the purple carrot: Farm Aid 2011: Kickoff

Finally, Farm Aid recap time!

It was killing me (okay, okay, that choice of words may be a tad strong, but really, it was hard to wait!) that I couldn’t blog about it right away! If only my full-time job was to blog, tweet, look at Pinterest, take photos, and experiment in the kitchen all day … then I suspect I would have had to time to blog about Farm Aid a bit sooner, eh? A girl can dream.

But alas, this weekend my job that makes the money beckoned and I was forced to answer the call. If someone wants to pay me full time to blog, you’re more than welcome. Just saying …

Enough of that, let’s jump right in! We have to start with Friday night … the Farm Aid kickoff party.

Farm Aid Kickoff

On Friday evening, we went to the LIVSTRONG sporting complex to pick up our media credentials and scope everything out.

What is Farm Aid?

Farm Aid is a nonprofit organization whose mission is to keep family farmers on their land in order to guarantee an agricultural system that ensures farmers a fair living, strengthens our communities, protects our natural resources and delivers good food for all.

First off, some background:

Farm Aid was inspired during the mid 1980s when American farmer’s found themselves overloaded with debts which were forcing tens and thousands of family farms off their land.
In 1985, Willie Nelson heard a remark by Bob Dillon that something should be done for our fellow farmers here in America and he agreed. Joined by Neil Young and John Mellencamp, Nelson produced a special concert with the sole purpose of raising funds for farmers, making people aware of struggling farmers.
It was then that Farm Aid was born. The first concert raised more than $9 million.

Farm Aid through the years:

Still dealing with economic hardships of the 1980s, family farms were them confronted with a new threat of factory farms, making their struggle with debt even worse.
The rise of factory farms not only was an assault against family farmers, but also a serious threat to all Americans who valued quality, healthy food and a clean environment.
Farm Aid began to fund efforts to stop factory farm expansions

To this day, annual Farm Aid concerts are still being put on by board members Willie Nelson, Neil Young, John Mellencamp and Dave Matthews, accomplishing their mission by:

Promoting Food from Family Farms
Growing the Good Food Movement
Helping Farmers Thrive
Taking Action to Change the System

Love it! The Farm Aid kick off on Friday night consisted of local bands, HOMEGROWN concessions, a farmers market with fresh, local farms and many exhibits from related groups in the Kansas City area.

We had an Australian couch surfer staying with us this weekend who came through Kansas City to attend Farm Aid. Thus, it seemed obligatory to take pictures next to “Veggie Willie”.

Kick Off Dinner

After walking around the booths and getting to know Veggie Willie a little bit we checked out a dinner they were having full of delicious looking foods.