Meeting fairshare's new Executive Director

I joined the FairShare team as the Executive Director at the beginning of April, and I am so excited to be part of this amazing organization!

Developing stronger, more robust food systems has been my area of interest since I graduated from high school. I started out with an internship on an organic vegetable farm, and that experience inspired me to come to Madison to get involved in sustainable agriculture work. At UW Madison, I studied biology, with focus areas in plant sciences and ecology. Following graduation I had the chance to sit on the Board of Directors of Mifflin Street Community Co-op, where I started to develop relationships within the local food system. The bulk of my time in food comes from my experience founding and scaling the Quince & Apple Company, a small-batch food company making preserves, pickles, syrups and candied nuts.

Recently, my husband and I decided to sell the business, and the position at FairShare opened up before I had even started thinking about job searching - it was my dream job and I had to apply! FairShare is a truly special organization that I’ve known about since my first year in college, when I bought the second-edition spiral bound Asparagus to Zucchini cookbook to learn how to cook for my 21-person housing co-op.

The FairShare Board of Directors has identified a few key priorities for the organization, which will be my main goals as I get started in my new role. First, the organization has grown a lot over the last few years, and we are working on developing new systems and processes to support the updated organizational size. Second, as we settle back into a more normal post-pandemic time, we are ready to clarify our mission & vision and update our strategic plan, with a focus on continuing to weave equity throughout our organizational goals. Finally, we are thinking about FairShare’s long-term financial sustainability and how our organizational structure can best support fundraising.

My kids, making pickles at Quince & Apple

I look forward to diving into these topics, and to being part of the awesome community that is promoting and supporting sustainable agriculture throughout the Midwest. My main joy in life is cooking and eating fun local food with my family (I really felt I’d scored big the other day when my 9 year old excitedly asked if I’d made nettle potato pancakes again for dinner!). I am so glad that I get to come to work every day and help build our amazing local CSA resources for now and future generations!

Gathering Growers, Creating Community

I joined the FairShare team in July of last year through a joint position with UW-Madison Extension. My role as Vegetable Educator has been primarily to support vegetable farmers around the Milwaukee area, creating a supportive community of new and established growers.

I have been involved in vegetable production since I was young (although I am still young at heart, I hope!) and enjoyed working for Peter Seely at Springdale Farm, as well as on an Amish produce farm. These experiences, in addition to running my own CSA farm and working with farmers all over the world, have shown me the power of a strong and supportive community of growers.

A big part of what I do is building relationships with farmers. By visiting farms and speaking with growers on a personal level, I hope to get to know farmers and understand their challenges and successes. My conversations with both farmers and agricultural professionals allows me to act as a connector - when a farmer encounters a challenge, I try to connect them with someone who can work with them to help find a solution.

Farmers Sur and Martice work with 2-wheel tractor weeding tools at Fondy Farm, part of a Sustainable Agriculture & Research Education (SARE) - funded FairShare project.

By understanding the issues facing farmers today, the FairShare team can also work to create educational events and collaborative conversations around these topics. This could be either a big winter conference with hundreds of farmers, like the Organic Vegetable Production Conference, and, more informally, Grower Gatherings.

Milwaukee-area farmers gathered in March to discuss the results of a farm-profitability survey written by farmers and FairShare and UW-Madison staff.

Grower Gatherings bring together a group of farmers in a geographic region to learn from each other about a specific issue or topic area. A few examples of previous grower gatherings include: learning about the greenhouse irrigation system on a farm, participating in a field-walk to learn about crop rotation, or discussions on farm labor. I have found that only farmers truly ‘get’ farmers, and so in addition to improving technical skills, the grower gatherings are also important as a social time for farmers to check-in with each other, meet new colleagues, informally solve problems, and of course, to laugh and have fun. Some of the most successful aspects of grower gatherings are often after the formal activities end, where growers can relax and share their problems and joys with the only other people who understand their reality.

Different People, Different Culture - Same love for food

I joined the FairShare team about 6 months ago, and have been so excited to combine my knowledge of HMoob (Hmong) culture with my passion for agriculture. Farming has always been part of my life, and my family carried over their knowledge of farming to the United States when they moved here from Laos. Being a son in a HMoob immigrant family, I understand the many challenges that HMoob growers face in selling their products - from language barriers and difficulties accessing markets, to drastically different farming practices.

FairShare received a USDA Local Food Purchasing Program (LFPP) grant in 2021, with the goal to help build resilience and aggregate market sales sourcing primarily from HMoob growers. I joined the team to help connect HMoob growers with resources, education, and opportunities to empower them to become more resilient in the face of climate and market changes.

During my time with FairShare, we have engaged in deep conversation with Marbleseed, the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade, and Consumer Protection (DATCP), UW-Madison, Garden To Be, Central Rivers Farmshed, Rooted, Big River Farms, Wisconsin Food Hub, Fondy Food, The Good Acre, the Wisconsin Hmong Association, and The Hmong Institute to ensure that a variety of voices, experiences, and expertise are factored into the work we are engaged in.

In the upcoming months, I will be working to intentionally collaborate with multiple HMoob organizations throughout Wisconsin, and work in conjunction with our project partners to set up grower gatherings and workshops for HMoob growers in Madison, Milwaukee, Wausau, and La Crosse.

My goal is that my work will be able to connect the HMoob community to not only the many resources that FairShare provides to growers, but also to everyone involved in improving and strengthening our food system. Because even though many of us have different cultural backgrounds, we all share the same type of love - the love for FOOD!