Sign up now for the NOFA summer conference!

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The 46th annual NOFA Summer Conference starts on Monday, July 20th! Register now and enjoy more than 57 workshops with professionals representing the Northeast organic farming community.

Included in the lineup of presenters are Julie and Jack, who will lead a workshop on “Soil Carbon: Raising More, Better Food while Easing Climate Stress” on July 27th. Of this workshop, Julie says “A radical shift in our farming practices over the past 6 years has resulted in more and higher quality food, clamoring customers and farmer satisfaction. We’ll discuss the practices on our diversified animal, vegetable and fruit farm, all in the context of emerging scientific discovery about soil carbon”. Check out the workshop timing (and view the rest of the workshop lineup) at https://nofasummerconference.org/2020-workshops/

Full admission to live sessions as well as post conference access to the video recordings for *$100 (NOFA member price, $125 for non-members.) Or, you can purchase the video recordings only and view them after the conference for $50. Scholarships are available.

Read more and register here

Reaching Out Like a Tree: The Expanding Reach of NOFA/Mass Under Julie Rawson’s Stewardship over 36 Years

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By Caro Roszell, NOFA/Mass Education Director

“The roots of NOFA/Mass are sunk deep in the collective realization of a generation: that the institutionalized drive for domination and power is inimical to a peaceful and happy society. Formed in the 70s in the wake of the Vietnam war, the civil rights movement and the invention of dangerous chemicals used variously in warfare and in industrialized farming, NOFA was a envisioned as a space of mutual support, education and collaboration for those who sought to create farms and communities rooted in a more humble relation to natural systems.

From this fertile ground came many organizations, NOFA/Mass and her sister chapters being among them—that advanced a vision of a better world in which humanity takes natural systems for their guides and seeks a place within those systems; not as masters over them.

NOFA/Mass has grown over the decades since its incorporation, much like a tree—quickly upwards at first with a central core team of founders and volunteers, then spreading outwards into branches, as staff positions and programs were developed, and along the way forming seeds—initiatives that NOFA spawned but that fell from the tree to become fully their own organizations. All along, the heartwood of NOFA/Mass has been Julie Rawson.”

Read the entire article here.