A New Collaboration to Highlight Veteran Food Producers

Taste the Local Difference (TLD) is excited to announce a new partnership with the Veterans in Agriculture (VIA) Network of Michigan Food and Farming Systems (MIFFS). The Veterans in Agriculture Network seeks to ensure the personal and professional prosperity of military veterans through connections to careers and opportunities in Agriculture. They offer farmer veterans access to resources, education, mentorship, and advocacy throughout Michigan, and their vet-to-vet approach provides a community for Michigan’s farmer veterans who work together to ensure the long-term success of one another.

Through this new collaboration, MIFFS and TLD will partner to produce a Veterans in Agriculture Product Guide to be published in Fall 2018. VIA Product Guides will be distributed widely across the state and offer a unique opportunity to connect consumers and other markets to veteran food producers. Any veteran farmer/food producer in Michigan can register their farm or food business to be included in the Guide by going to: https://michigan.localdifference.community

Questions about MIFFS Veterans in Agriculture Network:

Dylan Thomas, Director: [email protected]

Jeremy Huffman, Field Specialist (Flint area): [email protected]

Nicholas Kaminski, Field Specialist (Grand Rapids area): [email protected]

Questions about Taste the Local Difference:

Melissa Orzechowski, U.P. Local Food Coordinator: [email protected]

Bailey Samp, N.W. Local Food Coordinator: [email protected]

Molly Stepanski, N.E. Local Food Coordinator: [email protected]

Kelly Wilson, S.E. Local Food Coordinator: [email protected]

Kelly Wilson is the SE MI Local Food Coordinator for Taste the Local Difference. After a busy farm season, she is finally dusting off her running shoes again. If you have any favorite trails or routes you’d like to share, contact her at [email protected].