Farm & Food Care Saskatchewan was very pleased to lead the charge for Agriculture Month this October. Our #CelebrateAg Month theme year was #MealsFromtheFarm, which encouraged people to celebrate the great food produced by Saskatchewan farmers, highlighted meals shared out in the field at harvest time, and promoted sharing meals with others in the community.
On September 29, Farm & Food Care kicked off the #MealsFromtheFarm theme with a monetary donation and a tandoori chicken lunch at the Saskatoon Friendship Inn in partnership with the Chicken Farmers of Saskatchewan. We encouraged others to donate to local food banks and community kitchens so that more people could enjoy #MealsFromtheFarm.
FFC SK led a strong online campaign, sharing professional graphics freely through the industry and developing comprehensive social media communications for the month. It was great to see so many using the #MealsFromtheFarm and #CelebrateAg hashtags! Initial analysis shows social reach of more than 1 million with these two hashtags.
October is often associated with harvest time and all the activity around bringing the annual crop in. FFC SK prepared a promotional Ag Month video showcasing multiple generations on the Colborn farm coming together for a meal in the field at harvest time.
One of our main activities during Agriculture Month was our online photo contest. Almost 200 photos were entered this year—double last year’s entries—in the categories of farm scenes, farm faces, crops, farm animals, farm innovations, farm to plate, farm history and a meal from the farm. Our most popular photo category by far was ‘farm scenes’. Congratulations to Matthew Moberly on winning First Prize; Tim Oleksyn Second Prize and TeLeah Rosvold for winning the People’s Choice. You can view all the fantastic photo entries here: https://farmfoodcaresk.org/events-and-programs/ag-month/celebrateag-photo-contest-gallery/
We were also pleased to have considerable media interest in Ag Month this year. Media exposure for this year’s Agriculture Month campaign was over 1.7 million. FFC SK’s executive director Clinton Monchuk gave numerous interviews and spoke about celebrating agriculture and sharing with others. “We are very fortunate to produce such an abundance of food in this province,” Monchuk told PA Now.
Thanks to everyone who pitched in to #CelebrateAg and share #MealsFromtheFarm this October! A big part of Ag Month is all of us who love farming and food so much coming together to celebrate and share our passion with others.