Nelida Martinez and Lizette Flores Mother and Daughter Owner and operators at the Viva Farms Incubator Mt. Vernon, WA
Our mission We strive to empower women in agriculture to achieve goals and manage risk through education, networking and technology. Purpose Women face unique challenges growing viable businesses in farming and ranching. They often are not taken as seriously as men when seeking loans and insurance, may feel unwelcome at predominantly men’s farming meetings, and often need off-farm income which requires working during the day and farming on evenings and weekends. This statewide program for women involved in agriculture, will provide risk-management and financial management education, and guidance in mitigating problems in running their businesses.
About the 2012 conference We had our first signature statewide conference event on February 11, 2012. Nearly 500 women across the state of Washington attended workshops as 16 different locations!
The format included two presentations via technology and local panel discussions at each location. The online presentations are linked to the Agenda tab at the left. Comments made by attendees are included.
We strove to:
Our 2013 conference will be delivered with the same format on February 23. If you are interested in getting on the email distribution, please email donna.rolen@wsu.edu.
Why a gender-specific program? Women learn differently than men: they like connecting with other women farmers and enjoy sharing resources. Their situations differ from those of men since they generally have responsibilities with children and their availability for classes is more limited. The number of women in agriculture grows every year — women are natural nurturers and are interested in providing the foods that people want and need. Thanks to the planning team:
Margaret A. Viebrock Conference Committee Chair, and WSU Douglas County Extension
Chris Bieker USDA Farm Service Agency Lorrie Conway Conway Family Farm Colleen Donovan WSU Small Farms Program Tanya Dostal Farm Service Agency Christina Harlow USDA, NASS Susan Kerr WSU Klickitat County Extension Candace Jagel WSU San Juan County Extension Lisa Kissing Kucek USDA NRCS
Wendy Knopp Northwest Farm Credit Services
Debra Hansen WSU Stevens County Extension Paulette Lefever Holbrook Lefever Holbrook Ranch
LInda McLean WSU Colville Reservation Extension Pat Munts WSU Spokane County Extension Marcy Ostrom WSU Small Farms Program
Leigh Newman-Bell Viva Farms Michel Ruud Chelan/Douglas FSA Diana Roberts WSU Spokane County Extension Janet Schmidt WSU Whitman County Extension
Sarita Schaffer WSU Skagit County Extension Jo Lynne Seufer USDA Risk Management Agency
