Farms Not Arms

425 Farm Road, Suite 5
Summertown, TN 38483
931-964-2590


West Coast Office
PO Box 255
Petaluma, CA 94953
707-765-0196


info@farmsnotarms.org
As farmers, farm-workers and those in the agricultural industry who support them,
we come together to oppose the war in Iraq and the dangerous cycle of war and terror that threatens our world.
Farmers & Veterans Joining Coast to Coast for Healing
Positive News, January 2008

Early in September in New York City, Farms Not Arms (FNA), a project of Peace Roots Alliance, brought farmers and veterans and their families together to continue the Farmer-Veteran Coalition (FVC). The organization began this May in a meeting on Jim Cochran's farm in California as a politically neutral organization that will work to provide farm jobs, job training and land for participating veterans. These veterans who are already acquainted with hard work can be a great asset to our nation's food production.

Many veterans are returning to rural America where communities lack opportunities and jobs, while farms are lacking young people going into agriculture. Matt Mccue, a former Iraq veteran, spoke at the New York event. In Iraq he saw farmers passing through checkpoints to take their crops of watermelons or pomegranates to markets that continued to function despite the violence and chaos. "I realized there was a power in that," he said. He is now a Peace Corps Volunteer teaching agriculture in Africa.

The founder of Farms Not Arms, Michael
O'Gorman, who manages 1,500 acres of organic
farms, tells us, "Bringing FNA into being, like
starting a farm, is an ambitious undertaking.
...Today, agriculture is seeing tremendous changes.
We need to bring the focus back to individual and
family farms. At the same time we need to provide
a place for our veterans to come home to, to heal."
The FVC is working to make that happen.
Contact: Douglas Stevenson, Farms Not Arms
Tel: 931 964 2590
douglas@farmsnotarms.org
www.farmsnotarms.org
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