Recipient Organization
HMONG AMERICAN FARMERS ASSOCIATION
941 LAFOND AVE WEST STE 100
SAINT PAUL,MN 55104
Performing Department
(N/A)
Non Technical Summary
This project represents the continuation of a unique collaboration of half a dozen public and private, as well as rural and urban based organizations conceived of and spearheaded by two immigrant-led, community-based organizations (CBOs): the Hmong American Farmers Association (HAFA), as the lead, and the Latino Economic Development Center (LEDC), as a sub-awardee. In this proposal, HAFA and LEDC will recruit and develop a cohort of Hmong and Latino trainers through a train the trainer sub-program; develop a series of short videos in Hmong and Spanish; and lastly, emphasize that everyone is a teacher and everyone is a learner to reiterate that there are many ways of knowing. The long term goal of this project is to build thriving and sustainable farming operations, farmers and farming communities for the Hmong and Latino farmers in Minnesota. This can be achieved by (secondary goal #1): increasing the number of immigrant farmers' ability to make a successful living from farming while respecting traditional methods of learning and cultural practices, and (secondary goal #2): expanding economic opportunities for immigrant farmers and their children through collaborative marketing, value-added production and specialized farm business training.
Animal Health Component
(N/A)
Research Effort Categories
Basic
(N/A)
Applied
(N/A)
Developmental
(N/A)
Goals / Objectives
This project represents the continuation of a unique collaboration of half a dozen public and private, as well as rural and urban based organizations conceived of and spearheaded by two immigrant-led, community-based organizations (CBOs): the Hmong American Farmers Association (HAFA), as the lead, and the Latino Economic Development Center (LEDC), as a sub-awardee.In 2012, LEDC (with HAFA as a sub-awardee) received funds from the Beginning Farmers and Ranchers Development Program (BFRDP) to develop and implement two bi-lingual and bi-cultural training programs. HAFA and LEDC learned that to truly magnify the collective impact of a training program the curriculum and how the curriculum is delivered must be culturally appropriate, in-language, and delivered by a trainer that looks like the people he or she is training.The overarching goal of this project is to build thriving and sustainable farming operations, farmers and farming communities. For the Hmong and Latino farmers in Minnesota, this can be achieved by two secondary goals: Secondary Goal #1: Increase the ability of immigrant farmers to make a successful living from farming while respecting traditional methods and cultural practices:Many Hmong[1] immigrants in Minnesota are already involved in vegetable production, but most still operate at a subsistence level that is more accurately be characterized as "gardening" rather than farming (such production is characterized by working five or fewer acres and growing a wide variety of products for home use or maybe a single point of sale rather than specializing in particular products and selling to multiple buyers). Moreover, they earned less than mainstream Caucasian vegetable growers. Many of Minnesota's rural Latino residents already work in the food production industry and may even own land, but their jobs are typically low-wage work at kill plants or processing facilities rather than food production itself. Both groups face significant language and cultural barriers to mainstream farming and markets that go well beyond simply access to training classes.Objectives:Deliver two complete beginning farmer training programs per year each year for three years that build upon traditional immigrant farming culture and methodology while integrating mainstream agricultural concepts. One training curriculum will be in Spanish for Latino farmers and one in Hmong language for Hmong farmers. Each program will include 10-16 training sessions of 4-6 hours each, plus additional work in one-to-one and field settings. This will be a total of 75 training sessions or more over the grant period for beginning immigrant farmers.Deliver a specialized farm business training that begins with financial counseling from the Eastside Enterprise Center (EFC) which ascertains farmers' credit score, then moves to individualized business training and writing of a business plan with the assistance of farm business instructors from Ridgewater College, and saving money in an individual development account (IDA) managed by EFC staff, and ending with HAFA staff supporting the application for a microloan to be used for an asset purchase or the launch of a value added product. This will be a dynamic, yearlong curriculum.Develop 25 significant new intermediate training modules for graduates of the initial program focusing on additional ways to expand markets and build wealth. The new modules will include power points, worksheets and interactive activities and short videos that best deliver the lessons. For example some of the new modules may be on planting perennial crops and permaculture or planting sunflower for the specialty oil market.Train immigrant farmers or their children to become trainers in a comprehensive beginning farmer training program that is both linguistically and culturally tailored to immigrant farmers. These sessions will work closely with more academic experts but provide the immigrant trainers with confidence to deliver the modules themselves.Use ethnic media such as Hmong and Latino radio, newspapers and cultural networks such as clan meetings, church gatherings etc. to outreach to Hmong and Latino prospective farmers with information about culturally appropriate beginning farmer training for immigrant farmers.Secondary Goal #2: Expand economic opportunity for immigrant farmers through collaborative marketing and advanced business practices:Immigrant farmers in Minnesota generally work small plots of land producing a variety of vegetables. It is unlikely that at any time in the near future they will covert to large scale, mainstream commodity agriculture. To move beyond a subsistence living therefore, immigrant farmers will have to do three things: 1) work together in a cooperative arrangement to access economies of scale for sales and marketing, 2) explore value-added production opportunities to move beyond the simple selling of unprocessed inputs, and 3) enhance their business and production acumen to ensure their farm operations are as efficient and productive as can be.With the help of the previous BFRDP grant, Hmong farmers in Minnesota were able for the first time to move beyond selling at a farmers' market level, and sign contracts with a local school district, Head Start program, and several area groceries. Latino farmers forged relationships with local restaurants, and allied themselves with other small farmers for more efficient marketing. Both groups saw increased sales, and are enthusiastically awaiting more advanced courses to build on the momentum began with our first project.Objectives:Develop a training curriculum for navigating the value added rules and regulations in MinnesotaDevelop modules that deal with raising livestock and assessing new markets for proteinsWork with 50 advanced producers to test their ideas for value-added productsWork intensively with 25 farmers on a 1:1 basis to improve farm operations especially around food safety, whole farm planning and cost sharingIntroduce 150 aspiring farmers to the concept of cooperatives and the concrete benefits of working in a collaborative fashion.[1] The Hmong are an Asian ethnic group from the mountainous regions of Laos, Vietnam, China and Thailand. Minnesota has the second largest concentration of Hmong refugees in the U.S. and the largest per-capita.
Project Methods
Both HAFA and LEDC are at their base, social justice organizations that were started by and are led by members of their respective immigrant communities. Both organizations use an intensive organizing approach to work with their members and other farmers in the community to access land, equipment, capital, research and training so that the farmers can improve their farming operations, and thereby, lift themselves and their families out of poverty. There are other beginning farmer training programs that currently exist in Minnesota and the Twin Cities markets, but none of them have the linguistic and cultural competency, comprehension or capacity of HAFA and LEDC. For example, other organizations may hire a single immigrant staff member for the duration of a grant cycle, but both HAFA and LEDC have many, full time staff members who are bi-lingual, bi-cultural and experienced in farming. Other programs may organize conferences and offer 45 minute training sessions that draw a large number of attendees, but after the conferences, those organizations do not have the resources or programs to deepen or expand the learning. HAFA and LEDC have the experiences and direct connections to long term farmland access, value-added production and marketing opportunities, and relationships with financial entities offering microloans and other financial resources that immigrant farmers can use. Moreover, none of the other programs follow a cohort of farmers and their families literally for years the way HAFA and LEDC do, both inside the classrooms and on the fields, to make sure that their training programs have the desired result of ultimately benefiting low income, immigrant farmers.HAFA and LEDC's training programs are unique in the nation in a number of specific ways:They are the only beginning farmer training programs that have been conceptualized, written and delivered entirely by immigrant-led organizations;HAFA and LEDC are membership-based: They have a long-term relationship with their constituents and follow all of their training participants with active post-training support;Their curriculums are built upon existing traditional farming practices in the immigrant communities integrated with contemporary agricultural methodology;Their curriculums have a very strong business development component, conceptualized and delivered by an organization with a very strong track record in supporting successful immigrant entrepreneurship;They have the resources to link emerging immigrant farmers directly with value-added production and marketing opportunities upongraduation from our training;Their curriculums contain the added element of cooperative training to give small farmers more tools and opportunities to be successful through collaborative action.For HAFA and LEDC's trainings, they will assess and begin with what immigrant farmers already know, and build on that knowledge with what new knowledge can be added. The learning will be interactive, culturally presented and using relevant case studies. There will be a lot of interactions and one to one tutorials. HAFA and LEDC believe that such an approach yields a much higher rate of participation from minority farmers, a much higher rate of completion from those who do participate in the trainings, as well as a much higher rate of overall success as measured by the increase in farm income and family wealth for training graduates over the long term.