"small farm summer: marketing iowa's local farms to their neighbors" is an annual open house series that will invite the public to visit and interact with table food farms in their rural communities

The Sustainable Iowa Land Trust (SILT) was awarded a $225,773.37 Project Grant from the United States Department of Agriculture Agricultural Marketing Service under the Farmers Market and Local Food Promotion Program (FMLFPP).

The grant will fund SILT's "Small Farm Summer: Marketing Iowa's Local Farms to Their Neighbors" program, an annual open house series taking place over three summers from September 2021 through September 2024. The program aims to increase sales and educate the public about small and medium-sized farms in Iowa through open house events featuring farm tours, cooking demonstrations highlighting local products, and on-site sales. By deepening relationships between Iowa farmers and consumers, the program seeks to develop sustainable local food systems and support the next generation of farmers.

The purpose is to highlight and increase sales at retail farms while educating the public about the current realities that small farms face, including how land use determines local food security, and how distance-to-market affects the bottom line. Many rural iowans DON't even know that a table food farm exists in their area, no less that land debt determines so much of a farmer's choices. Yet, as such farms and their markets grow, silt is making land affordable to beginning table food farmers while preserving IT for generations to come. Across three summers of "small farm summer" open house events, thousands of people will visit iowa's small- and medium-sized farms to enjoy a farm tour. As they listen to music, engage with a cooking tutorial that highlights farm products, and peruse farm productsfor sale, visitors will also receive information about the value of preserving direct-to-consumer farms on iowa's landscape. By deepening their relationships with iowa's small farms, more iowans will be likely to adopt local food-buying habits and become repeat customers at silt farms, contributing to a more sustainable future of food.