If you or a specialty crop farmer you know is interested in applying, reach out to our team! Our connecters can help you with the paperwork and provide translation assistance in Hmong, Arabic, Somali, Swahili, Spanish, and French. To get started, fill out a Farmer Intake form for MASC Help and watch this webinar. 

Learn more about Go Farm connect at gofarmconnect.org or contact [email protected].

#8. Farm to School & Farm to Early Childcare

Farm to School - This year, Renewing the Countryside, along with other partners and stakeholders, joined the Minnesota Department of Agriculture and the Minnesota Department of Education for the official launch of Minnesotas first-ever Farm to Kids Strategic Plan. This is a five year roadmap for collaboratively advancing local food procurement and agricultural education in K-12 schools and early care settings around the state. The official launch of this strategic plan was the same day as the Great Apple Crunch, a day where everyone bites into locally grown apple at the exact same time to celebrate local farmers, healthy kids, and strong communities!

Farm to Early Care - Through a partnership with the Hmong American Farmer Association (HAFA) the Farm to Early Care program distributed weekly CSA boxes of locally grown produce to home childcare facilities across St. Paul. These CSA boxes enable the youngest eaters in our community (0 – 5 year olds) to build relationships with fresh produce and  incorporating locally grown food and recently harvested nutrients into their snacks/meals each week. Each CSA box also comes with educational newsletters for the kids and providers. As of this fall, our network has 11 in-home early care sites and two larger early care centers in the Rondo, Frogtown, North End, and East Side neighborhoods of Saint Paul.

Along with delivering CSA boxes, this past spring, in collaboration with the U of M Extension office of Ramsey County, Farm to Early Care provided raised garden beds, soil and gardening tools to our early care sites, connecting and introducing the kids to gardening and growing food.

#9. Come & Get It: Agrotourism

The 2024 growing season marked the second year of the Come & Get It program with Renewing the Countryside (RTC). In partnership with the Minnesota Farmers Union (MFU) and the Sustainable Farming Association (SFA), RTC helped host nine on-farm food events across Minnesota. In Year one, farmers received tools, resources, information, and coaching from RTC, MFU, and SFA to learn the ins and outs of on-farm food service and determine if it was a good fit for them. By year two, these farmers were equipped to plan and host their own on-farm food events, supported by grant funding from RTC. 

Each event was truly unique, capturing the essence of the farm and the community that supported it. Kelsey Wulf, the organizer of the Deep Roots Festival, focused on connecting consumers with farms to show the care and attention put into food production, inspiring support for farmers and reducing food waste. Tracy Jonkman, at Meet Your Makers, partnered with Sharing Our Roots to explore land access opportunities for immigrant and emerging farmers. Mary Fischer of Sowing Seeds for the Future wanted children to experience farm life, while Kelley Rajala of Aitkin Summer Sip & Savor sought to expand local food sales in sparse rural areas and diversify income through on-farm events.