Farm & Food Care Ontario Launches 2014 Faces of Farming Calendar

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The ninth edition of an award winning calendar showcasing the photos and stories of 13 Ontario farmers and farm families was unveiled at a gala in Milton last night. The “Faces of Farming” calendar, featuring this year’s theme of Real Farmers with Real Heart, is produced annually to introduce the public to a few of Ontario’s passionate and hardworking farmers. The calendar is produced by Farm & Food Care Ontario.

From the Farm & Food Care press release:

With this year’s calendar, the stories of 114 Ontario farm families have now been featured within the calendar’s pages since it was first produced. The stories of all calendar participants since the project’s inception are now featured in a new website at www.facesoffarming.ca.

All of the calendar’s models are real, working farmers and hail from all parts of the province – from Windsor to the Ottawa Valley to Rainy River District in northern Ontario. As the calendar shows, there’s no such thing as a typical farmer. Their farms are as diverse as the individuals. They produce a variety of crops and livestock from strawberries, corn and soybeans to poultry, beef, milk, mink and pigs.

The artistic, black and white photos, taken by Kitchener photographer Terry Scott White, are compelling and appealing, as are the farmers’ stories which include:

•        Sarah Brien and Erin McLean who are turning to blogs and YouTube to talk about their sheep and berry farms;

•        Harry Eisses who has been egg farming since he was 15 – and his grandson Colton who started helping at the age of 4;

•        Dana and Adam Thatcher – winners of Ontario’s Outstanding Young Farmer competition;

•        Dairy farmer Kevin MacLean who invited his whole community to a Christmas party with his cows last year;

•        Pig farmer Scott Richmond who, with other Ontario farmers, is donating pork to provincial food banks;

•        Sisters Jennifer and Heather Peart who bought their first farm when they were only 20 and 18 years of age;

Again this year, a QR code found on each calendar page allows viewers to scan the bar codes from their mobile devices to “meet” the farmers. Each of the codes provides a direct link to short YouTube interviews with each participant.

The calendar is sponsored by many Ontario agribusinesses and commodity groups.

Copies of the calendar are available through the Farm & Food Care office in Guelph, by using the online order form at www.farmfoodcare.org or by calling 519-837-1326. A list of retailers is also available on the Farm & Food Care website.

Farm & Food Care is the first coalition of its type in Canada, bringing together tens of thousands of livestock, crop and horticulture farmers and related businesses with a mandate to provide credible information on food and farming in Ontario.

 Photo cutline: All of the calendar participants in the 2014 Faces of Farming calendar join the project’s creative team for a group photo at calendar launch. The launch was held at the Ontario Harvest Gala, hosted by the Farm & Food Care Foundation

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