Seminar to cover the basics of selling meat straight to consumers

A free seminar will help farmers understand how to sell and market their meat directly to consumers on Sept. 18 at the Ohio Agricultural Research and Development Center in Wooster.

“As more and more consumers choose to purchase meat products directly from farmers, a system of production, processing and distribution becomes important,” says noted chef Parker Bosley, one of the seminar’s organizers and a founder of Cleveland’s North Union Farmers Market.

The seminar will begin at 7 p.m. in the Research Services Building, Room 103, located on the OARDC campus, 1680 Madison Ave. Individuals should enter through the main entrance, turn left onto Payne Drive, and find the Research Services Building, a two-story brick building, immediately to the left.

Advance registration is requested and can be done by contacting Megan Shoenfelt at 330-202-3537 or shoenfelt.9@osu.edu .

Speaking will be Kathleen Harris, who started upstate New York’s Northeast Livestock Processing Service Company, a new and profitable link between farmers and meat processors; and Leah Miller of Ohio’s Small Farm Institute, an organizer of a project studying grass-based feeding strategies and high-value meat-cutting methods.

Harris, among other things, will talk about how farmers can plan their harvests and market their animals, how processors can schedule with farmers and understand consumers’ needs, and how both can educate consumers on the differences between local and non-local meat.

“Ohio: Our Farms, Our Food” — a program of Innovative Farmers of Ohio supported by funding from the Rural Rehabilitation Council of the Ohio Department of Agriculture — is the sponsor.

Agroecosystems Management Program, an OARDC interdisciplinary program aimed at creating sustainable agricultural systems, is serving as host.

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