Minnesota Department of Agriculture

2024 Retailer of the Year
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(Minnesota) — December 5, 2023 — Seven Minnesota grocers who promote locally grown and produced products have been named a 2024 Retailer of the Year by the Minnesota Department of Agriculture’s (MDA) Minnesota Grown program, in partnership with the Minnesota Grocers Association (MGA). This year’s winners include: Northwest: Hugo’s Family Marketplace, East Grand Forks Northeast: Chris’ Food Center, Sandstone West Central: Elden’s Fresh Foods, Alexandria Southwest: Mackenthun’s Fine Foods, Waconia Southeast: Nilssen’s Foods, Zumbrota Twin Cities: Kowalski’s Markets,

Truterra Sustainable Farming
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Eight Minnesota organizations receive over $550K in one-time funding (Minnesota) — November, 2023 — As part of a continued effort to strengthen support available to Minnesota’s emerging farmers, the Minnesota Department of Agriculture (MDA) has announced recipients of grant funding for organizations that provide business and technical support to farmers from historically underserved communities. Through the Emerging Farmer Technical Assistance Grant Program, eight organizations have received a total of $554,920

Meat Education and Training Grant
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(St Paul, MN) — December 8, 2022  —  A new grant opportunity from the Minnesota Department of Agriculture (MDA) helps Minnesota schools looking to establish or enhance meat cutting and butchery training for secondary students.   The Meat Education and Training (MEAT) Grant Program will award about $350,000 in onetime funding from the Minnesota Legislature to secondary career and technical education programs (public or private schools or school districts) to

Suicide Prevention Training
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(Brainerd/Mankato, MN) — August 31st, 2022 — The Minnesota Department of Agriculture (MDA) and Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) are teaming up to offer conferences on Suicide Prevention for Rural Faith Leaders in Brainerd on September 17, 2022 and in Mankato on September 29, 2022. Rural clergy and lay leaders of all faiths and denominations are welcome. “Suicide can be prevented, and help is available,” said Minnesota Commissioner of Health

Drought Relief
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(Minnesota) — August 27th, 2022 — Checks to Minnesota livestock farmers and specialty crop producers who applied for the Minnesota Department of Agriculture’s (MDA) 2021 Agricultural Drought Relief Program (ADRoP) will begin to be mailed. A total of 2,922 out of 3,000 received applications were approved, totaling $18.9 million in eligible requests. The total request was more than double the $8.1 million appropriated by the Legislature for ADRoP this spring.

School lunch
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(Washington, D.C.) –August 23, 2022 – The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) today announced it has signed a $3,458,752.00 cooperative agreement with Minnesota to increase their purchase of nutritious, local foods for school meal programs. Through the Local Food for Schools Cooperative Agreement Program (LFS), the Minnesota Department of Agriculture (MDA) will purchase and distribute local and regional foods and beverages for schools to serve children through

Minnesota Department of Agriculture
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(Minnesota) — June 2, 2022 — Minnesota Agriculture Commissioner Thom Petersen today released the annual list of top Minnesota dairy herds with low somatic cell counts (SCC). Somatic cell count is a key indicator of milk quality – a lower SCC count is better for cheese production and a longer shelf life for bottled milk. In honor of June Dairy Month, 114 Minnesota dairy farms are being recognized for superior

New Brighton Battle Buckthorn
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(New Brighton, MN)  — April 21st, 2022 — Starting the week of April 18, New Brighton will be hosting a small herd of goats at Creekview Park. The City of New Brighton was awarded a $5,000 grant through the Minnesota Department of Agriculture to help remove invasive Buckthorn from approximately ten acres of Creekview Park.  In order to accomplish this goal, the City will be using animals to tackle the

School lunch
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(Minnesota) — April 7th, 2022 — The Minnesota Department of Agriculture (MDA) recently awarded funding to schools across Minnesota for two new grants to increase the amount of healthy local foods in school meals through its Farm to School programs. Forty-six school districts across Minnesota received a total of $741,619 for purchasing Minnesota-grown and -raised foods to be used in school meal programs. This grant funding will leverage an additional $624,619