Youth Required
Panel looks at agriculture opportunities, future farming trends
SUNY Adirondack will hold a “Youth Required: Building a Healthy Food and Farming Community” panel discussion on May 16 on the Queensbury campus.
Set for 6 to 7:30 p.m. in Room 206 of Scoville Hall, the program will feature young people working in a variety of agricultural careers in New York state. The panelists will discuss their career paths, opportunities for starting farm or business, working for institutions or nonprofits and exploring future trends in agriculture.
Panelists include:
- Holly Rippon-Butler is land Access program director with the National Young Farmers Coalition. Rippon-Butler grew up on her family's third-generation dairy and beef farm in upstate New York, where she continues to farm with her parents.
- John-Paul Sliva, founder and farmer at Bard College Farm, is a Glens Falls native. Sliva has been instrumental in helping to start the Glens Falls Community Garden and the Red Hook Community Garden and also worked on the farm at the Farmhouse Restaurant in Lake George.
- Kate Ziehm, president of Morning Ag Clips, is a New Hampshire native who graduated in 1997 from Cornell University with a degree in Animal Science and a concentration in Business Management and Marketing. After graduation, Ziehm worked for Cargill as a dairy nutritionist. She currently lives in Greenwich, where she grows pumpkins and has a small herd of alpacas.
- Leah Hennessy of Moxie Ridge Farm and Creamery moved back to upstate New York in 2014 to start a goat farm after spending eight years in Los Angeles in a career that spanned Hollywood, wine and online media. In 2014, her growing love of agriculture and passion for small food systems brought her back to New York with the secret dream of starting a goat farm. The farm opened in Spring 2017.
- Michael Palulis of Echo Creek Farm in Salem grows Certified Organic vegetables that can be acquired at local farmers markets, wholesale or through the Harvest Share CSA Program. Palulis has worked extensively in the restaurant industry and has had his own restaurant, The Sushi Bar, at Stratton Mountain.
Kimberly Feeney London will serve as moderator. London is an adjunct lecturer of business at SUNY Adirondack and will teach a new Experience Agriculture course this fall. London has been a farmer and farm-to-table restaurant pioneer in this area since 2006. She is involved in several agricultural non-profits and has a master’s degree in Food Policy and Applied Nutrition from Tufts University.
