CFAC sees a future where houses, farms, and ranches thrive together; people are well-fed and food secure; family farms are supported within a community food system; and beginning farmers and ranchers can access agricultural land to feed the rest of us.

To get there, here’s an outline of CFAC’s strategy:

• Grow markets for local foods. Western Montana is gobbling up locally produced food in schools, universities, restaurants, farmers’ markets, and grocery stores. CFAC has been working to create new markets and ensure fresh, local food is accessible to families of all income levels. Our programs include: Farm to School, EBT (food stamps at farmers’ markets), and Buy Fresh Buy Local (restaurant initiative). What we’ve learned is that the market’s appetite for locally produced food often exceeds the supply, creating new business opportunities for agricultural enterprises.

• Develop farm and ranchland conservation strategies with these goals in mind:

1. Comprehensively protect the agricultural lands that are most viable for farming & ranching.
2. Provide predictability to developers, planners, policy makers, and residents.
3. Facilitate producers’ access to agricultural land.
4. Respect the interests of agricultural landowners and the equity built in their land.

• Help beginning farmers and ranchers get started. While we protect agricultural land, we need to ensure that producers can access it. Land Link Montana is a farm and ranch transfer program that CFAC is piloting to help aspiring producers find suitable land and establish viable tenure arrangements. Visit us at www.landlinkmontana.org.